Adieu 22: 4 months of retirement - Reflections.

This was the long awaited change which was due from the day I turned 50. After a lot of thinking and re-thinking it finally happened on 31st August. You can get off the train but you can still feel the rumbles of the departing train when you are standing on the platform. My 4 months are something like this. When you are running for 25 years,it takes time to get into a new routine. 

What Next? 

When I look back at the last month before my last day. I was already planning what to do next. And I think that pressure continued for some time till I met a few friends who had been through this and had gone through similar withdrawal symptoms. I think it was more to answer my family & people around me and less to me. 

Long back I had read this article in HBR ‘What’s your story?’ - the summary of the article was that, write out your story when you do that you clarify to yourself how your life story is shaping. I may not write but often I do this exercise when I walk early in the morning. 

If you ever listen(or read an interview) to a good founder of a start up - you will see how clear they are of their idea and the genesis and its impact etc. More than the no’s & their success I always loved their confidence, commitment, belief on the idea, some of them can be as esoteric as rockets being sent to space or idli batter. Their ikigai is very clear. Mine is still hazy. 

The idea that if you are earning you are worthy

You can see it in the eyes of most of the older generation - read my parents age. I don’t have any quarrel with them because they have evolved from a generation of lack and we are the generation of too many choices and all of them are not necessarily wise. But the new generation or my generation folks welcome the idea that I gave more importance to my life goals than a corporate goal. It’s not that you I for acceptance but any different choice will give raise questions and i have to be ready to answer it - if you want to be social.

How much do you need ?

This is a follow up question to the earlier one.

Not much really. I did the math (because this is a constant debate with my finance minister aka the wife) and if you have your own house you can live luxuriously in 50K even in a city like Bangalore. With eating out and movies thrown in. The larger expense is only in travel, education and renovation, appliances (which are once in 10 yrs) etc. Yes, there is a corpus needed for medical emergencies and other saving instruments. Having done that, you actually don’t need much. I remember when I was in college I had told someone, give me a basement with music, CD’s and DVD’s and I will never come out of it. There was no internet in those days and no mobile - I can say many teenagers are carrying everything (I needed then) in their pocket.. 

Having a goal is important

It’s important to have a plan or to be clear on what you want to do, it’s easy to be easy - which is fine but you will soon get bored. Humans are wired to get a sense of achievement / finishing a task, this has been proven scientifically. Without a sense of purpose you are lost & days will just pass by. I am at the other extreme end of this spectrum where I plan my day / week / month and year. Something I picked up from Stephen Covey’s workshop & this has been my way for 15 yrs. 

Have a daily schedule / habit

I make it a point to sit at my desk every day at 10 this itself brings in the focus. There is no pressure to perform a specific task, except those I have chosen to do and I do it my way. This daily habit of checking in is very important as it brings in the discipline needed to get things done. Work will automatically happen.

Being in touch with the past

Friends can become a great enabler. One thing which disappears from your life when you retire is the circle of colleagues but it also gives you time to curate your friends list. It’s important that you be in touch with some of them who were more than colleagues. It will not be easy but you have to cultivate them - since they will be busy like you were. I am not a natural at this. Like I mentioned above I am more of a basement guy who is cocooned in his own world. I am still trying with some help from my friends 🙂 

Take your family along

They will be a great sounding board and encourage you in your journey. Sometimes it will be difficult for them to understand your choices. Let it be, nothing is perfect.

How will it end ?

There are times  

You have,

an eerie feeling

That, 

you are falling

Gravitating

Towards a bottomless pit 

You know you are not

You are 

Sitting

Talking

Eating

But,

You know that

This is an illusion

The reality is what is happening inside

Not what is happening outside

You have seen this before

You have clamored up before

Not once, twice but many times.

But everytime the journey was the same 

First,

The mind

Paralyzes the body internally

So you function but you don’t

It’s like a machine running

Without producing

Till the mind takes control 

&

Starts,

the process of rebirth.

Breathe. IN

Breath. OUT 

How it all started 

&

How it will end.

The curious case of missing lower

I got up from my sleep to find my jogging lower missing. My memory flashed the picture that it was neatly folded and kept in my cupboard but I kept searching and could never locate the same. Giving up! I went for my walk telling myself that someone who needs it has got it. 

We dry our clothes in the 6th floor balcony railing and at times few things fall down and neighbours are good enough to Wap us. Yesterday we got a message that a grey Domyo t-shirt was on their balcony. I confidently told my wife that it was folded and kept in my cupboard. In fact I remember pointing it out to her.  But in reality it was not there - because the image was from morning when I wore it and went down to walk. By the time I went down and checked one of the cleaners picked it and made it his own (that’s my assumption). I was so confident that I came back and did not even check my cupboard. So, it was shocking when I could not find it in the morning and my mind refused to believe it. For many minutes I searched everywhere but I knew it was gone. My mind kept playing the same image in loop ‘neatly folded lower and t-shirt’. I even went and told the house keeping staff that if they can find it 

Maybe it is just me and my forgetfulness for which I am well known in the family, but I am also very methodical and systematic - so everything is in the right place. Hence this was a kind of breach in protocol which my mind (read ego) refused to accept and kept flashing that image telling me that I am not perfect. I had to focus and bring my mind back to work telling myself many things - it was needed by someone needy, getting another for 500/- is no big deal and if needed we will buy else we will manage with what we have. 

It’s a silly example but for me it was a reflection of how we are trapped by the ego - replace this with your favourite (?x?) and the story will not be different. In fact my mind told me that this was one of my favourite jogging lower which I have been using for all my trips 🙂. Even after knowing the thoughts kept coming back - how? Why, etc. This note as I often mention in my diary is to get the damn thing out of my way.

Reflections are crucial - many people term it as over thinking. I think it’s important to think things through but also know when to end. 

Now, I am done and dusted with the lower. 

Postscript: (The logical mind wins) Detective B: While talking a walk next day my friend told me the color was grey and not black which made me conclude that it was not mine. It was a whoop of joy when I discovered both neatly folded and kept along with the folded cloths of (who else) the wife. (updated 48 hrs after the post :) :) :)

Leading a slow life series - 1

During my month-long trip to Assam & Kolkata, I saw so many events on sustainability happening in Bangalore but when the HSR cycling event happened last weekend I could not go as I was tied up with some work. Every week as a weekend to-do I read reviews of movies and books released - some which end up on my list to watch or directly get added as a Watchlist on various platforms. 

FOMO is something which I feel drives me and many of us. I have tried to consciously block the feeling and be happy with the choices I make. Unfortunately it is so hard wired that it creeps its ugly head as soon as I decide to make a choice. Which we do every moment in our capitalist society where freedom is equal to choice. Max It! is no longer the mantra but making a mindful choice is. 

Added to this is the pressure to perform - As soon as I saw the Bhoomi Workshop, the first thought was - I have to visit the 3 day sustainability workshop as I will connect with so many people and understand stuff around sustainability. That's the instant reaction. You have to pause and take a deep breath so you can choose the session which may interest you and attend only those sessions balancing it with personal commitments. It’s no longer about performance appraisal but more about immersion and learning at your own time and pace.

Leading a slow life requires you to be still and do check-ins with mindfulness activities which will bring you back to the center. We don’t need any self help book or app. Just focusing on your breath and doing deep breathing with your eyes closed for 3 minutes can bring you back to the center. We have to challenge ourselves to do this else we will run the same race which we quit.

There are many ways I connect back to my center whenever I get derailed (which is quite often):

Music: I think headphones were the best invention in the modern world, as it helps me block the noise around and get my focus back. Listening to instrumental - Indian classical especially santoor & flute & western classical - violin, cello or morning / evening ragas - Even during my crazy corporate days I used to always begin the days with these and they were the most productive days. The 2 K’s which are permanent are Kishore and Kabir - both gave soul and meaning to my days.

Walks, Runs, Yoga followed by a hot water bath: Any physical activity tires me but gets the adrenaline going but brings me back to a more active self. This morning ritual keeps me going wherever I am.

Postscript: There are 2 videos in this link, https://www.ted.com/talks/barry_schwartz_the_paradox_of_choice?language=en  

• The paradox of choice by Barry Schwartz

• The art of choosing by Sheena Iyengar

There are also books by the same name which you can read, but get a good preview on these TED talks. I think the essence is good enough.

The White Reindeer

This is supposedly the first Finnish B/W horror film made in 19 52. 

This is what briefly MUBI says:

Drawing from the deep well of beliefs of the semi-nomadic Sámi people, Erik Blomberg’s Finnish folk horror is a snow-encrusted tale of shape-shifting shamanism. Weirdness lurks deep in the desolate landscape of Lapland, where the fight to survive rubs up against the insatiable hunger for love. 

But it’s not a horror movie - it’s a movie which gives you a glimpse of life in Lapland in the 1950's. The first few shots are very similar to a desert, it’s just that instead of sand it’s only ice everywhere. Here the mode of transport is reindeer which is tied to a sledge. Instead of goats and horses or cows they have herds of reindeer which they take to different places so they can find food. Every surface is covered with snow, all houses are made of wood and in those times there were 20 homes in a desert. 

The beauty of movies which are now getting streamed at  your home is to experience the world sitting at the comfort of your home. Movies are your gateway to the past, present and future, the culture of that land and lifestyle. Like the native Indians of the Americas or The Aztecs and even India - the mode of worship is different. It’s all about nature (land - river - sea - animals etc) & spirits. Even in this movie it plays a critical role in changing a housewife to a witch. 

It’s a small film which is shot beautifully and transports you to a place and time which can’t be experienced now. See it on MUBI as part of it’s rediscovered series which has a collection of movies which has been restored from prints which were not in good condition.

It all starts with a photo

Time to Love is a Turkish movie by Metin Erksan which I recently saw on MUBI. The movie was restored in 4K by MUBI and is a movie which is based on a folk tale where a person falls in love with a photograph. Well the end is something which I would not like to reveal.

In the movie, a simple painter falls in love with a photograph but he does not want to fall in love with the person. The girl who is very rich & does not believe in love at first sight falls in love with the man seeing her love and throughout the movie tries to win her love. The reason given by the painter is very insightful: he says “the photograph will always love me because her gaze won’t change but your love will change with time, you may not like my shabby look some day or the fact that I live hand to mouth and exist on contracts”. 

Reflecting on it I realise why we build a platonic / spiritual relationship with authors, directors / painters through the objects created by them. Or, maybe it is the character like Potter or Arya Stark of GOT or Holmes with whom we build that relationship - the insight is the same, they don’t talk back, the acceptance or rejection is in our hand. But in a physical relationship it’s a 2 way street and yes people do change & I am not surprised when someone says “How did I live with him for the last 15 years?”.

This also takes me back 23 years when my marriage proposals started coming in, in the form of photographs and ultimately one of those photo’s led to my marriage - 2 kids. And yes both of us have changed over these years but we have also learnt to live and let live with each other.

Time to love is a B/W gem where apart from the actors the landscapes which is essentially the Princes island across Istanbul, the turbulent sea, lakes, rain play and music play an important role in making this movie seem more like a photo essay where every shot looks like sketched and shot. This was made in 1964 so it’s all real, no effects. This is again one of the movies where you can just switch off the dialogue and see the movie & soundtrack and you can see it endlessly.

Postscript:

Isles of Passion on Notebook | MUBI

The Housemaid

“The Citizen Kane of Korean cinema” - This is what Bong Joon-Ho, now famous for Parasite, had to say for the movie. Kim KI-Young who is the founder of Korean Cinema. Made in 19 60, the movie was restored in 2008 by the Korean Film Archive. 

It’s a fascinating movie which has many parallel themes running in the movie. This is what MUBI has to say:

Gut-wrenching yet spellbinding, The Housemaid eludes any genre. Kim cuts abruptly from the preamble—a husband and wife musing on the nature of infidelity—to the main plot, in which two young factory workers fall for their music-club teacher. When one of them is suspended after passing him a flirtatious note, the other infiltrates his household pretending to want piano lessons, and then hires yet another wayward colleague as the family’s housekeeper.

What follows is a torrid tale of forbidden love, sexual aggression, blackmail, and, ultimately, murder. Ki-young handles this contorted plot with such assured brazenness—mixing social critique with elements of horror and grotesque—that it’s hard not see The Handmaid as a model for all Korean horror made since. Last to last years Palme d’Or winner, Parasite, by Bong Joon-ho, for example, bears great affinity with it. Both films portray a hard-working family whose frustrated economic ambitions turn the whole world upside down. To an extent, Bong’s film is a playful pastiche on the classic story of the unsuspecting family exploited by a social “parasite.”

Kim ironizes South Korea’s consumerism with blunt, at times outrageous wit, as Bong does. And like Bong’s prize-winner, Kim’s masterpiece evinces moral ambivalence: a fallen husband too eager to purge his guilt, a wife whose self-abnegation makes her—depending on how you see her—a martyr or a despot. Kim Deok-jin’s cinematography creates a claustrophobic universe full of spying and of hidden threats.

It gave me goosebumps and reminded me of Hitchcock and his movies. Older movies when VFX was not there and especially the B/W ones a lot depended on dialogue delivery, emotions portrayed by the actors and the overall cinematography of how the screen shapes in front of you. The shadows especially tell its own story. The quarters are cramped and to shoot in that place with cameras and people around must be a big challenge or maybe it was easier - because it’s almost like a theatre. 

In my life too maids were our safety net, we were lucky to have maids who were like an extended family and took care of both my daughters. We helped them economically and my wife would patiently hear their painful stories of husband getting drunk, taking money from her, beating her & children etc. This was 10 years back when mobile was still a luxury for them. But now things are different maids have as younger ones are more ambitious and want to fight for their rights and their place in society. Which is what Kim shows in 1960’s Korea is the new reality of India.

The transgressions shown in this movie are more heard in Mumbai where the rich and famous fall, at least 2 cases are well documented. Hope there are not more. 

Postscript: 

About Kim Ki-Young: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kim_Ki-young 

Transience of Memory

As I write this I read a post-it stuck on my soft board. It says ‘Life is not what one lived, but what one remembers it in order to recount it’ & on my shelf is the book ‘The Memory Police’ by Yoko Ogawa. Our memory in many ways determines our current day, our reactions to what we speak & share with friends & family. 

The transience of memory is a central theme of Alain Resnais's french movie ‘Hiroshima Mon Amour’ of love and horror in Hiroshima.. The movies was made in 1959 14 years after the bombing which was carried out on 6th and 9th August 1945 in Hiroshima & Nagasaki. We are in November 20 22 - 77 years after the bombing nuclear war rhetorics are again in media with multiple conflicts spreading across the world. 

I saw the movie more as a cinema buff and found it not only a poetic & a beautiful love story but a masterclass in cinematography, music, acting and story telling - hitting you with a striking message on the impact of the bombing. What the civilians went thru, for the first 30 mnts it’s almost like a documentary where it shows the effect of Hiroshima but intertwines beautifully  with the voiceover of Emmanuelle as she is talking to her Japanese lover - telling her what she has seen in Hiroshima.

I would love to see it again without reading subtitles - since now I understand the story just to admire the photography. The parallel drawn between the memory of Hiroshima & the love story of Emmanuelle (the lady) is beautifully told. In a way as we see in the concluding scenes the love story equals the place where it takes place i.e. Nevers in France. So, the story is of Nevers and Hiroshima and what happened.

When we love someone or something and it gets taken away - initially the brutality of it hits you so hard that it knocks you off in the movie it makes her mad (almost) but over a long period of time you forget the memory of what happened the actual images or the scene which played out in front of you. At moments, you hate yourself for forgetting this memory. You question yourself - How can I forget the memory of a person who was my life or played an important role in making me what I am. That triggers a rage which sometimes self destructs you or spoils the current relationship. That is the essence of the movie.

While love is a personal memory. Hiroshima is a collective memory like partition in India’s case. Many of us may not be there but even now there are books which put a lens on what happened during partition. A recent book - Remnants of partition talks about objects which people carried back to India and the story behind it. 

Do places have a memory? This thought stuck me when I was in my return journey from Delhi, As I was emptying the divans, and double beds of quilts (i prefer rajai), dolls  with which I played 50 years back, photographs, shirts I had gifted but not worn…objects almost each of them had a story. As the taxi moved from various lanes of Vikaspuri so many memories got triggered from things as mundane as a place where I made my specs or puja shopping or ram leela ground and places from where I used to take the bus for my college. So many trips and so many memories of love and grief which faded away long back but now comes back as the flight takes off from Delhi. I settle down for a movie in my head 

‘Hiroshima Mon Amour’ is a slow languid movie alternating between love and grief imitating life. See it and you will feel your story come alive after the credit rolls. 

Postscript:

Read about the movie here: In the below note I liked the fact that the movie was made on a brief

Scores on Screen. The Obvious Necessity for Memory: Music and Memory in "Hiroshima, mon amour" on Notebook | MUBI (it was a seminal movie for those interested google endlessly but mubi and criterion has the best articles) 

Read about the bombing here: It made me realise how history is depicted as a rational and factual note, that’s the way we have read history books. This education or history completely overlooks the human side of it & that is why non of us could relate to it. It was just memory of dates and events.  

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Atomic_bombings_of_Hiroshima_and_Nagasaki

The idea of Focus

In my current setting this is unsettling and raises many questions. To focus is to choose. But, if you have made up your choice you are not exploring other things which means you may not have made the right choice. The context is not buying a shampoo because that is where the paradox of choice comes in and people spend hours online without deciding, the context is life decisions.

For most part - deadline pushes you to make a choice, a college admission deadline makes us decide the college which our children go to. What if we do not have a deadline, will we go on trying new things or will we exhaust and choose ? 

For many who are lucky, serendipity plays a big role, being in the right place at the right time can make the choice for you and those who are unlucky, mother nature, or a decision made somewhere in the echelons of corporate makes the choice for you.

Some really don’t care.

This is what Jiddu Krishnamurthy has to say on  attention “As we said, we ought to consider what it means to be attentive. This may be the clue to a harmonious existence. As things are, the intellect, the whole activity of the brain, which is thinking, dominates our existence. This brings about contradiction, peculiar behavior in us. When only one part of our whole being is dominant, it will inevitably bring about neurotic behavior. Attention is awareness of this dominance of intellect without acting on the instinctive urge to control it or to allow emotion to take its place. This awareness brings about subtlety, clarity of mind. 

There is a difference between concentration and attention. Concentration is to bring all your energy to focus on a particular point. In attention there is no point of focus. We are very familiar with one and not with the other. When you pay attention to your body, the body becomes quiet, has its own discipline; it is relaxed but not slack and it has the energy of harmony. When there is attention there is no contradiction and therefore no conflict.”

I agonized over these lines yesterday so could not finish my post. K does that to me (and many of us) always. It’s his way of pushing you to find your own meaning. Some one had commented that he is harsh / rough and difficult to understand whereas Si Sri is much softer / easy - because he gives you an answer, K does not. 

Focus / Concentration is what I (many of us) do when I go to work.I focus completely on getting to the office, doing my meetings with all sincerity, completing my work and coming back - the dominant role is played by intellect or thinking. 

Attention is when I am cooking or running. Yes both of them have a goal but there is harmony in the head - heart and hand / legs when I am doing it and my attention is complete - all your senses are alive - I smell the food, taste the food, see that it looks beautiful. 

Circling back to my original question? Why is a break year (or a longish break) so crucial ? 

When we work our mind gets hardwired to focus and it’s difficult to get away from that circle. It’s embedded deep, even when u take a break - the pre break work / prep and the low of coming back and the stress of the pending work sucks you back with double focus. This is a pattern. Just like a circadian rhythm, this is a pattern which all of us fall into. Many people love it and they should enjoy it as long as it lasts. See TED talk: Danger of a single story (link below).

A similar story plays out after 12th, when we were looking for admissions for Joyee most of her batch mates children had a vague notion of what they want to do - one of the best things which I saw when the new set of colleges - Ashoka, Kriya & Plaksha who understand this and give complete flexibility to students in choosing the subject. They can choose the subjects, do projects, have a mentor who will guide the child on the projects and counsel her on what the application of what they are learning and the future may hold for them. It’s expensive and extends the study period but it sets the direction clear. 

Coming back to ME - it has been 2 months and I am still learning to defocus and just experience activities so I write a lot, shoot photographs (put out the story it whispers in my mind), cook, walk, run, travel, listen to long podcasts which dwell deep into the life of a person. I recently joined a painting class - to build my attention. I am still learning. 

It takes time. 

Focus is great. Attention is Bliss.

Postscript:

Read the full note on awareness by Jiddu Krishnamurthy here: https://jkrishnamurti.org/content/chapter-41-awareness-brings-about-subtley-clarity-mind 

See this TED talk ‘Danger of a single story’ by one of my favorite authors: https://www.ted.com/talks/chimamanda_ngozi_adichie_the_danger_of_a_single_story?language=en

Slowing Down

Did you know that it take 1mnt 45 seconds to heat the boiled water in your gas vs 45 seconds in the microwave.

1. Did you know that to cook a meal for 2 - a basic sabzi, dal & rice (where you are cooking looking at the you tube and making the sabzi) it for the first time take 1 hr all inclusive.

2. Did you know that, when you water the plant and touch the soil in your small piece you feel that you have touched a larger being and feel a connection - Really you can?

3. Did you know that you can buy groceries, biscuits without plastic - like 30 years back ?

4. Did you know that you will get paid if you give plastics out to an organization who will help you recycle it. 

I didn’t. 

The answer to all the above was convenience & reason today we need convenience is because we don’t have time. The reason we don’t have time is because roads are blocked / broken and at times filled with water and we have to travel to the office and that would take an hour or more. If you don’t go to the office you are hooked on to Teams call for the same amount of time. You want to reward yourself in the evening or on the weekend - so you binge watch (i can’t) have a drink, go out, order in - but wait there is no ice - no prob - you will get it in 15 mnts - thanks to Blink It.

 

I didn’t live by many of the things I mentioned above in italics all the time but I did a few things some time. But, it’s true I discovered the answers to all the 5 questions in the last 2 months. I am still trying to find creative ways of using time meaningfully in my 2nd Innings which is, after I took an early retirement - refusing to run the meaningless race.

 

When you slow down,the first thing you discover is that there is a lot of time which is such a luxury - but it takes time to get used to it. You are so used to being busy and multi-tasking that you feel like a student who is caught cheating in his exam. You have this constant urge to do something - you need some goals, some milestones to feel worthy. 

 

How can someone not do anything? This is the expression I get when they see a guy with black hair who has retired. I used to feel very insecure when I said(say) - I don’t know - Am figuring out? It’s a kind of break year for me. You know I want to do sustainability but I also want to do photography, paint, go to Japan & meet Murakami. Before I can finish - I can hear it “He is nuts? He is worse than my 12th class son”

     

I continue walking & when I see the next person approaching I adjust my volume and start listening to Kabir - Ud Jayega Haans Akela….

Ode to Columnists

When we embrace change, it is always followed by a churn. It can seem hard and confusing. We may worry and begin to second guess ourselves. Wise leaders recognise that transitions are hard. They create space for uncertainty and chaos. It is the dark tunnel that eventually leads us towards the light. Stay committed to the purpose and give it time for the fog to clear. These lines are from Natasha Budhwar whose columns I read with a lot of interest in Mint Lounge. Thanks to Amit and his circle of friends and his podcast that I heard her speak (for the first time) on his show Seen & Unseen. 

This was one column I would look forward to every Sunday - I still remember 1 particular article which talked about turning 50 and re-reading it I felt like someone had taken a pen and transcribed what was there in my mind in the most beautiful and poetic way, It's very rare that someone can speak to you and arouse this feeling of friendship without being there. I remember because I turned 50 and I had pasted the cutting on the door of my cupboard which I used to open every day. There were portions of it I had highlighted and dressing up getting ready, I would just read those lines and leave my single room cubby hole in Mumbai.

Staying alone away from my family for a long time the cutting was like a friend who was there, a kind of reminder that said - this loneliness, this struggle, it’s worth it. 

Another columnist who I go back and keep reading is Game Theory by Rohit Brijnath. This is what he wrote on Practice and on Pete Sampras’s retirement. “The practice arena (Court 16 where he would practice)is a factory of repetition,a polishing workshop and it can be boring but it’s also a privilege. He is playful and purposeful, all flick & whip,mobile and still. In matches they would do super slo-mo shots and we could see his head still, eyes tracking the ball on to his racket. An expressive Federer searching for precise self is unforgettable. He quotes a famous choreographer - Practice means to perform, over and over again, in face of all obstacles, the act of vision, of faith, of desire. Practice is a means of inviting the person desired.”

Comparing a game with choreography and it’s importance in sports is an arc which you can cross as visuals of an orchestra or ballet floats in front of you or Maradona dribbling past defender and scoring a goal or Pele coming up at the right time to predict the ball and hit it into the goal. This is magic which we can see but writing it down - that’s the power which columnists need to have for their readers to be true fans. 

Book is a long read - we all have our time slots, cuddling in bed in rajai, sitting in the winter sun (being winter it is evoking these images in me), you have to get into the plot and remember what you read and what you thought would happen etc. It’s like a sapling which grows and becomes a creeper which is slowly spreading on your balcony net. A book is like a creeper which grows on you as you keep reading. 

A column is a fast read, a slower version of browsing. To hold the attention of the reader till the end is a challenge which makes it like a T 20 game vs a 1 day. It’s a lifetime of learning (in sports for Brij & psychology & visceral observation in case of Natasha) which the columnist uses to put forward his / her opinion in front of an unknown audience. 

I believe it’s an amazing work of art & practice which the columnists do week after week and helps us in giving words to our thoughts which lie buried in our heart or mind. 

To me and I think to many others - the column gives meaning to otherwise a mundane day.

Postscript:

Listen to the podcast here:

https://seenunseen.in/episodes/2022/10/31/episode-301-natasha-badhwar-lives-the-examined-life/ 

Some articles here: https://www.tribuneindia.com/columnist/natasha-badhwar-81 

Subscribe her to substack here:https://natashabadhwar.substack.com/