Kitchen Counter wisdom!

Couldn’t help putting them down anyway..Have a read..smile and move on :)..

I started my cooking lessons early into middle school. I was amma’s sous chef doing all the chopping, peeling..and then she taught me the first practical lesson on ratios and proportions when I made a classic “kanji” (porridge)…when asked to cook some rice on a day she was unwell. Appa stirred in some pickle into it and literally drank the overcooked rice that evening. Amma always used visual estimates and not measuring cups and I blamed that for my culinary accident. Well, let’s say, from then the kitchen wisdom helped my math. Let’s also say my initial mysore pak attempts have been valuable contributions to structural engineering. And that Wrigley's signed an undeclared contract after a specimen of my halwa. So you are catching my drift with this right!….Cooking wasn’t the first of my passions or talents…But oh hell, so what… But from then to now, I have grown and graduated into a pretty good cook. …..I can’t still think of spending too much time in the kitchen if I am by myself. It feels like a chore. But cooking is something I have started enjoying lot more after having a family of my own. And that the family also enjoyed the cooking helped.

I am blessed with a picky eater like many other moms. He nibbles his way around things like a little squirrel and I end up experimenting in the kitchen to please my nearly 3 ft tall food critic. While at it, the kitchen counter has also been a place of learning life’s lessons…so to say, if u coexist with the tomatoes, onions, bell peppers and eggplants, get thrown into dishes, get swirled around in soups…it’s a little journey of learning, cooking and eating..:)..Hence presenting my Kitchen counter wisdom…

1. All elements have to go in ..the sweet, salty, the sour, the spicy ..But that’s what makes the soup flavorful.

We tend to hold on to the perception that life will get to a point of feeling all settled in and then we can then make the best of the time ….There shall be little problems, little things constantly throwing off the picture from the perfect setting. But in them is the learning and the experience. Life needs a little bit of everything for us to appreciate or cherish the good moments.

2. If you didn’t wait for the mustard to crackle, you are going to bite into a bitter seed.

Ever had a spoonful of a perfectly good dish, just to bite into a bitter mustard seed? Hot oil makes the mustard crackle, but once it’s crackled it seasons the dish. Sometimes you need to wait and get to hear the complaints, grievances and the crackling, because getting them out is better in the longer run.

3. Patience goes a long way.

Ever tried cooking for a party in a hurry and ended up spending more time fixing the dish than u did making it in the first place. Sometimes a little patience takes u farther and to a better place.

4. If there is too less salt, add it …If there is too much salt, don’t fret …use a potato to soak it all away

There are always solutions. More salt is always a more difficult situation than less…but there are still solutions. They may just not be obvious!!

5. A little lemon on the onion helps u tear up less.

I cry buckets while chopping onions…For those of u that don’t know, Bed Bath & Beyond carries ‘Onion Goggles’ which B bought for me to preserve his marital vows of not seeing me tear up!! But this little tip went a step further in holding the dam together. There is always a softer way to deliver a hard message. There are ways to retain the value of the message but reduce its acidity.

6. Dishes that tend to be sticky need to be stirred often. Else they’ll either burn or get lumpy

Some issues are sticky and complicated and our impulse leads us to avoid thinking about them purely because we are not sure how to fix them. When in reality all they need a little more attention and patience.

7. Baking makes the fruits sweeter.

Like baking brings out the flavor in several things, some experiences make u better, stronger and bring out your core qualities…Even the not so sweet blueberries taste sweeter when baked.

8. It's OK to start over again.

Sometimes over correcting a dish beyond a point does not fix it but makes it a bigger disaster. A mistake is a mistake. Acknowledge and start over again.

9. Perseverance pays off

From carving out continents on atta and seriously contemplating starting an Organic Frisbee business, I have come a long long way in these years and have improved my chappati’s in shape and texture.. I still hold my breath as it beautifully puffs up and bend down in curtsy. Like anything, some aspects of cooking need some perseverance if u don’t have the natural talent.

10. Forget the bad dish, don’t forget the lesson

The household kitchen table is a learning ground…a place of mistakes and lessons… a place to grow up. You are not expected to be perfect all the time. So make mistakes, forget the bad dish, but hold onto the learning.

11. End with a desert.

End with a positive thought…end a fight with a hug….A little sweetness in the end makes the whole meal worthwhile.

And lastly….

12. Murphy enters ur kitchen on the day you have invited a lot of people over for lunch

No comments on this!!

If u stayed with me through this, Thanks for reading…:)!

Stress Busters...

All of us have a degree of stress and our own ways to handle them…Sharing some of mine…

1. Turn on the humidifier with Menthol vapors…Even if u don’t have a cold or sinus…warm mist and menthol vapors have a tendency to calm u down

2. Maggi noodles… not the thousand variations of flavors, just the plain good old Maggi masala noodles.

3. Cuddling with my lil boy and tickling him into a giggle…its immensely relaxing

4. Listening to my favorite instrumental themes

5. Chocolate glazed Donuts ….Dark Chocolate too..

6. The tranquil mint Stress Relief lotion on my hands

7. Presence of the ocean….Sound of the ocean…if nothing else, at least ocean sounds from a sound machine

8. Music…gentle or peppy but definitely not sad…

9. Fresh cool breeze on the face…

10. A long drive …with no destination in mind…

11. Looking at photographs…

12. Talking to my favorite people..

So why suddenly….

I have been so stressed of late……There’s so much up in the air and a sense of helplessness and inability to either fix them or let go. Time is the key a friend tells me…U just have to wait something out. I understand that its true…but that’s the hardest part…how long is long ?....Have I or have I not waited long enough…? its getting hard to say that clearly..

At the bottom of it, one of the important ways to stay less stressed is to be flexible and mindful of the fact that a lot of things will not turn out the way you want for them to turn out.

The small joys!

Sometimes we are so self-absorbed in the big things and big goals that the little ones get forgotten...This week I had a gentle reminder to slow down. A reminder that didn’t come in a form I expected or desired. But in hearing something terrible happen to someone else. A single moment changes the course of life and life doesn’t always provide for a life jackets and parachutes to help u land safely. A single moment helps us realize how frivolous and superficial most aspects of our lives are and to focus on what really matters.

The little moments in life bring u the happiness. Not the big expensive vacations, not the big gifts...the little moments stay with you forever. The one moment of happiness is that anchor to providing the strength to withstand everything life has to offer.

May we learn to appreciate those moments and cherish them.

The morning cup of sunshine!

Woke up late…my alarm aka phone was completely out of charge…Opened the fridge to see that I ran out of milk. There was a tad bit just enough for Abhi when he wakes up…and I had a 9AM meeting which means I had just about time to shower, buy milk and drop it off at home and rush. And I was completely zoned out and out of energy. Abhi woke up in the middle of the night and insisted that he would only sleep on my shoulder and only with me walking up and down for the next 3 hours. And I have a boot up problem, without my morning coffee my brain won’t start.

And to add to this, I had to wash and dry my hair as well. Not that I have these long enviable tresses that demand lots of attention….But that day, I looked like I had dunked my head into Ali-Baba’s oil pot thanks to Amma’s long advise on skype the previous evening. So I had to wash it….And when I wash it on such a day and dry it in a hurry, I look like freshly electrocuted or something. (I apologize for the very disturbing image!!). Abhi woke up just in time to add to the chaos and I was warming up his milk and couldn’t find my scrunchie or clip to tie up the storm on my head. I quickly grabbed what I got from over the dryer and tied it. (I shall tell u “what” very soon, and also keep in mind; this is not how I get ready for work every day!!!)

The ice skin on my windshield was the next battle. The glacial pace at which this was melting and the poetry surrounding it didn’t help my BP. That I succumbed to the temptation of parking right in front of my apartment instead of the covered carport was biting me back. I am normally a friendly person, but I think I almost barked a quick bye in response to a surprised neighbor’s pleasantries. She is possibly not going to talk to me in the near future!

I was then standing at the Whole Foods counter when the cashier checked out my milk with a broad grin ….I just thought he was a pleasant guy having a great start to the day, unlike me of course!! This was till he blurted out in a half-giggle “Do u have a socks on ur head???”…Aww, great…that was what I grabbed..i thought it was one of those thin scarves!! And this pleasant cashier was having a great start to that day thanks to me!! Silver Lining: At least I didn’t walk into a conference room full of people with a stocking on my hair.

Then I found parking in the next zip code I think …and scrambled down checking the meeting room while my phone was breathing its last on the one drop of charge that I managed to squeeze into it that morning.

I paced myself through the meeting trying to sound half intelligent. As I mentioned, I have some start up trouble without the early morning fuel. My colleague had a candid and not to mention “timely and appropriate” sense of humor, “Do u want a hat?” he asked!! No, I actually preferred a bucket, so that I could hide my face as well.

Dashed to the coffee machine right after that to find it out of order…..Made do with chai instead.

I also made some interesting and far from happy discoveries through the day. That all the stuff I ran the last evening had to be re-done because it was not the correct setup. And everything either refused to work or worked when it wasn’t supposed to. It seemed all my little failures were lining up in front of me.

After a friend pointed out, I realized Abhi had left in some of his “pappu-mammu and beans ka” paw marks from the last evening on my fleece jacket. For those who don’t know ….turmeric is one of the stubborn stains to remove….Not wanting to look like someone homeless and also not wanting to reveal intricate details of my son’s dinner to my work world, I took off the fleece jacket…and roamed around like it was mid-summer. Only that it didn’t feel like mid-summer.

I checked my email; one of my close friends chose this day to tell me how angry she was at me for not returning her calls. Felt downright miserable by now. I wanted to get the stuff out of the way and the day out of the way. It was gloomy and pouring outside and all I wanted to do was finish my work and hide in the closet.

B’s email with a gentlest of reminders on two things I needed to finish was replied in a snap with an ‘I am stressed, the world is on my shoulder’ type of response …enough to make him retract and go “its Ok, its Ok, it’s not important. Take care of the other stuff”…I wish I could pull that off with everyone else ;) ;)

Having a dozen to-do’s and follow ups to catch up on, I finished what I could and drove home. It was like having an giant octopus sitting on my head pointing in all possible directions. Abhi was well rested and ready to greet me onto my second job.

My recipe for a bad day was to lounge down for some sitcom therapy…with our TV boxed up for close to two years now (I record that as an achievement!) that wasn’t possible. Abhi’s annoying fascination with replaying talking tom’s version of chammak challo non stop was not helping. Not that I like the original, but the cats version of it is pure unadulterated torture!! He then tore up the dosa I made for him into a million pieces, rolled them into tiny balls and lined them up against the wall. My energizer bunny also wanted to climb all over the sofa and dive down. After some long drawn chasing and feeding I was finally done with his dinner, and I settled down…

I wanted to cheer myself up. Buzzed some of my favorite people and most of them were busy or unavailable. Finally just as I was about to close shop and crash when my friend buzzed back.

X: Hey, u OK?

Me: Nope, I am down in the gutter, make me smile.

X: make u smile or make u laugh?

Me: Is that a choice??? Make me die laughing!!

In the next 15 minutes, I smiled, giggled, laughed…and the day seemed OK…a little bad, but far from how I felt a little while back…The baggage on my head felt a little lighter…Thank God for the internet and my friendly angels!!

Surprisingly Abhi slept like a baby that night….a real baby that is! I caught up with my sleep and the next day was definitely a better one.

Moral of the story: Don’t miss ur sleep, if u have no choice on that, don’t miss ur morning coffee!

Never mind the elephant, let’s just talk...

Two is a company, three is a crowd…especially when the third person is a huge elephant sitting by your side and cramming into your conversation uninvited. You are jammed into a corner deprived of space, and obviously uncomfortable to be your natural self and yet have to appear completely oblivious to the huge companion because no one else sees him. Or they don’t want to admit they know he is there.


Sometimes, do u worry about how the very obvious things are ignored or set aside and people talk as if they came out of a bubble in space with no memory whatsoever of anything that happened earlier. The mammal weighs its way into the conversation or discussion and is flat out ignored.


What’s prompting me to write this is more of inter-personal situations where sometimes there is reluctance to address things explicitly, clear the tables when needed, and have the conversations that need to be had.


Wish life was like movies… the way movies end…a dozen happy faces, all good people prevail, all loopholes closed, all questions answered, all issues settled, there is bliss and the hope of continued bliss and “The End” flashes in front of it… well, unless there is a sequel and the tiny hint they throw at u…No matter how clichéd that sounds, we have no open ends gnawing into our mind..


Truth is things aren’t so and without a worried director to close things and explain the unexplained for us…we need to do it ourselves…set things straight…Some questions will never get asked and some will never get answered.


What then stops us from having an honest conversation…and not beat all around the bush hoping to rattle a poor bird when the elephant is still sitting by our side with a smile? What makes us ignore him….Fear to deal with issues sometimes leading to the denial of their existence. Or ego wherein we know they exist, we know they must be addressed, but it hurts our ego to be making that explicit effort for whatever reason.


The problems that I see existing in such communication are…


Pretending that a problem doesn’t exist when it does…This is not helping anyone. Problems just don’t go away or resolve themselves. Inaction is not a solution though it’s often an easier option. The perception that there is no real necessity to fix something that’s not totally broken and need driven band aids can help keep things together needs to change.


Subtlety is a bigger devil than inaction. A conversation with subtexts hints at something, but these hints are perceived differently by different people and can be completely and totally misinterpreted. With people we love, we push ego’s aside and reach out to resolve the differences, we reach out in case they don’t and we explain till they understand. The underlying value of the relationship is much more than the assumed correctness of our opinion. But in relationships where that trust and understanding remains to be established, the challenges come in, ego plays a bigger role and things are further muddied by subtlety. A complex implied and subtle communication with subtexts flying around needs to be correctly interpreted and addressed.


Don’t let the elephant stay in for too long….he then becomes like family…its harder to show him the door. He’s now become so much a part of the conversation that we feel downright guilty to even get rid of him.


Our huge companions need an audience. We have a small room and the only way they are going out and giving us back the space is if they are addressed. Be it professional or personal conversations, sad attention seeking elephants in the room cannot help us move ahead or decide anything sensibly.


So the next time there is an elephant in the room, in the conversation…show him some respect…Address him if u need to set things straight.

Aeeeeiooooo !!!!

Right after college with a lot of time to spare, I found myself getting a membership to British Council…The pretext and intent was to browse for grad school info, SOP tips, resume tips and also have some step-out-of-home time.. I would come down there every day, hang in till around lunch and then get back home….Not completely sure of what my purpose was but to kill time…That’s where I met M……M brought her 5 yr old son Vinay every day and studied while he got busy with his books. A cute little child with a wink and a naughty smile ....his little eyes spoke for themselves, he was a handful. As adorable as I found him, I now understand why M was so exasperated. Being a mom is always different. Vinu’s company was the most welcome distraction for me and M was always more than relieved to see me. So it worked both ways. My British Council visits increased for no technical reason whatsoever. I just enjoyed being there. It was a bubble to escape into, distract me from what’s ahead in my own life and my own little confusions….

A month of these library trysts later, Vinay and I are busy picking the next story book to read...when suddenly Vinay says “I love you”…My jaw drops and I am looking at the cutest being ever that has said that to me …and he smiled and continued with his books....so matter of fact like nothing just happened :)!! Guys..i tell u…even these tiny ones have no idea of how they let ur heart flutter :)…M’s parents came to Chennai to help her out in the next few months, her British council visits stopped…and I lost interest in going to the library myself…

It’s been several years …I email M once in a while and she has managed to set herself on a great career……and Vinu has forgotten me and moved on to the real things in life …And I miss those times….those library visits.. :D!....But isn’t that life !!

The last couple of weeks have been pensive, thoughtful and difficult for several reasons…The one person I can call anytime and bother has also been busy with his studies….and I have busied myself with sketching…..to escape into a bubble again…

Then on Monday, my nanny called in sick and I had a super active toddler with a cold, lots of work to finish and not the best of spirits to handle. One at a time …one at a time …I tell myself as I finish work, chase him down for each meal, put him to sleep, reply to emails, finish the action items….and I felt overwhelmed…

Towards late evening he was tired, I was tired …All the skype calls for the day were over…We settle in quietly and talking tom gives us company…One thing leads to another and Abhi and I are on a giggle train…I am hugging him, swinging him, kissing him ..and I said “I love uuuuu”…and we chase each other around the couch for the next 5 minutes. Then suddenly Abhi is looking at me with his sweet few toothed grin and says…”Aeeeeiooooo”…It was the most beautiful moment….Most endearing…

My lil son just told me his first “I love you”…i think :) ..Dear dear crazy world, I am ready for you again!!

Tech-plosion!

Have you grown up feeling annoyed when your grandparents or parents comment on how things were in those days as opposed to now? Many a day have I gotten mad at my mom for making an ‘unjust’ comparison of things when she started out as “andha kaaluthala” (translated to: in those years).

But…………………………….

Is it just me or did we just explode into a new universe…

Reminiscing through my childhood, didn’t we look forward to the Disney cartoons on Sunday morning and weren’t we excited when TV opened up He-Man, Shazam, Glo worms and Tom&Jerry. Giant Robot was the coolest thing ever and StreetHawk was super uber-cool. Cable TV was strictly prohibited till we got into college. So I did live off Doordarshan and Channel 2 was by itself a bonus. Chitrahaar and Super Hit Muquabla was our music destination and our cassette collection was the treasured hobby. Now we are bombarded with a plethora of options, 24 hour cartoon channels, unlimited music downloads, online, streaming blah blah blah..and we need google and bing to help us through the options. We have tons of remotes to keep track of and tons of buttons in them that justify an extra thick manual. BTW, everything comes with a manual these days, even my son’s toy telephone. When Abhi was born, B commented on how a ‘user-guide’ would be handy. That’s us geeky confused new parents for you folks! Anyways I digress….Technology rubs on everyone.. My mom was super thrilled to watch her Zee soaps on DVR where she could rewind and hear the dialogues without missing them. B’s ears were up in smoke as he lost out his ‘24’ slot to the re-runs of ‘Pavitra Rishta’ but nevertheless. Technology has its pros and cons :)!!

My first home computer which was seen as an extravagant purchase by a seemingly money-indifferent younger generation justified only and only by the fact it was being used for my GRE preparation. Having a 20GB Pentium 2 processor was a huge step (BTW, I think the P2 had the shortest life span in the market and was the in-thing at that narrow moment of time). I had to make sure a technical looking screen was always up and my skills at Alt-Tab were good to make sure my dad was convinced that the computer was being put to ‘good use’. We also had rationed hours on the computer. ”Romba use panna kettu poidum” (Loosely translated: It will go bad if used for too long). Same was stated for the telephone. I would place my electronics and communications books and swear on the education I received that the telephone wouldn’t wear out with longer hours of talking..:)..No..i am just kidding, my parents knew that, it was more of discipline thing for them. My friends knew these and stuck to me in thick and thin even with no talking :D.I love you all :D! Anyways I won’t generalize. I was brought up in a stricter home with more rules than average. …But in hindsight, I would have a liked a cell phone then, it would have certainly been handy :)…but those were ‘those days’.

I didn’t have my first cell phone till I started looking for jobs in grad school. Bought one of those free after rebate ‘bricks’ which btw has stood the test of time …Brick it is ..solid and strong even now..Drop it, dunk it in water..it still works ;)! I educated myself on the coolness of Iphones and ‘smart’phones from the younger kids back home when I visited India.

Much as I was aware of a constant generational shift, my prof in grad school once calls me home for dinner and in a conversation with his wife, I slip on my own ice. She told me she didn’t have a cell phone even then and I opened my mouth wide enough for the world to be seen and quipped “what would you do if you car breaks down in a highway, how do u manage without a cell phone”. “How did we manage, all these years, when there were no cell phones?” she quipped, jamming my mouth shut and went to explain those blue pillars that I never bothered to look closely were call phones on the highway.

Tech Industry creates luxuries, makes us believe that we can’t live without them and eventually we all need them. Oh yes, they make life a lot simpler for us. Being right in the tech world, I support their noble objective “Necessity is not the mother of invention…Invention is the grandmother of necessity”. All of us have fallen in love with the change. B handed the Iphone to an endlessly-crying son as a new dad and looked up and said “God bless Technology” when that calmed him down instantly.

Yes, God bless technology indeed. I couldn’t have imagined so much information being available right in my lap in my early school years. I went over endless magazines collecting info and scrapbooking aspiring to be an interior designer some day. Well, that didn’t happen, but I can’t imagine submitting even a half decent thesis if it involved tearing down a library searching for information instead of googling it.

This information explosion also results in greater awareness as the generations’ progress and greater comfort with the increased awareness. Which may be good or bad..i don’t know! Right out of a college…I went to a particularly queasy movie with my friend, her sister and her sister’s college friends. I ended up watching the movie feeling more uneasy and squeamish than the kid sister and her friends all 4-5 years younger than me. I also realized these kids were way smarter than I was at their age. They all planned their future much more than I did and understood the choices in front of them. Thanks to the wealth of information available right in front of them, they didn’t jump and hope to land on their feet :)! Anyways we never stop learning, even if it’s from people younger than us!!!
In our parent’s eyes, we also sometimes fell as overconfident, confused kids with an attitude. My dad was a bit confused when two colleagues of mine from an Indian company where I briefly worked came home and discussed in detail on the x-figure salary that they so much deserved 6 months after college. To him, it took years to get there…’Appa, its all bcos of conversion currency, Suddenly our salaries look to have scaled much more’ I mention, as he pulls me aside. Anyways, I do think our perceptions have gotten modified a bit too in the process and our parents do find us insensitive to their spending habits. When parents come over and quiz you on how much you pay for produce (not as a whole, each one of them I mean), it threw light on my ignorance. It’s a card driven world, so much that it’s impossible to find a single men’s wallet that has room for change.

I love how dads and grand-dads have upgraded themselves to Mac and get into the Mac-PC debates. The Kindled grand-dads reading ‘Ponniyin Selvan’ off their recent handheld reader win my admiration. They have transitioned gracefully into this whole new cyber driven world. What could be more classic than the grocer (read maligai kadai karan) next to my home promoting his new online website for door-delivery and how I can go on a ‘church-engine’ to find it!! Honestly, I was more amazed than amused. But that’s a classic exhibit of how far we have come.

My son has held an Iphone since he was 3 months old. He has since then used it as a teether, a white noise machine, a music system, he has made calls to several people (including Amex and a recent one to my boss) and he has figured his way around with the apps… and I wonder if I am going to tell him a story one day “Once upon a time, when there was no internet….”..There shall be times when I am appalled at what he says and have the urge to go “Andha kaalathula….”

Amma shall be laughing out loud somewhere in my head when I do so!! Life comes a full circle!

Ahh Damn!!! I am growing old :(!

Wo’Me’n and Machines!

Machines and I have had a love-hate relationship. I love how they run my life making it so much easier for me. I hate feeling helpless when they let me down. My friend and I once tried to repair a wet grinder, the motivation being home-made-dosas-on-a-budget. We ended up with a couple of bruises and scratches plus a dented grinder. Not to mention the urad dal missiles that fired around while testing it. I keep writing a note to self “Don’t even try things you are not good at” …but again, maybe I should get it tattooed in my hand or something, so that I remember.

Is this something fundamental in women…or is it just me :)…No offense at all, if you are one of those girls that figured these things out, I downright admire you, want to be you…it’s just probably going to take me more than just effort to get there. I initially got admitted into Mechanical Engineering…And am thanking the heavens that I switched into Electronics eventually. Would I have failed as a mechanical engineer, or would I have battled and survived it is one of those questions that will never get answered. I was never the girly-girl sorts who can’t stand a little grease on their hands. I think most girls with a brother don’t end up being that. I wasn’t the tomboy types either. I can hold a spanner or a hammer and even do a decent job with some assembly stuff…But there it ends…When it comes to actual machines, vehicles I have a brain-freeze. My problem hasn’t been so much with my outlook to doing these things as much as it’s about my ability to do it. Hence it’s my perception that there is some built in gender superiority when it comes to having the “iron-thumb” as I call it.

My dad is an engineer and he is one of the most hands on person that I know. Though a mechanical engineer by profession, he would try to fix every electrical and even electronic issue we had at home. I grew up helping him fix fans, fix the bore well, even try fixing the TV and spent hours listening to him talk about engines. Lots of times, it would whoosh over my head, but I would just listen. When he served at the IAF, he made sure that the fighter jets and helicopters were cleared for flying. He looks at the stuff that I do, and he thinks it’s cool..I think what he did was far cooler, interesting and challenging.

My brother got those genes…I missed them. My brother and I opened up the tape recorder as kids. After putting it back together, he slipped the seemingly “extra screws and random stuff” into his pocket. I would eye that tape recorder suspiciously after that wondering when it would break. He would always be so confident that it will still work while I was amazed it was still working. It’s all perspective I think.

My son has got his grand-dad’s genes for sure. I was busy fixing the shelves at home and he sprinted and grabbed the pencil lying on the floor and stuffed it into every hole in the wooden plank and started turning it around. He seemed to enjoy it so much! Grand-dad will be so proud!

As for me, I think that part of my brain didn’t develop much. I worked in a university fab with these huge furnaces and stations and would feel so insecure when something broke down. My Russian friend and lab mate used to say “Priya, just learn how to pull apart a car and put it together, you will learn anything”…I was totally awed and intimidated..Again this was not a guy who said that to sound cool. I have actually seen him work with his old car and with the furnaces that broke down in the lab. I would most intently slurp into my coke in the hope of catching a few extra minutes to think anything even remotely intelligent to say when he asked me questions as we(he) fixed the things.

So why suddenly am I thinking about this…. I was talking to my neighbor and he is thinking of buying a plane. OK, not even just that. “You can get a kit for a single seater private plane for 20 grand and you can build it”...he tells me. My mouth still wide open…, “Where will you park it” I ask like a meek kid. “At the Hangar of course”, he quips and I feel silly for even asking. I just couldn’t resist having the mental image of my accord parked next to a plane :) !! And he is taking pilot training now. And he is that absolutely down to earth and simple software engineer who is pursuing his passion. I instantly admired him for that. Fixing a plane from a kit….really!!!! ..And having the guts to sit inside it and fly it requires both competence and confidence.

After that conversation, I went home inspired to fix Abhi’s orange-berry toy. He loved it till it worked and now sits by it and presses the buttons hoping to hear something. I feel sad for him. If my neighbor can build a plane, I can repair Abhi’s toy. I will start with small baby steps and one day will get better :) ! So I get to it. Brought my tool kit and readied myself for the project…

B always tells me I pull a bazooka at a mosquito..He says that for different reasons. But now it sounded so appropriate. Huge tools, little toy, focused mom, anxious son, amused grand-dad.

After 2 hours of meddling around..with constant running commentary from appa of-course..Abhi came and patted the toy gently and sympathetically, pressed its buttons and looked at me…the verdict was out…

I try not to fall bang in the middle of such clichés but honestly for me, it’s like having two left feet and trying to dance. Pulled out my scribble pad from the handbag and started writing “To buy: Onions, cilantro, milk, new blackberry toy for Abhi!!”

Every artichoke has a tender heart

I have never had an artichoke till now..At the grocers, I have looked at it and wondered what to even make of it and put it back right where it belonged…the shelves. I don’t know of any Indian cooking that uses it..I am no expert..but having seen both my mom and my mom-in-law giving it a suspicious stare, I am sure they weren’t acquainted either..

So a friend of mine comes in with a suggestion. ”Let’s make an artichoke custard"..Custard ??!!? My eyes pop out.. :S !!.I have taken risks in life..But this is one I really wouldn’t want to...I just blurted out a few minutes earlier to her, that I am open to exploring new cuisines to get Abhi interested in food and wished so much now that I could have taped my mouth shut. She leaves the bag of artichokes at my counter and steps out with my son.

I eye this curious vegetable (or fruit ??!!? I thought we made custard with fruits!). It looked so prickly and harsh... Custard really!! With you?? I make nice warm paneer paratas for Abhi and he doesn’t seem to get interested in food...And we are going try to make artichoke custard to get him excited. It just seems soooo wrong!

The afternoon tryst with the artichoke was something to remember. So it was me, my friend and our little sous-chef trying to make artichoke custard. Abhi was interested in playing with this curious vegetable. He liked to hold it with the stem and bang it on the fridge door. Was he thinking "If I could just smash you, then these two women would spare me from eating u" ..My dad comes by the kitchen and I hear him murmur to himself "Custard? Custard?" in disbelief as he steps out ...A few min later, he comes back...”U are making this only for kuzhandhai right? “looking very concerned...And then he tells me, "I feel like taking a long walk" and walks out of the door. Lucky You!! Appa…

I looked at this abandoned vegetable (I am still trying to wrap my head around how to drop u in custard)...but nevertheless I am more sympathetic now. A friend calls in and while in conversation reminds me of my last post on how I should give the imperfect thing a chance, laughs out loud and hangs up....What timing...Me and my big mouth I think!! This is why I shouldn’t be writing philosophy!! This is y I shouldn’t be writing at all...

Then it gets even better, she pulls out a spinach bunch...And I am pretending to make something good with it hoping to distract her from her “main dish”. She goes “Nooo, this is for the custard”…Huuunhh!!??!! First it was artichoke and then its spinach and we are making custard ?! ? By now I am almost at her feet begging “I will make amends for any mistake of mine…Why ….why are we doing this..and why abhi…poor little thing, what did he do, cant u see his innocent little face ” …Its almost like she read my mind. “Priya, don’t worry, it’s made with salt not sugar” and she smiled at me like my main concern was addressed. “Why do we call it custard?”..I innocently ask..; “A custard doesn’t have to be sweet..You have savory custards, it’s like a quiche and we shall bake it” she quipped.

What’s in a name...u may ask..A name is everything. A name is an identity and if your identity just got switched a 180o, then it’s not a good thing. Thou shalt not be a custard to me ….In my mind, a custard has fruits and is not baked…Thou shalt never be custard to me.. Thou shalt be a quiche….And I closed my heart and moved on..We dropped in butter, cheese, eggs, nutmeg, and spinach. Then we were going through the motions of peeling off the leaves in the artichoke and fuddled with the soft and squishy inside when my friend mentions “Every artichoke has a tender heart…Its almost like a person…rough on the exterior, soft inside”. A giggle slipped out of me …the kitchen is such a great place for philosophy…if only we didn’t have to eat all of them.

So what happened at last….Yes, a spinach-artichoke-cheese-quiche came out of the oven..I couldn’t tell where the artichoke was..It was like me searching for the ladys-finger in the tiramisu. It wasn’t bad, but it wouldn’t find its way into my favorite dishes either …Abhi couldn’t care less..he bit into it, squished it with his hand and rubbed it all over the high chair and was ready to play. My dad was so relieved that no one forced him to eat it and passed on an empathetic stare to Abhi. It was a funny evening in hind sight and I learnt something. That custard is not always sweet and an artichoke is like a person – hard on the outside, with a tender heart inside. And I shall not make fun of it ever again…In this post, yes !! but no …never again :)

Give me a chance!

Have you ever felt that you didn’t get that one chance to prove it to someone you were worth it...?

A couple of weeks ago I was at my wits end with getting my son to adjust to his daycare. The inconsolable crying broke me, but I tried being strong. I would walk out trying not to look back, drive an extra loop to calm myself down, tell myself it will all work out and pull into work. But then he fell sick all the time and I was done with long doses of antibiotics one after another. I had to pull him out every time he fell sick. And getting any work done with a crying sick child was impossible. I was in a new job and there is not too much room for slack. I needed a solution….I started a nanny search again, interviewed people ..but nothing really worked out. It’s hard to hire someone to take care of this little person u love so much by just pruning through the paper resumes. Some of the best sounding resumes were just examples of good writing abilities….

Then I found this girl...She didnt have a strong resume, but she had a unique circumstance, and she connected so well with him. She didn’t come with the pre-requisites I had in mind for the ideal person. B & I talked to her and just as much as we liked her at the outset, we had an equal sense of apprehension again because of her unique story and how different she was from what we sought. There appeared to be something genuine and sincere about what she said, but I really couldn’t put a finger on what that was. It was a decision that was left to me. Everyone decided to trust my judgment, while I didn’t. My instinct asked me to go with her, my head wouldn’t agree with the decision. There was fear that it would be the wrong decision for me, for my little love. But as much as I wanted to judge and evaluate her, I also wanted for her to succeed.

If we could decide everything for ourselves with just logic and reason, life would be so much simpler, so much more robotic and more predictable. But its when the heart rules the head, life is spontaneous. Yes, to all the men from Mars ..I am one of those women from Venus and happy being that way. I was born with brains and I do use them...but it just doesnt win every battle. :). After several hours of brooding over the next couple of days, i decided to give her a chance. It was purely a decision based on my instinct.

Now, she is trying hard..harder than usual to keep me happy. More important than anything else, my little baby feels happy with her. She expresses her gratitude in several ways everyday for giving her a chance. And that gets me thinking about the people that have given a chance, an opportunity at several points when I probably wasn’t shining at my best and how I continue to walk that extra mile for them...and of the times when i missed that one chance that I really wanted so much. Whatever be the context, giving someone a chance is a risk you take for yourself or your firm or whatever it is that they have control over. And it may not always work out, but sometimes I think we should also set aside our impulse to seek out that perfect and ideal solution for us and give the seemingly imperfect solution a shot. It might teach us something and that lesson is worth it.

Don’t get me wrong…I am not advocating going with impulsive decisions, but sometimes and just once in awhile, we have to give someone who doesn’t present that perfect picture, a chance...and who knows, we may be pleasantly surprised at how happy we would be with it.

The tiny sapling that finds its way out of a concrete floor is the chance that nature gives it to live...

I may be wrong...don’t take me seriously if you think differently….This is just a random scribble on the wall :)

A Box of chocolates and a bag of nuts ….

Mama says "life is like a box of chocolates, you never know what you're gonna get." ~ Tom Hanks in Forrest Gump

A couple of years in the corporate world opens your eyes to a potpourri of people. While you could meet them anywhere, work is where you spend most of your weekdays and you need to co-exist with people who can be very very different.

While some are like the box of chocolates.. some that inspire you, some who you love working with, some that end up being great friends at work and some even outside of work.....

…and there are a whole bunch of others you just observe, who amuse you or annoy you…..

Presenting exhibits A through Q….the bag of nuts, some sweet, some spicy and some absolutely nutty...

A) The Echo Generator: The guy who wishes to drive and have control of every discussion thread, but drives you crazy by just agreeing and repeating exactly what you said, right after you did. Dude, if you do want to summarize the discussion every 2 min – you should paraphrase...do not repeat verbatim….His motto: Reinforcing a thought is a good idea and most probably people werent listening the first time it was said.

B) The Attention Hogger: You will see him in as many meetings as there can possibly be. He loves sending emails around that you wonder where he finds time to actually work. Its all about visibility. His motto: The more time you spend in reporting on what you are doing, the less time you have to do anything. Stability is achieved when you spend all your time doing nothing but reporting on the nothing you are doing.~ Cohn's Law

C) The Saint: He sits in a corner. A deep intellectual…No amount of commotion tends to faze him a bit. He won’t bat an eyelid and you would think he has given up on his work. He lives the Zen way of life. And absolute disaster has to strike for him to come and speak and he can stun you. His philosophy: When the student is ready, the master appears. ~Buddhist Proverb

D) The Gossiper: The one with the entire scoop. Your easiest point of access to the local newsroom. Your one point window to all professional gossip. His motto: Gossip needn't be false to be evil - there's a lot of truth that shouldn't be passed around. ~Frank A. Clark

E) The Midas: His touch is definitely magical but not so necessarily golden. He complains that somehow things never work for him, while they work for everyone else. His touch is his destiny...His thought: From error to error, one discovers the entire truth ~ Sigmund Freud.

F) The Complainer/Whiner: After a point, what he speaks is like white noise..You have heard it over and over again..About how he has an unfair share of burden to carry, how his tools don’t work when they need to…His philosophy: Every Morning, I rise and whine.

G) The Over eager Newcomer: This one is like Aladdin’s Genie…. And is definitely a blessing if he is working with you on something. He keeps working non stop till he gets burnt out (You don’t even have to rub the lamp and ask for a wish)…Completely bubbl-acious with excitement he sometimes works too hard that he makes everyone else look bad.

H) The Invisible one: You see him now, and a second later he is gone. He has telepathic abilities to sense if a load of work is coming his way. You wonder if he actually has a cloak that will render him invisible in the middle of the meeting… His philosophy: Hi, I'm not available right now but my answering machine is, so you can talk to it instead. Wait for the beep.

I) The Blamestormer: You would think he’s thinking more of his back up blame strategy than his actual task. He begins and ends with a defensive note. He truly lives by his philosophy “To err is human, To find the right person to blame for it is strategic”

J) The Life balancer: The one who makes you understand what you are missing while working hard. He teaches you the importance of seeking out your hobbies, having an active life. His philosophy: His motto: A job is nice but it interferes with my life.

K) The Orator Coordinator: He gets to talk his way through his job. His job is to make people work which he disrupts by talking to them in the name of coordinating. His philosophy: “Teamwork is a lot of people doing what I say.” (Marketing executive, Citrix Corporation)

L) The Stalker: Before you can complete reading his email on what he would like your help with, he has sent 3 follow up emails, buzzed you on messenger, left you a voice messages and is at your door. Worst part, the stuff isnt even urgent. He wants to know if there any issues in getting this done…Biggest issue – YOU…Go back to your office and it will get done.

M) The Olfactory Offender: You would love to group gift him a box of socks and perfume. But who shall bell the cat ?. His Motto: None…I hope he thinks….

N) The Sick One: Ohh…he is not really sick..He’s mastered a bunch of high sounding medical terminology. And if you did ask him what happened, he can blow your brains away with the details. He knows what can cover for a day or a weeks absence…Never mind that he doesn’t miss his tennis sessions, his gym or his late evening bar dates. His motto: I always arrive late to work, but I make up for it by leaving early.

O) The Drama Queen/King: If all the world is a stage and we are all actors, this guy did take that way too seriously. Life is often much simpler than the tele-serials. Disaster Scenario’s are all he thinks about. His dictionary has only superlatives… His ideology: “We have to continually be jumping off cliffs and developing our wings on the way down.”- Kurt Vonnegut

P) The Martyr: This one makes you feel like he wants the Param-Veer-Chakra or something…You end up hearing over and over again as to how he put himself in the firing line , solved the problems (that quite a few times he had created !!) and saved everyone of the incurring the wrath. Sometimes that whole jig was a result of a completely unnecessary creation of his and all that was required was to involve the members working on the details offer a much clearer explanation of why certain actions were taken.

And finally …

Q) The Boss Figure: His philosophy: What I need is a list of specific unknown problems we will encounter. ~Lykes Lines Shipping

I had a colleague who told me once that the corporate life was a huge chess game, there are no friends….there are just games and one should learn to start playing them. While I don’t agree with that thought entirely, I can agree to the point that there are people playing games, and you need to be a little more aware of the strategies they have than just work your butt off and expect due returns.

At the end of the day, it’s no longer a simple story of the ant and the grasshopper. But at least you have a bunch of chocolates around to help you pull through…..

That stranger is an old friend…

I was talking to a R this week and somewhere during the conversation I just thought off how long I had known her…..and it was a whopping 24 years that we had been friends…

That thought triggered two reactions….

Really…Have I grown that old …and

Wow, I know her almost as long as I can remember…The only people who have known me for longer are my parents and my brother…

While some friendships sustain themselves through years (Touchwood and Hugs to you R), that brings me to writing about some that sadly don’t….

Sometimes it takes just a few conversations or a few weeks for someone to become one of your best friends. Some people endear themselves to you the moment you meet them.. Some friendships grow through knowing and understanding a person with time. Some have even come about when I read their blogs and saw a side to that person I dint realize existed.

And then….

Sometimes with time and distance, things change drastically and for no particular reason. You see yourself drifting farther away and suddenly he/she feels a lot different from the friend you had known... You hesitate to call that person, you used to pour out your thoughts to, who would be the first one to know you’re excited or sad about anything, who you wait to call and talk to, whose phone number and bday you can never quite forget ….And eventually that feels quite normal. You have a new friend who has stepped into those shoes and life goes on…

Why do some relationships change….What can make friends un-friend themselves…And when distance and time was all that was needed to change the chemistry, why do I miss that friend ?

Friends are a part of your memories of your childhood, your teens and your adult life….When we look back on the memories, it feels incomplete if that the face that smiled once in it, doesn’t smile anymore. Sometimes it feels weird to the point that you try to block off the memory of that period.

I don’t think friendships die. I don’t think we can suddenly stop caring about someone we cared about. And a friendship can’t reduce to nothingness for no reason. When our lives can get as different as they do, with some people you always know that they are really just a call away and you can pick up your conversation right where you left even if was a couple of years back.

With some there’s a lot more effort needed to sustain a friendship and with time I have realized, it is not something one can accomplish alone. It needs two minds to work together on getting back. When one individual doesn’t quite share the same memory you have cherished, it becomes difficult and next to impossible to get the weirdness out of the system. And eventually you have to move on to say..”That stranger is an old friend”…..

A blast from the past ….

Stumbled onto this song, thanks to M…One of my favorites, A great song, beautiful lyrics, No stereotype dance sequences with uniformed extras, simple yet beautiful picturization....

Whats in a name?....

A week of making phone calls, making appointments, cancelling some, verifying some charges, creating some new accounts…, all of which got me to the familiar ordeal…

Voice on the other end of the phone: May I have your full name
Me: It is PR……., Should I spell that out for you…
Voice..: (sounding particularly tired and annoyed at the length of it ..) : yes Please …
Me: P as in Paul, R as in……, (thinking: With 19 letters in my full name, it’s a total alphabet soup…My parents could have taught me ABCD with just this….)

I empathize with the “Anan”’s of the world (the Narayanan’s if you don’t know what I mean)….because I too have the a’s generously spilt around in my name and frequently hear the other person..”Ohhhh..thats another ‘a’.., I thought u were just repeating the first one..”

Duh !!…She spaced out before I could complete spelling out my name…

Is it because Indian kids are exposed to these long names that they are good at spelling bee…

Nevertheless moving on, I married someone who could understand my plight…as he battled not only with a long surname but had a middle name too…And u guessed it right…he knew the plight of an “anan”…

How many folks have their last name truncated by expedia bcos of a word limit on the field…

When my parents decided to christen me with a Sanskrit name, they prided themselves for their meaningful pick. The journey, then on has been interesting…

Despite not being a totally uncommon name, I have never personally known someone with the same name. Through school, my friends caught on to the ‘vada’ in my name …due to their fondness for the south indian savoury delight, my name transformed with dahi and sambhar to their taste. An extra ‘h’ would have saved my name from that, but my dear mother preferred to hold on to the grammatical correctness of “it’s the first dha, not the second, and that singularly would transform the meaning of my name from ‘one who speaks with affection’ to ‘one who kills with affection’ ”..Hence in the greater interest, the ‘h’ was never inserted.

Undergrad saw some Profs struggle with my name and me standing up waiting for them to finish reading it, whilst being a curious exhibit fielding stares from fellow classmates. Relief crept in finally when they ended their struggle and called me ‘37’ instead. My name definitely wasn’t he longest around. The struggle to an unfamiliar soul though was how to pronounce the M followed by VA without sounding like a kitten. I shortened my name in Grad school to save myself and others of the agony. But it didn’t end there …

I chose a Starbucks name after my coffee cup came out being marked “BIRA”..That day I christened myself Ria for the restaurant world.

My world is filled with news of newborns now and I notice that 6 letters seems to the longest a name can get….And given that limitation, the names tend to repeat more often. Theres only so much you can do to get a meaningful name that’s not way too common within 6 letters.

And I am thinking, as names get shorter and shorter…we may end up with abbreviations for names, or will we get as tired as the guy who named a road Zzyzx on the way to Vegas.

Somewhere over the rainbow…..

It sucks !!...Two people very dear to me are going through troubled times and much as I want to help them, there’s nothing I can do but offer a shoulder to lean on and promise to listen. I wish God shows them brighter days soon! Their circle of life seems just stuck at one point for too long…. :(…

And when you are down in dumps that you can’t do anything about, there is not much faith or positive energy you can summon. Your belief system breaks down into cynicism and frustration. And there is a question “Why?” that howers around.

I have no answers, but I still believe that things will be OK, even when u strain your eyes to look for that silver lining and seem to find none. I don’t believe in miracles, but I believe things have a way of happening that you can’t explain at the moment, but seem to fit in a bigger picture that we see much later.

In prayer….

10 min of Spam Face

My morning coffee time ritual of deleting spam messages got me thinking into what kind of person I would be if I were my spam face.

First off, I will save thousands and no one will know. Someone will help me do that.
I will get 70% off discounts on several stuff which I would never want.
Someone wants to mail me free trial weight loss capsules.
Dozen emails need my attention or my urgent answer.
Several others tell me I have made a payment or to check on an invoice status or my payment was rejected.
Some prod me to go get an online degree in minutes
Some get me gender confused.
Some tell me all my worries are over …

Some obviously think I love watches.

I am this insecure person who sends myself emails..
And I have 90% discount on ordering Acai berry supplements.

Spam Face obviously has a dozen people in her/his (?!?) life to help her solve all worries, get killer deal discounts and degrees with least effort. And also has financial issues with payments getting rejected and unauthorized payments being made.

I am happy I get to be spam face only for the few minutes I spend deleting her emails.

Dance like no one's watching...

Most of us have been stuck in transit waiting for connecting trains, planes or buses and spent that time looking around us, observing people as they walk by, picked up a magazine that we dont typically don’t read, paid more attention to whats around. If so, why do we find it hard to apply it back to life.

Its been a week of serious conversations for me, mostly talking to my friends ‘stuck in transit’ in real life, some poised to move on to the next phase, some struggling with issues with the current and looking to hit a fast forward button, some regret missing out on something, wishing they had done things differently…

One of my dearest friends was caught up feeling miserable about the whole process of finding someone and getting married...One wants to switch her jobs badly because she is not happy with it, one is wondering why he left a good job and took up an MBA to graduate at a point when everything looks so bleak.

Somehow we are constantly in pursuit of something… As kids in high school we want to get past the boards and into good colleges. Then it’s about jobs, higher degrees, better jobs, finding the right person and getting married, wanting a home, kids and then we get so buried in our work and kids that we wait for them to get somewhere before we can take a break and do something we have always wanted to do. The present remains mostly an investment for our future, grading ourselves based on our progress..We are unhappy if we are stuck somewhere in this natural progression... To give a sense of the conversation with my friend….

Me: Its not about you…Take it easy, don’t bring it down on urself..
She: No, it’s got to be about me that I am still here; I am investing so much time and energy.

Its in our psyche that we have to be somewhere, have some goals all the time. If not, we are somehow not successful..If we constantly latch onto the next journey the moment we get to a destination ....then, when do we actually sit down and enjoy the present? Can we actually free our minds from the thought of ‘what next’..?Can we actually get a blank mind and soak it in today…live today to the fullest…

And then I read these lines…

"Work like you don't need money,

Love like you've never been hurt,

And dance like no one's watching."
--- Satchel Paige

This whole thought is fascinating and infectious….Could we detach ourselves from our expectation and fear that we might fall short of it – getting rewarded, getting loved back, getting a word of praise, and leave judgments aside and throw ourselves completely into something?

Work like you don’t need money….I wish I could do that :)….I really don’t have a hobby that would pay me anything but satisfaction. And we need to pay the bills ….But surely, one thing I have been missing is taking time out for in the recent years is my hobbies. Someone recently asked me what my hobbies were, and I had difficulty in putting my finger on one thing that I had actively pursued in the last 5 years…It was embarrassing and awkward….. But I had hobbies which I loved. I used to love sketching and painting, I danced for 10 straight years, I had a major liking for interior design that I almost studied it. Now my hobbies have degenerated into watching sitcoms, listening to music, window shopping and watching more sitcoms….The only worthwhile thing I have taken up more seriously of late is cooking. I have started to slow down and enjoying cooking instead of taking it as a task that I need to perfect. I have stopped relying on my 20 min rush recipes. I have started to observe the spices I use and the flavors they have, and have started to experiment with understanding (or so I believe!!). I bought myself a keyboard (casio) a year back in the hope that it will be my sweet diversion, my new hobby. I have yet to find time to take it as a serious pursuit…..

Hobbies make our life more fulfilling. Its something we enjoy, we don’t have any targets or expectations. Its our creative vent out and we can give ourselves as many chances we need to perfect it out, and there is no fear of failure (I don’t like the look on B’s face as I say this and cook…but never mind him…); Its working like you don’t need the money…

Love like you have never been hurt….If a past of hurt shadows ur emotion, you are just pulling back in defense. There should be no reservations in love, no preconditions, no fear. Don’t lock yourself up, Go with an open heart. Will I get hurt again; Yes, I may …but atleast I will know that I gave it my all. And there shall be no regrets.

And then there’s my favorite line..Dance like no one’s watching..
Observing young children teaches you one thing. They have no fear …of falling, of getting embarrassed, of trying new things. I have always had a hundred thoughts zipping in my head when I held a microphone and looked up at a room full of people. And yes, it took me blurting out “Good Evening everybody” a couple of times during bright early mornings and flashing a foolish giddy smile when I realize this and my many other bloopers to finally get comfortable standing over there.

Its that constant sense of “will I be able to keep this conversation interesting”, “will someone laugh if i told them a joke now”, “will I meet my own expectations” “Am I nervous and will it show” and “OMG, did everyone notice that I blurted something wrong”…….and It takes me a while before I get comfortable chattering away without watching (Sometimes, that hasn’t worked out so well…:) but still..). I have also learnt over the years that being able to laugh at ourselves is a skill that makes us feel less intimidated by the situation….So let go of inhibitions, don’t always seek approval, Dance away to express yourselves, like no one’s watching …. If someone see’s you falling flat on ur face, just smile back and it wont matter as much….

Sometimes we just need to slow down…. Scenic drives aren’t freeways, they are these windy roads telling people to slow down and watch around. And when we are stuck at a transit point in life by something we cant control, we need to drop the sense of urgency to be somewhere and live the moment… Spend some time to enjoy the little somethings of ur life.