Kindred Spirits

Source: Shutterstock

"I felt that he was a kindred spirit as soon as ever I saw him."
"You're both queer enough, if that's what you mean by kindred spirits." said Marilla with a sniff.


The twelve year old put down Anne of Green Gables for an occasional brooding.


Kindred spirits. Perfect! It was simply perfect. Ahh bless the soul who coined that term. 'Best friend' sounded so low key, don't you think? You get a few good clicks together with someone and bam you're #BffsForLife. According to the statuses in social networking sites that is. Calling you my best friend simply wouldn't suffice. At all. I thought there wasn't any other choice. Until of course I read Anne of Green Gables and discovered this something that perfectly described what you were to me.


So the next day at school I rush over to you with my new found knowledge, grinning so wide you'd think I'd won the lottery. And you grinned back for absolutely no reason before I said it -

I am Grateful :)

I lay beside the window watching the night sky. The lights are out and my roommates have slept. The sky is cloudy, leaving not a single star in sight. But my mind isn't on the sky, it's still reminiscing in the day's events. There is a smile planted on my face. To that, I am grateful.

We still stay free #PeriodPride

"What's that?" Asked the curious little one, watching her sister sneak a plastic packet into the bathroom.
"What's what?" She replied, doing a bad job in hiding the stuff.

Ten to One - Do you know me?

I didn't want to do two tagged posts in a row at first, but this was too fun to resist. So once again here's a get to know me more post...followed from Vishal's, Leo's and Geets' posts. A total of fifty five questions in the order of ten to one. Hold your breath!

Source: FirstCovers

#Ten How's

How did you get one of your scars? 
  - I must have been five when a coconut shell somehow sprung out of the fireplace and landed on my chest. Thankfully, I don't recall the details...only that I cried and got a permanent burn mark on the skin.

A to Z of me #WritingWednesdays

So this interesting 'A to Z of me' post has been circling the blogosphere for a while. I saw it at Leo's, Sanch's, Geetika's, Anamika's and a few others. And now I'm in the list too...stating 26 random facts from A to Z about myself. Tadaa!

A- Age: Almost 18

B- Biggest fear: Rejection and Abandonment

The Liebster's Here !

Dear Vinay Leo R from I Rhyme Without Reason has bestowed me with the Liebster Award and here's a BIG thanks to him for the same. Despite being awarded for the fourth time, he was kind enough to pass it on to his new friends in the blogosphere. :)

So here are the rules of the award...

• Thank the person who nominated you and link back to their blog.
• Display the Liebster Award on your blog.
• Share 11 random facts about yourself.
• Answer the 11 questions you were asked.
• Nominate 11 bloggers with less than 200 followers for the Award and have them answer 11 questions.
• Let the other bloggers know you’ve nominated them.
• Copy the rules into your post

     Here we go, 11 facts about me...

1.  I'm short
2.  l love to daydream
3.  I love Snickers chocolate (and you may get me one the next time you meet me)
4.  I don't watch TV
5.  But I do watch American series and sometimes Anime (in PC)
6.  I love taking solo walks
7.  I often go to my terrace at night for introspection and some me time
8.  I wish I didn't have to sleep at all
9.  I like to be always on the move, and keep myself busy
10.  I'm not good at picking favourites
11.  I ask at least five people before taking a decision

. . .

     And here's Leo's questionnaire

 1.  One memory that you cherish from your school days?

 -      Bunking classes in groups, and feeling like spies while dodging teachers in corridors.

 2.  Your favourite fiction novel, and why?
  - Like I said, not good at favourites. But I guess I'll go for Harry Potter, and you must know why!

 3.  One thing you'd always tend to be forgetful of?
  - Uhmm....I can't remember :p

 4.  One thing you do to regain calmness when you are upset?
  - Write. Always.

 5. A food and/or beverage you love having on a rainy day?
  - Freshly brewed tea <3

 6.  One thing you wish people would stop pestering you about?
  - Future plans! They'll know about it soon enough in the future right? They should stop asking!! (Or maybe it's just a different way of saying I don't have a proper answer :p )

 7.  Favourite among all your nicknames and why?
  - Dashy. Because the only other ones are Dachu and Piggy out of which the former is my childhood name and the latter was framed by my idiots (or 'friends')

 8.  A rose in a bouquet or in the garden?
  - Garden, the biggest bouquet in itself.

 9. A part of social network that irritates you?
  - "Hey" - "Hey" -"Sup?" -" Nothing much, you?" - "same" - "hmm" - "wat els?"
   These kind of conversations. If they have nothing to say, why message at all?

10. That place that you love returning to for vacation?.
  - My grandparents' place.  Nothing beats that. If only I didn't get fatter each time I returned!

11. Favorite day of the year, and why?
  - New year's eve. There's some magic in that day, the flashback of the whole year  before you, and remembering all those people who mattered to you the most.

. . .

 I'd like to nominate the following awesome bloggers for the award, hoping they'd accept it and pass it on, with no obligations though. In case they've already gotten the award, I suppose they're worth getting it twice then. ;)

1. Ramya Rao P at Words & Me
2. Sunita Rajwade at Mumbai On a High
3. Sampada Raje at My Musings
4. Geetika Gupta at Boisterous Bee
5. Ankita Shukla at Mojito With A Twist
6. Sriram at Sriram Warrier
7. Geetashree Chatteerjee at Mindspeak-Vanderloost
8. Chandana Sreetha at Boongbangeverything
9. Athira Jim at Bewitched By Words
10. Sidra Nadeem at Imperfectly Perfect Life
11. Karan Shah at Scribble

...

  My Questions for the nominees

 1. What made you start blogging?
 2. If for one day you could be someone else, who would it be?
 3. How would you like to spend your birthday?
 4. One of the proudest moments of your life?
 5.  Do you prefer night or day? Why?
 6. What are the three movies you can't get enough of?
 7. A dream that you had at night and cannot forget?
 8. What would you like to be remembered for?
 9. What is the greatest advice you've heard?
10. What is your dream destination?
11. One thing you'd like to change about this world?

. . .
Signing off,
- and looking forward to some answers-
Dashy

Real Togetherness from a cleaning drive

The streetlights were still on when the sun rose, lighting up the peaceful Calicut city only beginning to awaken from its slumber. The Kozhikode Beach witnessed a higher turnout of visitors than the usual weekends. Especially today, when people had something more than a casual hang-around idea in mind. Most of them were here for a purpose, with a resolve to transform the arena. They were here to clean the city and show their respect to dear Bapu.

It is the second day of October, the day that reminds us of the greatest man on Earth who couldn't rest until he saw goodness reap in every corner of Earth. This day saw the nation holding hands in integrity, for the better good of the society. This day, not only India, but the world bowed to Mahathma Gandhi, the man who became the change he wished to see in the world.

 And today, the natives of Calicut had gathered at different places for a cleaning drive, for every man in the city was entitled to its cleanliness. Their smartphones and laptops were going to be disappointed, for they would be inactive all day. This time, the people were going to be active, and not the phones.

The daily morning walkers passed right past the quarters across the Beach, expecting to see the usual mountain of garbage near its entrance which had become its landmark. But today, they saw something new. Masked men holding sacks and sticks dotted the place. Some of them brought in shovels and buckets. After all this time, the residents had decided to clear it themselves, why wait for the rag pickers who might never show up?

And for once, the quarters saw real togetherness among their residents., united with brooms (mind you, we're not talking about AAP). People from every block came out with their tools. There was a lot of swishing and sweeping, picking and poking, scrounging and brushing until the mountain was brought down and replaced with natural manured soil. The land was then embed with small plants, and a sign that read, "Please do not throw waste here".

By the end of the admirably exhausting effort put forth by the neighborhood, the ladies had prepared a lovely lunch for everyone. As the men, women and children gathered together for the lunch, they had had their reward. Nope, not the lunch (although one wouldn't deny that the ladies had done a stunning job), but what was more worth was the real togetherness that they got to have. The profuse sweating that spoke of the volumes of hard work, the taste of the food that explained all the love put into making it, those smiles on everybody's faces that could beat everything else they could possibly have.

Yes, Real Togetherness is the best reward for their effort. Why,  they had made a pact with mother earth as well, all along in the presence of Bapu  in their hearts. And from the next day on, the morning walkers had a surprise, with the garbage landmark being replaced by a garden.

Such is the story of this quarters. Maybe the same happens elsewhere too. Here's a video of a similar incident of Kissanpur discovering real togetherness.

http://www.kissanpur.com

Go McCrazy

http://www.mccainindia.com/McCain India

"I'm going home!" she snapped back at me, visibly frustrated. With her hair all tousled up and eyeliner smeared, anyone would've said she looked like a ghost. But not me. To me, she would always be my gorgeous bestie. And today I was determined to give her the best surprise one could possibly give. 

"What are you sniggering at you meathead?!" she squeaked at me again. Gorgeous, that she was. But it was so hard not to laugh at how funny she looked when annoyed. In a few minutes, that was going to change anyway. I had to take care not to spoil the surprise. So I composed myself and spoke up, "You're not leaving yet sweety. There's something important, come with me." and I turned my back to her and walked off, knowing she would follow. "This better be good." she chimed from behind me.

It was Catherine's sweet sixteen, and for a girl like her one wouldn't disagree that she deserved better than what happened with her today. She was so caring, so smart, so elegant though slightly crazy, that you couldn't just not love her. She'd been in high spirits in the morning, but was quite bummed when all she received was a few birthday wishes from people who didn't matter. Her gang did meet up with her, but hadn't uttered a word about it being her special day. By now, it was noon and Catherine couldn't be more pissed about it all. 

We'd reached Forum Mall. I could bet she knew why we were here already, or at least had an idea. "Look!" came her cute squeaky voice, "If you simply want to sit and have a snack, I'm not in the mood. I'm just gonna buy my McCain french fries and leave okay?"

I was grinning again. Of course she wasn't in the mood to eat! But she never said no to McCain (none of us did in fact). Cathy was nuts about potatoes, and naturally of McCain. McCrazy, we called her.

 She followed me to the elevator. Catherine stepped out on the fifth floor and turned to our usual place. She stopped short. "Oh My..." 

"Surprise!!!" chorused the twenty or so people before her, each holding a coloured balloon. The arched board on top read "Happy Birthday McCatherine!" 

A table placed right in the middle of the crowd had a double-decker cake, decorated with McCain smiles with whipped cream and lettuce on top. McCain french fries covered the whole of the bottom layer. A tray next to the birthday 'McCake' had McCain cheese shotz, and another had nuggets. There was no better gift for miss McCrazy Catherine.

I could swear Cathy went wild with joy. All her frustration disappeared in a poof as she hugged me in euphoria. Ha! It was worth it. She looked back at all her favourite McCain snacks and then at us, at a loss for words. And at that moment I knew, that my gorgeous girl couldn't have asked for more.

McCain had always brought us light moments. With the way Cathy was ignored on her special day, one would've thought she'd never forgive us. But then, this surprise definitely beats everything.

Right now when I looked at her, I couldn't say if the happiest person in the world was her for having gotten the surprise, or just me for making this happen. Why, it was not everyday that we get to have all the McCain snacks together. Each one of us in the party was glad to be here, glad to make Cathy smile, and glad to smile with her.

 "You guys are crazy!" Cathey finally croaked, finding her voice again. I shook my head, "Nop." And with loud ripples of laughter, all the twenty of us chorused, 

"We're McCrazy!!" 

A Week with the Kitchen

Surely, it could manage for a week without mom. But of course it wouldn't be happy about it. Dad and I were to take her position for the time being. We were to be employed as home-makers temporarily. Salary? Three square meals everyday, that is, if we do it right. It was only a matter of one week after all, how hard could it be? So here we go..

#Day 1

Dad and I enter the kitchen, all geared up to make the dish of the day. While dad got the tea ready, I opened the fridge to get all the stuff we might need. Well, there was *everything* that we needed. As in, mom'd prepared food for a day to ease our work. We were relieved, but also secretly disappointed to have nothing to cook for the day. But the kitchen was happy. So were we.

#Day 2

Dad and I are feeling responsible. Today, we are going to cook!  As I scrounge the kitchen for our requirements, dad becomes acutely mad for not finding anything he wants. Unfortunately, the kitchen sensed the heated mood and got irritated. It ended up hiding all that we needed in easily-unnoticed corners. After an exhausting preparation of a few hopefully-edible idlis, we still hadn't made the curry we planned to. If we were to start making that, we'd end up having breakfast at lunch time.  Luckily, there was still some left from what mom made, and we adjusted with it for the day.

#Day 3

We start early, with one day's experience of work. We'd finished up all the curry by now. So it was going to be a dad 'n' me special sambhar. He asked me to get all the vegetables we had. I did. There were so many that we couldn't choose. So naturally, dad cut out all the veggies available and we had a tough time finding a vessel big enough to fit them all. With a great deal of excitement we made our epic sambhar, just the way we expected. Content with the accomplishment of making enough sambhar for the neighborhood, every other dish looked petty. So I shall not be mentioning it here. The Kitchen was content too, though exhausted just the way were.

#Day 4

The kitchen badly needed a bath. It wasn't particularly fond of the change in livelihood in the past three days. Dad and I were cross at it more often, and it only made things worse for us. Atleast we were glad the sambhar was in plenty. We didn't have to make more curry for a while. I gave the kitchen a nice clean up. Hopefully it would be better tempered now. It was definitely missing mom a lot. All we did was mix things in wrong proportions, make food either too much or too less, and leave a huge heap of left-over wastes around. But I guess we were getting a hang of it. 3 days to go.

#Day 5

Whoops. Poor kitchen is running out of supplies. Dad and I went shopping. In any case, we had to keep the kitchen in good terms with us. The refrigerator, the plastic containers, cupboards, everything was empty. Except the dustbin though. Surprisingly, the sambhar had gotten over. Apparently, we consumed it too lavishly, overestimating its quantity. We managed to make a fish curry in just about the right quantity. The kitchen was reloaded. Clean and complete. We'd done our dishes well. Ahha. Who said the kitchen was a tough nut to crack?! It was a piece of cake for us! 

#Day 6

The smoothest day so far. That's right, we rocked the kitchen. I bet it loved us. Dad and I didn't complain anymore. We'd replaced the kitchen stuff our way. It wasn't confusing now either. We'd nailed it! Trust us, cooking had actually become fun, though time-consuming. It wasn't a full-time job anyway. We did have a few hours of break after each meal. Since we were only beginners, many petty jobs in the household were waived. There is no teaching aid to prepare us to handle a home after all, the only means of learning being experience. Mom is so far ahead in the field that we couldn't possibly see her. But at least today we got the knack of it. The kitchen was happy, so were we.

#Day 7

Dad and I feel very important. One more day and we would succeed in our week-long kitchen management task. You have to admit that our accomplishment isn't trivial! Everything was in place, we knew what to do , and we had one smooth day's experience. This day was surely going to be better. 

*Ding Dong* 

Surprise! The veteran home-maker is back a day early. It seemed that she missed the kitchen too much to have stayed away any longer. We could have easily managed another day. But yes, we were relieved.

Mom is quick to adjust back with the kitchen. It seems overjoyed, and more homely. It wasn't as neat and organized as we'd kept it. But it seemed to like the slightly messy way mom liked to keep it. What we took hours to do she did with a flick of her finger. What we couldn't find in the kitchen, mom saw with her third eye. What not another soul could do, mom could make home feel home. 

And so we now know the tedious task of handling a kitchen. Here's our salute to all moms for their perseverance, patience and peace-keeping, which most of us often fail to appreciate. Spend a week with the kitchen and you'll know it.