Archives
A Start!
Truly great madness cannot be achieved without significant intelligence.
Henrik Tikkanen
Meet Marty!
An ancient creation of mine! My alter ego, the personification of my procrastination, the skeleton of dead potential! The one who forever waited for the big perfect wave to arrive before he got into the water…he possibly waited to long!
I created Marty not to hi-light the macabre, though the visual association of skeleton is very closely related to death, but more as a creative metaphor of an idea which has decayed to the point of having lost its potential! Let’s say a constant reminder of my own redundancy!
There are few things more challenging then a blank page, a blank canvas, a lump of clay, a block of stone, and a nascent idea! Each invites you to create and at the same time face scrutiny and stand judgment!
Have been egged on by Dina to start a blog of my own, but the task continued to be daunting, trying to figure out how to make the prefect start! The perfect gambit!
Perfection is always a good excuse to delay a decision, and so I've been postponing it, until I realized that I could go on forever and not make a start!
Have you faced such situations too?
Well a wise well-wisher had always told me that “The best way to enter a pool is to jump in” and here I decide to take the plunge!
I have finally decided to take a jump and start off my blog!
This is a blog dedicated to thoughts and thought processes, muses and amuses, life, living, creativity, people, relations and all other odds an ends! Like life expect it to be meandering, loosely associated, completely off track at times, but hopefully moving towards a distant horizon! At times it’ll gush, at other times move sluggishly but most times hopefully it will flow.
I christen my blog, the Thought Garden! Here we, you and I, will seed thoughts, transplant inspiration, harvest a crop of ideas, breed hybrid concepts and indulge in other such pastoral activities.
This blog is mine, but I hope it will be a commune!
I bid you all welcome!
In case you’d like to add a comment (I hope most of you would like to), please add your name too. And in case I don’t know you, please also do leave your e-mail so that I can get back to you. However there’s the risk of a spider locating it, to spam you. In that case do e-mail me! I’d gladly receive a few thousand proposals to enlarge various body parts of mine, irrespective of sex, in my inbox for even one mail, which had some thoughts to share!
In case you’d like to know more about me, visit my ryze page!
Magic delayed...
My childhood years have been weaned on comics. Not that I’m no longer a comic fan, but in the early 70’s it was possibly one of the only means of vicarious escape. Things like TV, computer games, video etc existed mostly in Sci-fi and fantasy novel, which were beyond my purview!
The strips of coloured picture created imaginary realms for me to loose myself in. Superman, Green Lantern, Wonder Woman, Mandrake, Phantom...these weren’t fictional characters but real people who existed in the inner recesses of my mind and with whom I existed. I acknowledged that there was little chance of me bumping into them in my everyday life, but safe in my mind they were as real as one could get! Of course if I could come across any of these Super Heroes walking, breathing, and talking, all my fantasies would be fulfilled!
At the age of seven, I was fortunate enough to get an opportunity to realise my fantasy. My father was in the Indian Army, and each cantonment had a movie hall where there was once a week screening of movies. And, in the cyclostyled typed monthly Film schedule, to my utter disbelief, was written…Adventure of Phantom! This couldn’t be! Phantom was my "favouritest" Hero! Here I was about to have my fantasy realised. Something, which was hitherto just a mere drawing on paper, was going to walk, talk and fight! Surely this was too good to be true!
However life hadn’t quite finished playing all its cards and it landed me an exam the day after the movie. The choice boiled down to either going for the movie or preparing for the exams so as to get "respectable" marks. Well we all know what my choice would have been, but seven year olds are not allowed the privilege to choose what’s good for them by powers that be! My mom however allowed me to go provided I promised to return within an hour and a half even if it meant leaving the movie half way through, to come home and prepare for the exam.
Looking back the movie could at best be described as a third rate B grade film. However to me it was wondrous! Phantom, though in Black and White, now had a voice, Hero (his horse) could run like the wind (whatever that meant), Devil had a menacing growl and they actually sent messages by beating on drums in the jungle telegraph! The proof was there as I could see it all on screen. However bad the production values, nothing could stop me from realising Magic! Such bliss!
We all know that good things are not meant to last. I had made a promise, and half way through the movie, with the Phantom badly wounded and the Villains enjoying a firm upper hand, it was time for me to leave!
I made my way back, out of the movie theatre (it was, still is, an open air theatre) heart heavy. A friend of my parents saw me and asked as to why I was leaving? "’Cos I have to study for an exam tomorrow!" I left giving a last longing lingering look at the flickering Black and white image on the screen.
Many years later I was to see another Phantom the movie! A lot slicker, much better story line (though one hard to believe) lots of effects and action and much better suit. In short a lot more impressive, but I was no longer a little boy of seven! There was no magic in the experience.
Somehow the dreams and longings of the little boy still remain unfulfilled.
They say "Justice delayed is justice denied!" Could it also be true that Magic delayed is magic denied? Would it be all that bad if things went as per our dreams? What would it be like if phrases like "All that happens, happens for the best!" were to become redundant?
They say life is a summation of all the choices we make. It’s also a summation of small dreams denied or delayed. Why does it have to be this way? Why can’t we dream and have them realised? Would I be lesser a person if my dreams stood realised? And we all sought power from the realisation of each other’s dreams rather then the power of denying someone their dream? Of those who deny or block the path of magic realisation is God/Life/Destiny the first culprit?
I’m not sure I have satisfactory answers but do have uneasy questions and the lingering memory of a little boy who stood at the exit of the Cinema hall taking turns watching the flickering images of his dream realisation and the exit sign, which lead towards his commitments.
Could I go back and tell him gently to stop and watch the magic unfold to his hearts satisfaction and life would take care of itself and the commitments?
Then again I wonder if that dream had been realised, would I still have retained the magic of it all and nurtured that child lovingly within me?
Dear reader: In case you’d like to add a comment (I hope most of you would like to), please add your name too. And in case I don’t know you, please also do leave your e-mail so that I can get back to you. However there’s the risk of a spider locating it, to spam you. In that case do e-mail me! I’d gladly receive a few thousand proposals to enlarge various body parts of mine, irrespective of sex, in my inbox for even one mail, which had some thoughts to share!
In case you’d like to know more about me, visit my ryze page!
A Temporal Love Affair
Have you ever made love to a moment?
The discovery of another New Year ('98): S/W Bryce2; Poser3
Have you ever made love to a moment?ffice
ffice" />
Have you ever given it your completeness? Have you been totally with a living moment?
Gave it your full attention, not entranced by its sisters, the phantasm of future or the siren of dead past?
Have you ever sought the moment with love, instead of wanting it to live up to your expectations? Have you tried to not load your wilful hopes on it and willingly accept what gifts it brings your way?
Have you ever given a moment, some time?
Allowed yourself to be enthralled by it? Be caressed by its kiss however tentative it might be?
Have you offered it your commitment to a partnership and built up some harmony? Have you chased it all your life and never stopped with it to experience? Have you ever stopped with it in a quite glade or enjoy with it an armada of clouds fleet past?
Have you ever said you never had enough of it, but never given enough of yourself to it?
Have you looked at it as a continuous flow instead of a bevy of lovers, arriving, one after the other, to indulge you in a bit of celebration?
Like you I’ve lost time too, have given up the moment with all its bounties, lost to its chimerical twin sisters, the ghostly siren of the dead past and the phantasm of the future.
I’ve lost it to worry! Worry for what time would bring for me around the bend of future and yet never stopped to ask time, as it flowed past me in moments, the question.
I’ve lost it to dreams of future constructs yet never partnered it to create from this moment on.
I’ve cursed it for not bringing to me a prop to attend to my posy of fears, yet never caught myself welcome it, and wait long enough to inspect in it the bouquet of opportunities it brought my way.
I’ve called it the mistress of destiny, an enslaver, and the bandit robbing me of my will. I’ve abused it for not being a slave to my expectations. I’ve scorned it with pent up anger, frustration and pain, for imaginary prizes not got, and lost in my self-pity ignored greater gifts which was around the bend of time.
I never asked the moment to help me unsheathe my will to test the travails of destiny.
I’ve been caught in a dead calm, I said, blinded to the moment’s sensuous dance as it waited for me to step out in tune with it.
Whenever it’s come to me in a beauteous form, I’ve wanted some other. For no beauty was good enough for me, proclaimed I, never admitting that I might find myself inadequate for the beauty offered. Instead of putting my fears and uncertainties to test, I found it easier to heap curse on the moment.
Yet, through all my idiosyncrasies, the moment stayed with me. It hurt, it ached, but by me it stood. The bouquet now carried the same flowers of my dead expectations, knowing I would never care to inspect it closer nor look around for an alternative. My insults it accepted with a smile, veiling a pain in its all-seeing eyes. Frustrated by its inability to speak, wanting to prod me to look upon it as a radiating choice instead of a narrow tube of happenstance.
The tale would have carried on into a dreary wasted end, unless moment hadn’t taken its sister, the phantasm of future, into confidence and decided to ambush me, to shake me off my temporal callousness, awaken my senses from their comatose perception.
Together they planned some eddies along the flow, put up a few cascades of surprise and flooded in a sudden volley of turmoil.
I was snapped out of my stupor and suddenly found myself navigating a treacherous stretch. And in so doing gifted myself a most precious gift of all! A sense of wonderment!
A sense long lost! A sense I was made to believe, and I readily believed at that, that I no longer required. And even as I tried to steady the lifeboat to bring it into the waters of status quo, I began to notice the moment anew.
I saw how beauteous it was.
I saw that it always had something more to offer. I saw that it responded!
Some moments were coquettish, some petulant. Some were indulgent, others indignant. Yet no moment was the same and each bore a gift, awaiting my interaction.
I can’t say that my lifeboat has steadied, nor claim that now I’m a sailor of skill.
But it gladdens me to say that I’m now, alive to now! Whether we, the moments, and me make something grand or not is difficult to say, but I’ve been able to inject a sense of wonder in our relationship and the view is enthralling!
Dear reader: In case you’d like to add a comment (I hope most of you would like to), please add your name too. And in case I don’t know you, please also do leave your e-mail so that I can get back to you. However there’s the risk of a spider locating it, to spam you. In that case do e-mail me! I’d gladly receive a few thousand proposals to enlarge various body parts of mine, irrespective of sex, in my inbox for even one mail, which had some thoughts to share!
In case you’d like to know more about me, visit my ryze page!
Insomnia
Insomnia came with recommendations in the extremities! While Sunil and Deepak recommended it, Lavanya and Vineeta denounced it or had strong reservations about it!
Well the only way to settle the matter was to go and see it for myself, and that’s what I did yesterday, playing hooky from office (something which I had been promising to do for quite a while!)
My reaction: Five thumbs up!!! Definitely a great film to see and here’s why:
fficeffice" />
The movie opens with Pacino's character, LAPD detective Will Dormer (Dormer? French verb, to sleep?), arriving at a small fishing port in Alaska with partner Hap (Martin Donovan) to investigate the grisly death of a young teenage girl. Swank is the 'Nancy Drew'-like small-town cop that assists the two veterans during their stay. They come to Alaska, with an on-going departmental investigation, taking place against them. The spin comes into play as Dormer finds himself closely paralleling the killer’s (whose identity is disclosed quite early in the film) experience and he along with the viewers start walking the tight rope of what is right and what is wrong.
I’ll not get into the details of the story, but in case you are interested you’ll find some good reviews of the film here, here and here!
Let me come to my reactions straight away:
Over all reaction: The cinematography of the movie is superb! And Alaska turns into a part of the start cast providing a presence, which is tangible and comes into play through out the film. The use of sound in this film was terrific, the acting superb and the script taut and airtight! What more could a good movie want? Thus my vote for it!
Details: A complaint, which can be made about the film, is the film is predictable! But that only comes into play if the movie is considered to belong to the whodunit genre! I however feel that Insomnia is definitely a crime thriller but not a whodunit. Also all narrative is a mix of the ritual and novelty, therefore no narrative could be completely bereft of the ritual elements and still be palatable to the broad based market which is the Hollywood audience. Secondly when a conflict has been introduced, it would have to be resolved by confrontation, if the dramatic climax has to be attained and for a Hollywood movie belonging to the crime thriller genre, a physical confrontation is but natural, in fact the audience was set up for it. Would this be too predictable for the film?
Being someone who works in the cinematic/audio-visual media, I can’t but help notice the craft of film making involved in a movie and the craftsmanship in Insomnia is superb by any stretch of imagination!
The cinematography, low lit, dramatic, swinging from starkness to the soft light illumination of everlasting twilight, the starkness of the insomnial state, the claustrophobia of a sleep deprived mind, the extreme close-ups, almost microscopic shots merging into the vista shots of the untamed terrain...just observing the craft of the camera redeemed the price of the ticket! (Or paisavasool as the Bombay patois would term it)
The sound ably complemented the camera work, spinning out moods, distorting reality, playing on the viewers mind, inducing Insomnia within the two odd hours of the Film play!
The chase in the fog, lyrical yet tense, would have been a production manager’s nightmare (how do you choreograph fog density to cue?) and could easily have fallen flat on the screen turned into a virtuoso tango between the editor and the cinematographer!
So was the chase over the logs (reminded me a bit of Stake Out) is one of the best-choreographed action sequence I’ve seen recently. You were not only there, but also inside the water, lungs straining to get out!
The Script was taut and, I feel, walked the tightrope of maintaining the tension of a thriller and yet have enough leeway to explore the conflict of the Black & White world of right and wrong clash with the gray area of what exactly is a crime.
The allegorical use of everlasting sunlight bearing down relentlessly on the protagonist like the truth of his past catching up with him, was quite nicely conceptualized and executed. The exploration of whether the “end justifies the means” and other deeper questions on what constitutes crime and other such issues were presented well enough to evoke questions in viewers mind yet not relieve the tension which keeps a crime thriller moving, was I feel, balanced perfectly. And this is no means an easy task. No scene in the movie was out of place or redundant!
In fact in terms of content I’m reminded of KRZYSZTOF KIESLOWSKI’s “Short film on killing” from his Decalogue series.
Finally the raw beauty of Alaska provided just the right backdrop of exploring the rawness of both emotions and crime, stripped of the black and white delineation of judgment.
As cinematic experience goes, I definitely recommend Insomnia strongly. Some of you might differ with me. I hope you’ll put in your thoughts on the same here!
Dear reader: In case you’d like to add a comment (I hope most of you would like to), please add your name too. And in case I don’t know you, please also do leave your e-mail so that I can get back to you. However there’s the risk of a spider locating it, to spam you. In that case do e-mail me! I’d gladly receive a few thousand proposals to enlarge various body parts of mine, irrespective of sex, in my inbox for even one mail, which had some thoughts to share!
In case you’d like to know more about me, visit my ryze page!
Time enough
Thought I'd post this post my muse on Temporal Love Affair.
Time enoughfficeffice" />
Have you stopped to watch
The rays of sun kiss the edge of clouds
As it skirted past,
The blades of grass caress the wind
Whistling through the meadows
Or have you sacrificed these gifts
To lack of time
The hover of dragonfly
Demonstrating its celestial technology
The beam of a face surprised
By appreciation unexpected but expressed,
Have you stopped to watch?
Or lost it all
To a frenzy of future appointments
The smile in your love's eyes
To a play of errant thoughts
The giggle of a child
Enthralled by rainbows confined in bubbles
The rapture of mind ensconced in innocence.
Or swerved past it
Skidding off to catch time lost.
Hold on and live the moment through
To unwind its miracles before you
Catch you with a new turn of surprise
To renew in you all that is alive.
For all miracles there has always been
Enough time to unravel,
But for all your fears there never was time enough!
Dear reader: In case you’d like to add a comment (I hope most of you would like to), please add your name too. And in case I don’t know you, please also do leave your e-mail so that I can get back to you. However there’s the risk of a spider locating it, to spam you. In that case do e-mail me! I’d gladly receive a few thousand proposals to enlarge various body parts of mine, irrespective of sex, in my inbox for even one mail, which had some thoughts to share!
In case you’d like to know more about me, visit my ryze page!
An ode to the last moment!
Tides of Time: Photoshop.
The only useful thing about a deadline is, it is preceded by the 'last moment'!
And it's this 'last moment', which lays claim to 99% of my productivity. A desperate attempt to miss the guillotine of the 'last moment' has seen me complete more work then any other motivators. The rest 1% is sheer, sporadic indulgence.
There's something about the 'last moment', which provides the clearest vision, the deepest insight, the bridge across all creative blocks, the most coherent thoughts and the complete symphony of dead heat effort.
The mad dash of the last moment isn't a preferred modus operandi. Indeed I've tried all other saner means. I've structured, scheduled, planned, strategised and indulged in all other pro-active, proto-active, para-active and all other suitably prefixed activities. Efforts geared towards ensuring a diligent application, on my part, to utilise the vast expanse of time, which lay before the 'last moment', to make the task more steady and fruitful. All to no avail of course. Having observed the design of my life I realise that this is a futile effort!
I might try my best to convince myself that I'm a long distance runner, but when it comes to reality it's the last moment sprint I indulge in! Possibly due to the sheer impossibility of achievement and the desperation to make-do, that the sprint even becomes a flight, and for that 'last moment', I grow wings and in the blur of the dash even fly!
Could it be that this was the way birds first learned to fly? By urgent flapping of fore limbs! Trying to escape the deadline of extinction and in the process growing feathers? Could they have been the original 'last moment-ers'?
Can it be that, given enough deadlines, I'll be flapping enough to grow some feathers of my own?
Let me sit and blissfully contemplate the possibility...even as the deadline seems like a mere speck in the distant horizon!
In the meanwhile what kind of person are you?
- Last moment-er?
- Half-way mark sprinter?
- The paced runner?
- Or have you already learnt to fly?
Dear reader: In case you’d like to add a comment (I hope most of you would like to), please add your name too. And in case I don’t know you, please also do leave your e-mail so that I can get back to you. However there’s the risk of a spider locating it, to spam you. In that case do e-mail me! I’d gladly receive a few thousand proposals to enlarge various body parts of mine, irrespective of sex, in my inbox for even one mail, which had some thoughts to share!
In case you’d like to know more about me, visit my ryze page!