Alphabetically speaking

Atop a building, I'll one day own a house with big windows that open into the sea and palms that walk into my room.

Bougainvilleas are flowers with no fragrance. A steady reminder that we’re not the only ones imperfect.

Cats arrogantly walk about my building compound when I come home tired. They look, and then they look away. Sometimes they even pretend to see through you. They are typically the pseudo advertising types.

Darkness I fear, nights I fancy.

Elevators fill me up with anticipation, there’s always someone you don’t yet know to look forward to.

Friends really came out in the open with their affection and how much of it for me, when I left Delhi. It takes an exit to realise a lot many things, I figured that a month ago.

Grandma, I love you.

Hills do to me what honey does to bee, money does to man, fire does to moth, magnet does to iron, diamond does to a woman.

Ink pens go best with pale yellow ruled pads.

Joseph Heller’s Something Happened was discovered by me tucked under a pile of books in an old church in Simla. It has dark yellow pages and it smells of so many years. I dry flowers in it.

Kettles make my tea that much more special.

Love.

Monsoons make me want to sing and swing around a pole in the middle of the street.

No is the smallest, biggest word. I haven’t learnt to say it yet.

Ohio has bridges I want to stand under, holding someone’s hand. Just the way Francesca held Robert’s in the Bridges of Madison County.

Pakistan gave us Abida Parveen, Farida Khanum, Nurat Fateh Ali Khan. Nothing else matters.

Quaint little cafés in McLeod Gunj killed me.

Rum goes well only with old friends.

Saffron calms me down.

Trains make me want to jump out of them – it’s that free I feel while travelling in a train. Trains mean the spirit of Bombay, wind howling in my ears. Trains mean travel, they mean trips, they mean tunnels, an occasional rainbow, they mean fields, they mean stations you get off for tea, they mean childhood, a deafening sound, they mean tracks that meet for a second and then part ways, they mean speed, they mean window seats and drizzle. They mean my favourite station, Summer Hill near Simla.

Umbrellas remind me of that song from the film Ijaazat. What soul stirring lyrics.

Vanity helps you with your self esteem once in a while.

White flowers are a weakness.

X boyfriends, I loved them truly at some point.

Yesterday, I had two accidents in a row. One in the auto, and one when a piece of hot iron rod fell on my hand at work.

Zen and the art of motorcycle maintenance lies in my library, half finished. An addition to the list of unfinished businesses in my life.