Wednesday, March 22, 2017

The I-Love-You Conundrum


I LOVE YOU! Often considered to be the three most beautiful words to be ever heard, they are actually misunderstood.
Simply putting it, loving someone doesnt mean that you get married to the person, have kids and spend rest of your life with them. I love chocolates but all the fore said things are not possible with chocolates. Now, you would argue that a chocolate is not a living entity. So, I love dogs, especially puppies. Who can not love those tiny bundles of soft fur, button eyes gleaming with innocence and cute faces. Again, you can argue that I am a human. So, let us get more specific. I love my mother, my father, my siblings, my grandmother, my grandfather, my uncles, my aunts, my friends and the list goes on. I love them and I want them (or specific ones whom I can tolerate) to be around me all the time. I want them to be a part of my laughs and share my sorrows. I want them to see my grow old and stupid and still love me back.


You see, love IS NOT just being around a person all the time. That's almost a punishment, like being in bars all the time (JAIL). Love IS to willingly spend time with someone you can be yourself with and enjoy every moment, be it joy or sorrow. Love is to accept a person as they are. Love is to be yourself and let them be themselves.
Recently, this term has been distorted and modified. It is now almost a synonym to infatuation, affection, obsession or even lust. Consider this, the English are good learned people. I am sure that they didnt create these multiple words just to make their dictionaries thicker or to write the thesaurus or just to mock others. Yes, there are words with very slight difference but the difference is significant enough to distinguish them into two different words.


Now, having said all the above, I am no expert in this subject. Everything I write is what I believe and none of you are obligated to follow this. I just want to say that being a girl, I can fall in love with a guy. I can adore him for the person he is. I can enjoy his talks that the others dont understand. I can care for him like family. I can fight with all the rights over his life. I can want to spend the rest of my life knowing him. I can plan of activities for the two of us for like forty years from today. And yet, this person need not be a lover or a husband. He is can be my father, brother, friend or best friend - depending on how much they are comfortable to share back. If you dont agree, read the above lines again with a different perspective. Since I started with 'I can fall in love with a guy', automatically, the brain gets triggered to picture a couple.

Coming to the title - firstly it is inspired by The Big Bang Theory episode titles. Secondly, you might wonder that the conundrum here is that if I say 'I Love You', which sort of 'I Love You' it is. Do I love him like a brother, a father, a friend or a lover? Actually, wrong! This is very simple. Love is a feeling and if I say 'I Love You', it doesnt make any difference unless it is reciprocated. If I say I-Love-You to my dad and he replies back to his daughter, I love him like a dad. This concept is just like bro-zoned. Let a girl call you a brother but unless you too want to consider her your sister, doesnt really end your chances of hitting on her.
The Conundrum I speak of is the confusion we have with our feelings. Its a simple word and let us stop confusing it with the other ones.

Well, maybe the feeling I spoke of, has a different name altogether and I am the one unenlightened. Well, if you know, do share.

Tuesday, March 14, 2017

A letter for the departed ... HAIR

Disclaimer : I recently read an article on 'The Sneeze' blog which is similar in nature. It is the article that inspired me to do this one. However, I solemnly swear that this is not copied and that I am going through the pain that the author of that article had once undergone (I hope it worked out for him.).

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Dear Hair

Everyday you fall down and trust me, even though I never feel it on my skin, it pains my heart deeply to see you leave. I have never been good with goodbyes and so I never say a word but I expected you to know of the pain (especially since you have been a part of my body till a moment back). Or do you not even see the tear that seldom clouds my vision?
I love you, to the moon that is 14 billion light years away and beyond and back, yet, you dont seem to care at all. I bring all sorts of expensive hair care products for you - shampoos and conditioners and serums and oils. Do you know how much a decent shampoo costs these days? Yet, I never pay heed to the cost when it comes to you, my precious. I spend two evenings (minimum) a week, to oil you. And I dont just nourish you with one item throughout. I ensure that you get all the essential oils. I change the shampoos and conditioners the moment I realize that you dont like them. Still, you seem angry with me. Worst are the days when I take deep care of you, like applying curd. It stinks and I have to bear that smell. Then I think of all the moisture that you would be getting from that curd and I smile in all the odour. Yet, when I wash the curd off, more of you would fall. Maybe you dont like Curd, just like the rest of me, but what option do I have? How am I to bring moisture to my moistureless hair? (oops, did I say that out loud?)

I
 have spent hours and hours browsing through articles and videos on the internet, about how to take good care of you. I have taken advices from whoever seemed willing to share. I have even stopped envying long straight hair. Yes, I would love it if you were straight but as long as you dont fall off my scalp, the wavy you is no less. Even the tips that once worked for me, wouldnt work a second time.

What happened, love? What did I do wrong? Everytime I see a single strand leave me, I ask it - what happened suddenly? It had chosen to stick with me for so long, even when the others were leaving. What changed now? Why did you decide to leave? And yet, one after the other, you all decide to leave, never answering my questions or soothing my agony.
As I roll the departed bodies into a roll and throw you on the floor or into the bin, I wonder why would you choose that life? I mean, see when you are shiny and long and ON MY HEAD, people sneak glances at you and admire you. Once on the floor, you disgust others and once in the bin, no one really gives a damn. Yet, you choose that destiny more than being on my head. Now I understand, I havent exactly been the best partner of choice. I am careless and ignorant. I had wanted straight hair for long to have damaged you and in turn, made you the moisture-less and lusture-less versions of yourselves. But, I have changed. I dont experiment with heating equipments any more. The most I am willing to do is, apply a new shampoo/conditioner/oil. I dont even fight to keep you open any more. I braid you, try to keep you combed and tangle free at all times. I know its not a cent percent commitment but I am trying and you should consider it.


Apologies if it got dragged a little. I just couldnt keep it all in and had to tell you. Hope you will share your feelings with me too.

Love,
The scalp owner where you are always welcome to stay and flourish.

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Read the article on The Sneeze blog : An Open Letter to My Hair

The Train

While browsing the Merriam Webster portal today, I checked that they have few interesting quizzes, word of the day section, puzzles like daily sudoku and interesting articles. Having checked the word of the day for the day and past week, found that I have a better score than the average score for my age in a vocabulary quiz and having played a game of sudoku in under five minutes, I turned to the interesting and informative articles! For someone like me - who loves to read, who loves to learn, who loves to learn new languages and who wants to improve their proficiency in the English language, these articles are interesting and informative. Very simply to understanding and containing small bits of wisdom that make us build a well-informed and more understanding outlook of the world, these articles are found in all dictionary (or learning English) websites. Through small anecdotes, they will leave us with facts and information that we will never forget.

Today I found multiple articles on the above mentioned website. The first one to catch my sight was an article titled "Why Do We Call It a 'Train'?" Since I watched a Big Bang Theory marathon yesterday, my first thoughts towards this title were - 'Let us find out what interests Sheldon', 'Let us find out what Sheldon probably already knows.' (And Jim Parson's famous Sheldon Cooper voice echoes in my head saying - 'Really? Is it possible that Sheldon doesnt know this?').
I open the article and Sheldon Cooper is driven out of my mind in an instant. The image staring back at me (the one accompanying the article) was none other than HOGWARTS EXPRESS. I shook my head and thought I was hallucinating having not seen the moves for a couple of weeks now - but no!! It was there!! I shook my head, blinked my eyes but the image did not change. Curious... very curious! (In Ollivander's Voice, please)


 I held my breath, not wanting to jump to any conclusions, I decided to do some research. The obvious place to begin was - Google. I searched 'Train', 'A Train', 'The Train', 'Why we call it Train' and some other combinations. Surprisingly, all the above searches gave me images of trains that were NOT the Hogwarts Express. There was the image from the article which came for 'Why we call it Train' (as expected) from merriam webster search result [and you dont want to google 'The Train' unless you want to see images of Emraan Hashmi]. So, it was not a coincidence that while publishing this article, the image of the Hogwarts Express was taken by mistake.

Thus, I feel it considerably safe to declare that whoever penned and published the article, is a Harry Potter fan.
Such incidences never fail to amaze me. I am astounded how some ink and paper can create a magic so deep and so wide-spread. Even when I am not looking, I know it exists. Harry Potter, dear friends, is NOT a person and definitely not a book. It's a world - a world filled with magic and not just the wand kind. It is magic that holds people together and makes them believe. It is a magic that makes us see the best in each other and in turn in ourselves. It is a magic not just to create wonders but to support them as well.
Seeing the image, even after a long dull day at work, I feel like I can go for a Harry Potter movie marathon as soon as I get home ;)


PS : Train means something that is dragging behind. It was initially used to denote the part of gowns that trailed behind. [This is all that I read of the article.]
Hope you read the article and enjoy it!https://www.merriam-webster.com/words-at-play/the-history-of-the-word-train
Do let me know if you too know that its the Hogwarts Express!

Tuesday, March 7, 2017

Harry Potter Questions :: Why are muggle born underage witches and wizards allowed to do magic?

Why isnt there any magic supervision for the muggle-born children?
I just thought of all the fuss everyone makes when Dobby performs the Hover Charm in Harry's house and when Harry performs the patronus. I also remember Dumbledore telling Harry how magic is NOT detected by underage wizards if an adult wizard is around.


However, to read an excerpt from Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone -
"Are you sure that's a real spell? said the girl. 'Well, it's not very good, is it? I've tried a few simple spells just for practice and it's all worked for me. Nobody in my family's magic at all, it was ever such a surprise when I got my letter, but I was ever so pleased, of course, I mean, it's the best school of witchcraft there is, I've heard - I'e learnt all our set of books off by heart, of course, I just hope it will be enough - I', Hermione Granger, by the way, who are you?"
[I really enjoyed typing the above. It was like Hermione was speaking all this rather slowly as I typed it away.]


Well, in the second monologue that our Hermy every delivers, she clearly mentions two things -
Firstly, she tried a few spells and THEY ALL WORKED.
Secondly, no one in her family is magic, that is, there are no witches or wizards in her family.


Hence, now, I would like to know - why is Hermione allowed to do magic?

Considering the statute of secrecy (or whatever the Ministry has made of it), I really believe that magic done by a muggle born, unsupervised, is way more dangerous.

Take for instance, the Weasley twins - I am pretty sure that they have done underage magic many times. Yet, having seen their elder brothers, parents and other relatives do it so often, I am sure even if they did it all by themselves, they were less a threat to the world as a muggle born who was doing something no one around them knew of. Further, since Fred and George come from total wizarding family, surrounded by other wizards, even if they perform magic outside their houses, no one is going to look astounded. On the other hand, if Hermione performs magic inside her house, her dentist parents will look.

May have been the case that I might have missed something, but I would just want the Ministry of Magic to look into this matter seriously (not that we are not accustomed to carelessness on their part).

A little drama is required

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