Tinder Date Story

““You don't get creative once everything is okay. In fact, we are creative because everything isn't okay (yet)” , Rohan repeats this line from a popular blog. He thinks of reconciling with his not so fantabulous life. The thought of it gyrates his mood to put his creative urges on a piece of paper. Rohan jots down everything. Everything which has bothered him”

“Ok, stop stop”, screams Devika. “Why the hell are you referring yourself with your name. That is so weird and trite. I have had enough of it in past. It has lost its charm”

“Devika, just listen! I’m narrating to you our story. How we met. How I met you. How we are here sitting side by side each other. Can’t I get over the top and act a bit melodramatic and cheesy?” states Rohan.

“Sorry Rohan, not interrupting you in between again” says an apologetic Devika with a sly gleam.

“So, Rohan starts giving every worry a written shape. Rohan knows he is boring for the regular Joe or Jill. He has never been so bothered about his lack of taste in music & gourmet food or his non-existent travel stories. He feels we all need to feel stimulation from within. Seeking the same from an outside stimuli is the last resort for the creatively oriented. Rohan feels whenever he is in need of an external agent to calm or excite himself, that is when he is at his worst. Cutting the long overdrawn philosophical hyperbole, let’s now jump to what he chances on.

Rohan realizes he has never made an attempt to do the “Can I buy a drink, lady” act. He is overwhelmed with this idea. He starts scrounging the internet for free tips on picking up women. While doing that, Rohan is dealing with thoughts of his lame & pathetic research. But, as our Rohan is, he never leaves a room for error when it comes to research for his personal satiation. So with all his newfound arsenal about , “How to buy a drink for women” & “seek indulgence” he proceeds to the mission.

I know Devika, this may all repel you and you may term Rohan a psycho. But, you know what? Day 1, Day 2, Day 3,....Day 11, all went by with Rohan buying drinks for himself and burning a huge hole in his pocket. There is a special name for people like Rohan. I must not utter that word.

Then it dawned to him. There is something called the online world of dating, where it is easy for people to act like Jack Sparrow. And, Rohan downloads Tinder.” completes an exhausted Rohan.

“How boring, Rohan. This is how we met. I already know this but I expected a better story from someone who calls himself a storyteller.” says Devika

“But it is truth. And as they say, Truth is stranger than fiction” retorts Rohan

“You know Rohan, I have read somewhere that never let truth come in the way of a good story” quips Devika

“Oh, wow! This first Tinder date is already giving me sparks. We have something going on” speaks Rohan

Rohan and Devika start having conversations about first date conversations. They had already broken the proverbial ice, and were dancing on it. Rohan started shooting his flurry of cheesy one-liners and made Devika blush like she has had never before. Apparently, it started a blushing competition. From a good distance also anybody could’ve said that Rohan was blushing in equal intensity if not less than Devika.

This is a thing about Rohan. Rohan has a 10-year old kid, a 16-year old girl and a 70-year old grandpa inside him. All of these personalities betray our 26 year old Rohan. Rohan has a sea of tranquility to hide them in his day-to-day business-as-usual proceedings. But at the first instance of intimacy with women, his emotional defenses collapses and he starts acting like a kid, girl or grandfather. This attracts women sometimes. So, Rohan always was never in dearth of women company. This however makes him a bad boyfriend. He is not the archetypical matured ladies’ man.

Rohan & Devika then started walking. So, their first dinner date was now already a walk-date. They exchanged glances. Devika held her gaze for a bit longer than Rohan, quite a few times. Still, this was a well contested fight. Tension was just building and they already had a chemistry.

“So, you write stories since when?” asked Devika

“I have been writing for the past 7 years now, Devika. It started for a weird reason & it started getting me into weird situations and I kept on it. Though, my relationship with writing has taken many twists & turns. I still rebound to writing after any emotional episode.” expresses Rohan

Devika puts her head on his shoulder and says , “I am sleepy Rohan”

“Shit! That’s the worst form of insult. You are bored to sleep. And, I thought we have a thing going on between us!” exclaims Rohan

“Walk me to home Rohan. You boring first date!” teases Devika tongue-in-cheek as her statement was as far from truth as sea is from the skies.

“Of! Course my beautiful young lady” speaks Rohan

Rohan escorts Devika to her 3rd floor flat and accepts the invitation to hang on for a bit. The invitation leads Rohan to explore Devika’s flat. Rohan crashes on her bed and starts reading the bookmarked “The Metamorphosis” lying on the bedside table. 

…..

Rohan wakes up next day to find himself floating on a sea of golden water. He had mermaids all over the sea swimming around and smiling at him. He starts moving his hands and legs only to realise that it was a dream. He sees Devika sleeping on his shoulder. He gently caresses her hair, ear & kisses her head. And goes back to sleep.


PS : Not based on any true story. Complete work of fiction. Remember, “never let truth come in the way of a good story”

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AAP Story & its Side-effects

Just a few years ago, it was ok to to label all the political parties into one category and collectively dismiss their every action or the lack of thereof. Then comes a man with an ambitious & well-timed action plan to change the political narrative of India. Now, it was cool to support this man’s political outfit, Aam Aadmi Party (AAP). He had everything a thriving middle-class well educated armchair-activist citizens of India dreamt of in a politician; an elite engineering degree from IIT, a background in social work & his anti-corruption vehemence. However, he had already over-stayed his welcome as an anti-corruption hero when he tried to capture a permanent place for himself in the psyche of Indian populace. The sequence of events after that is very well known to almost every Indian on social media. His ambitions never stopped and when reality struck him, he compromised with a CM’s post in Delhi. So, far governance has been zero and activism maximum despite being in power. 

While the political party, AAP was trying to gain political mandate it amassed help from all well-meaning people of India who had been frustrated with rampant corruption. Soon, there was widespread polarisation within the tech-savvy generation who earlier where united in their political ideology. Now people who didn’t support AAP labelled the AAP politicians & supporters as AAPtards and Narendra Modi led-BJP supporters known as Bhakts. Now it was AAPtards Vs Bhakts. Over the past one year AAPtards started getting disillusioned, a portion of support has been lost but not everything has gone from AAP to BJP.  While, it was cool to donate funds to AAP & openly support Arvind Kejriwal it is no longer the same. He has led down a huge fraction of people who supported his initiative. He is now seen as a dictator.

This turn of events is not good for other less-greedy & less-corrupt political outfits, which are many in India. Sadly, not many know about them! These parties would be seen with a lot of cynicism. If things go on the same way, the political mess would always be unsorted & repel young responsible citizens of India. All due to Arvind Kejriwal. 

Let's compare our Scars

This is not going to be an entertaining or an escapist read. So, close the tab if you are looking for something in that general category.

Scars! We all get bruised many times in our lives but few bruises stay and become permanently carved as scars in us. These scars, romanticists may say are the aspects of our personality that makes us beautiful. But are we supposed to believe in the beauty their eye beholds? More so, the question rumbles for this particular group of people who not only have a tendency to see things with their rose tinted glasses but they also attach an over emotional attachment to everything under the sun.

Scars don't define us, they don't make us beautiful, they don't teach you any lesson, they are just fossilised experiences stored in the form of weird marks to be seen either with physical eyes or sentient ones. They hide a story, lying dormant in them. Stories which mean the world to the possessor of scars. They don't make anyone weak, strong or mature. They just change your worldview.

Once in a while new experiences may infringe upon the personal space of these scars. They may interfere with the very existence of these old dwellers. These experiences may adjust & come in terms with their ancestors and live in perfect harmony. But! Not always. There are instances when fresh experiences may turn your scar into a gangrenous wound. Then, what do we have? I have no idea!!!

Are we supposed to compare our scars? Perhaps not! Not everyone can be objective enough to appreciate the pain of others. In this particular case, subjectivity is an accomplice to the act of apathy & coldness, unusually. No matter what any one says, we all have a greater subjective weight for our own worries, wounds, grief, pain, pangs & penchants. And, we tend to project these distorted viewpoint in an objective manner. This is certainly very apathetic.

We all grow up with different set of experiences and depending upon a lot of factors, we may choose to associate relevance with all of them in various random ways. Societal upbringing forces us to take lessons from each one of them and become a better participant. This is perhaps self-fulfilling because when we try to learn listlessly all the time, we are bound to become walking zombies.





There are experiences which gives us bruises, few bruises become scar. And, these scars have stories. There is a thing about stories : Stories lose their magic when they are seen more than just a story [Watch the video above]. We have an innate tendency to look for signals in the sea of noise. This is what gives the scars a bad name. A scar visualised as a symbolic form of story-telling is what we all need. We don't need new lessons for our survival. We don't have to compare our scars to feel better about ourselves. Scars are no measures of personal achievement to be compared and gain happiness or for the matter to wallow in sadness.

Scars are just scars not to be healed or compared. They are just a doorway into the days of the yore, to quench your innate desire for nostalgia

A Giant Vermin

I want to cry. I want to cry and just want to be in that state.
I want to submerge myself in my own tears. I want to see myself drowning in it. I want to almost die.
I want to suffocate. I want to feel helpless & powerless. I want to crawl in my own worry-pool.
Only to be rescued by you. I want you to rescue me. I want you to take me out of that cesspool of misery & pessimism.
I want you to scold me. I want you to punish me. I want you to laugh at me. I want you to slap me red & blue.
I fucking have no clue as to how would you strangulate me. But strangulate me by all means. Hang me from the most decrepit tree. Shoot donkey shit at my dead face. Take pictures of it. Laugh at it. Then again bring my body back and shred it to pieces. Distribute it to millions of beetles.
Because that is who I am. A giant vermin. Someone who is a fucking insect with a human face and body of man.

I want you to absolve me from all this. I know only you have the power. You only can kick me where it hurts the most. Only you can put pepper spray on my wounds where it is most lethal.
I want to submit to only you. You are everything I think about. You are the reason I want to die. Because I know that you are subjected to a lot of suffering because of me.
I can't help it. I am helpless to the maximum. The level of grief inside me is venomous to all the people. But to you it is claustrophobic and inevitable. You have been going through this by no fault of yours. But I have accused you in my mind a million times. I had thought you have done this to me. I don't know what makes me think of that but now I feel I am stupid to live. Please grab by my neck and put my face in a shit-pit. Make me drink urea. Give me more wounds. Because I love your wounds. Because I love the pain inflicted by you.
Because I love the way you heal those wounds. Because I love you. I would always do that, till the last drop of my body fluid.

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