A Million Shades Of Grey

I love rain. simple as that... you're thinking i'm in the right city... i am. although the rain here isn't the rain i fell in love with initially... people complain about our currently horrible rainy summer... i've been basking in the grey-ry!

rain and warmth together are like Penelope Cruz, Natalie Portman and i talking about how great my taste in music is... over cocktails... Caesar without Tabasco for me, thanks.

a healthy child... running... jumping... unattended... wild... free... emphatic... joyous... dancing under the amber-grey dusted skies and hopping in the puddle swamped streets of Jallandhar, Punjab, India, was i... within that period, that space, that I. i developed, i enveloped a love for the monsoon season. i revelled under snug torrential showers. the perpetual rain. the perpetual warmth... funny how childhood experiences develop (un)healthy obsessions within us.

i love rain... in case you didn't read me properly... I LOVE RAIN!

laying in my landlord's hot tub staring at the sky up above swallowing the slightest hints of water not deserving to be called drops, falling upon me... from up there, somewhere up there... wet powder fell upon me. i decided to write while dewy dust dropped on me. dry steam raised up off me. limbs relaxed, absolutely. thoughts calmed me. those eternal thoughts of calm. that grey... everything grey. no moon. no stars. no clouds... just grey. no color... shades... shades of grey. a million shades of grey... no black. no white. grey... just grey. a million shades of grey.

I Was

I was going to write something... decided not to just as i thought i better...

k, here i go.

was. past.

the past is a funny thing. actually it depends on your past. mine's not so funny per se. funny moments? yes. funny past? no.

past is that pest that brings pestilence at best.

been bit by it.

always hurts, always lurks.

can't shake it. afraid of it.

what next? dare ask it?

past knows. future shows.

can i let go? NO!

the bite from the angered beast repletes.

the poisonous salt of mind repeats.

i am. what i was.

The Look Of Love

Size wise, the eyes, are such a small part of the body but in communicating with each other their significance is unmatched. babies and even dogs can express themselves with their eyes and understand what their communicator is trying to say to them.

they truly are windows into our souls.

i read something in a book earlier today which inspired this, it was just something about being in an ICU waiting room and the kinship between strangers there. it made me think of when i used to have to go to the chemo room every 2nd week and the people i shared that room with. first thing i remembered about these now faceless people was their eyes. our shared glances. our shared smiles... that always came AFTER eye contact. and so much was shared between us within those split second glances. SO MUCH. so much love. so much understanding. so much sorrow. so much pity. so much thankfulness. so much welcome... not only between us patients but also with friends and family who came along to comfort their loved ones... i was always the youngest and i was always alone (i never asked anyone to come) but those split second glances never discriminated by age or kith and kin or anything else for that matter.

and the nurses always had eyes full of joy and comfort, they left their home and family stressed eyes at the door of the chemo room and put on reassuring and nourishing eyes on for us. which was needed and we were grateful for them. (i've been holding a post on nurses back, i'll get on it eventually.)

my favorite eyes though, are the "come hither" eyes, the ones only a woman can give me. it is one of the greatest feelings to get those from someone special... or someone drunk and not so special too ;) ok so the latter might not be so special but still feels good. i've had girls that have seen me make those eyes and returned them with a smile and a kiss, i've had 1 or 2 even say, "not now, amman" which i would return with a smile and a shrug... or the lack of eye contact with someone who once bore the look of love.

my eyes have given me away too. 1 girl i used to work with always knew when i was sad even though i would be smiling... a false one that my eyes couldn't mask, not from her anyway. some people are a lot more intuitive of other peoples eyes and some much more expressive with them. i've been told my eyes are expressive, i wish i was more intuitive with them too. some people hide their eyes well.

love can feel so much heavier in the eyes than with words just as eyes heavy with hurt can't match the words explaining that hurt.

i hope to show invisible eyes through writing.

I've Never Known What's Good For Me

i don't like how i have the inability to let people close to me get close to me. the inability to keep people not close to me to remain that way.

i've been let down.

time after time. after time. after time.

something lets this continue. i. bare my soul. my heart. to people. that i know will not do the same. knowingly... i think... i know... i think... worse, they might know.

my friends that have always been there for me and stuck with me through thick and thin don't really know me... probably... i think... my fault... certainly... i don't let them in, let them in my secret world. i hide. from them. i hide. "they wouldn't get it anyway." they would pretend for my sake. to make me happy. for my sake. they would do anything to make me happy... so i ignore... i'm ignorant.

i wonder of someone without obligation. someone of want. almost need... it's what i want... i almost need.

3

i lost an aunt. due to cancer. again. but i'm tired of writing about cancer so i'll try something else.

this aunt, along with another and my mom and my dad along with their husbands were great friends, when i, my brother and their offspring were children. small bright eyed children. the ones you see blowing out candles, the ones dressed to impress (or to embarrass us in latter years), the ones with ear to ear smiles in those family pictures. Because that's what we were, extended family. our parents were immigrants and they somehow found each other, befriended each other. that was almost an eternity ago...

we were best friends as children as were our parents as adults. us children had our nucleus disintegrate, in one way or the other. our parents' friendships somewhat distanced and maybe diminished a little. their internal spousal conflicts definitely had a part. so our childhood friendships diminished and disintegrated along with their relationships.

of our 3 families, 2 have felt the ABSOLUTELY DEVASTATING loss of a parent. i, the fortunate one, have only felt distance to one of my parents. i mean fortunate in every sense of the word, their pain i could never understand or even begin to comprehend nor do i wish to, I'M TRULY SORRY!

all this made me think of how life and its inhabitants change and how relationships can be so apparently life lasting and then break away to strangeness. not real strangeness but that awkward strangeness, that distance, though the love remains... THE LOVE ALWAYS REMAINS... what hurts is that sometimes it takes tragedy to bring it forth.

i wonder how my own adult friendships will further evolve or dissolve. i hope they never dissolve.

RIP MR. SALH AND MS. SANGHA, my uncle and auntie neither will ever be forgotten.

It Is What It Is

You know how you feel like you deserve the best because you're a great person? deep, deep down inside you feel like you're good, so why not the best for you? you ask, why shouldn't i deserve the best? why should i not possess what i wish? not something outlandish, not something unreasonable, but something that is truly within your reach, something you should have because you are who you are, something you should have because it makes absolute sense. YOU FUCKIN DESERVE IT!!!

so why is this not yours? why is this not mine? why not?

it's not a car, it's not a mansion, it's not a career as a professional athlete, this is something that can be yours but isn't for some unforeseen reason, something mystical, only the stars know why.

so why is that not mine? why is that not yours? what's holding you and me back from that becoming ours? WE HAVE TO SACRIFICE...

how much? what if i feel like i've sacrificed all i can? this thing still isn't mine.

what if i was someone else? this thing would so easily be mine... so i imagine... why should i need to imagine myself as someone else? just to have it? i just want it.

i have friends much greater than i, AND THEY DON'T EVEN FEEL THEY DESERVE IT!

if i feel like i deserve it, then they most certainly do!

i wish is wasn't always it.

Harder, Better, Faster, Stronger

I'm 30! turned so almost a month ago. i haven't noticed any changes or anything, except for everyone asking me "how does it feel to be 30?" that question is new to me. so the only change in my life has been a general query on the minds of most people around me. this question is only annoying because of the attitude in which it usually presents itself. ok, i know i'm being snarky so let's just get on with it...



"GREAT!?" replied amman with a sense of confusion of its sincerity, which only felt perplexing due to the investigator's perceived response to his question. amman and the inquirer looked at each other dubiously, each wondering of the intention of their utterances. ok, amman's being snarky again so let's just get on with it...



seriously though, i do feel great. i'm in a better place than i have ever been in my life. that said, i'm not happy either perhaps somewhat content depending on your definition of content. but the melancholy, poverty and poor health of my terrible 20s pale in comparison to my present state of delusive exuberance. so the word "great" doesn't necessarily hold true to its definition either but rather to its relevance.



my late teens and early 20s were what i now refer to as the dark ages but coming into my mid 20s and moving onwards a very, very, VERY slow progression into an amman renaissance took place. some of which has been documented here along the way. i'm still amidst this renaissance, happily, and it has come a long way but i want to ride it much longer and further. this wave of the future.



HARDER BETTER FASTER STRONGER



i've been neglecting my blog, my baby, my heart and soul. the downside of not being on a personal down slide.



so in response to how i feel about being 30?









it's aight.