the space between Pink and Black

After applying my head on the issues of the beleaguered automobile sector ……

This, exactly is the problem: non-existence of creativity and rather staid opening lines…

I haven’t visited this bablesque world of mine since I joined the world of financial journalism. Not that I did not want to. What kept me away was the fear of realizing that my opening lines would read like a mundane news report, which hardly anyone reads, and most do not care about. Not that there wasn’t the urge to write about my otherwise undocumented life, but lack of suitable sentences and expression left me post-less.

I realized that my usage of ‘I’ is rampant and I’m uncomfortable with this realization, like I’m with many other.

So, what have we missed here…a few rants maybe, a lesser dose of cribbing perhaps and 500 words worth of random verbosity…*here again- I’m dangerously assuming that maybe…just may-be someone reads me*

Is there anything this post is getting at? No! this is just a reminder to myself that I have part to play in this side of the world too, a reminder that beyond the pink space of finance, there is this black space that connected me to I, that used to be my mouthpiece for my own ears, that needed no number crunching to arrive at a conclusion, but all it needed was honest splattering of mindless words.

Within 10 minutes, everything seems meaningless again…

Exploitation of space

Write…delete….write again…thought breaks….look around, too many people looking back at me… “Stop giving me those raised-eyebrow-looks; I don’t want to justify, give me a little corner somewhere here, where I can be,” I mutter to myself.
These days I talk a lot of nonsense, also talk silently within, voice spoils the element of a violent drama, magnifying the horrors of disobeying words. “These words are such rascals,” says the ghost in one breathe. So this cult….’words’ I mean, becomes our liberty, our religion, our whim, our route to escape, a string of muse, a need to suit (very often.)
When I fall at their mercy, I feel complete, when they oblige me, I feel weak, when they turn away, I am lost, when they act like a miracle, I am caught in a doubt…Words, they are, as random as my rootless thoughts.

I am pretty miss useless today, been pretty much like this for few days. This jungle of humans is rather depressing, the Tarzans and Janes of this pseudo professional world never seize to play their silly games…tired of them all…I turn to the better rascals…in words I find my peace again.
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To come to think of it, I wrote for the sake of writing, I rhyme like a kid learning the sound of a rhyme scheme, believing that I might just find the lost treasure…or did I ever lose it?

A knock unheard

Write! I tell myself each day, through the day, at the end of the day. 'Words come back, this is your place, thoughts race up, the gun has been shot. But the half before the white line is empty and the mile after the line is long. Sigh!
So many images floating around, each wanting a word to frame it, but words are hiding away in a distant mountain, or perhaps hibernating, awaiting the spring, or they have lost their track, or the whole map itself, reaching a point of no return?
Slipping from one week to another, in four weeks life is capsuled to form one life running into years. Sometimes little choc chips get sprinkled on the plain vanilla white and the bland tongue experiences some delight, a little life, for a little time, little happiness will help you survive.

So the trinkets of joy left my space, what I thought can be my panacea doesn’t seem to work at all, its like a brand new car at the showroom with no fuel. I distract myself to the extent of creating illusions, and then I get bored, enough to push the earth off its loyal rusted axis.

Ole denims, faded t-shirts, worn out floaters, water-soaked leather bag, a gutter to cross, been a while standing at the edge with tentative conclusions.

I’ll wait for the right lines to strike me

When it rains, it pours

Last two months have been nothing short of a roller coaster ride and a bumpy one. Changed jobs…switched to another industry after much speculation and deliberation and trust me am still confused and diffused about my stand.
First I spent most of my time dealing with the grief of leaving TOI, then adjusting to a new environment and work I so detested, then to a new industry where I’m on the other side of the fence, coping up with the newness of it all, and craving for work to kick start.
I’m the kind who is low on patience (very), want everything to happen now! And fast!
Restless soul that I am, it gets difficult not to drift.
It’s only been a week and I feel like running back to writing/journalism, only this time I’ve to stick around for a while and get thing straight once and for all, only this time I need to step out convinced of what I’m doing and why, only this time I don’t want to be hasty and impulsive.

Too many questions were asked…many I asked myself to the elusive I, but, it led to nothing but irritation…so here I am!

Things changed rapidly…friends moved to different towns and cities, all of them at a snap of a finger, I started being more with myself than I’d ever been. It gets lonely but too pre occupied to gauge what’s been happening. Let me make that fashionable statement – Moving with the flow, you see!

Do I feel out of place and yet in the spot? Yes, is all I can say and end.

Winding up...

Its been a year and a half, long enough to keep me in one place, saw many colleagues/friends leave over this span and used to wonder when is my chance.

I remember the day when I first came to this place to give my editing test, was awestruck looking at THE TIMES OF INDIA, for the first time from inside, and yes I drooled over the interiors, the feel of PRESS permeated my being and I felt trifle nervous, thanks to my medicines I was too groggy to be overwhelmed by the enormity of the white elephant.

The test was ok, got the job, money was measly but like all beginners I was ionized to take life by its horns…worked hard, learnt that my English isn’t good enough, that my grammar was to the dogs, that writing wasn’t easy at all. The art team made my life easy, taught me Quark and made me tech savvy…those guys I respect from the bottom most pit of my heart…when I felt low, like a caring father Ashok sir was there, when I felt dull Sunderji pepped me up and yesh of course gave me Tamil lessons…when I felt groovy, Nandu sir shook a leg with me …and when I felt helpless…. my friends cushioned me and acted like sunshine in the gray air conditioned office.

This place saw me write better, grow my graph upwards, gave me my first Byline – Neha Rishi- and no pleasure is bigger and more fulfilling than seeing your story appear in print. Nothing more worth flaunting than this.

(And I had a break in my thought)

Am back to the same workstation from where I began my journey. Second floor couches, steps, weird places to find a corner and just sit (away from the editors eye) have seen a lot in my life change…this is where I saw the start of a relationship, and this is where I found solace when it ended….this is where I felt safe and almost complacent.

Endless goodbyes, a lump in my throat, I dislike farewells but today….I surrender my press card, the baggage of the past and move on to new places and people.

The white, green, yellow of the ceiling and the walls hold within it the most beautiful times I spent here.

Yes yes people I haven’t forgotten you’ll:
Anu my sunshine the tea/coffee will never taste as good as it did when we sat chatting on the couch. If it wasn’t for you I would have lost myself long back.
Preeti thanks for making it easy for me to stick to my stand each time I lacked the confidence.
Ramiya my cupcake, your belief in me gives me the faith that I can do it.

And you my dear Gem Paul lovingly Bob- I’ll miss being in Pinkyland during the boring edit meets…damn ill miss the senseless laughter we shared.

So on this note- this is Neha signing off and ready to take off
And with me goes- the best people I met, the good stories I did, and the fact that there is no learning better than the one where you get your hands dirtied in the mud.
Dharavi you’ll always remain my favourite area for reporting

The queue at the ticket counter was long, missed the trains without regret…turned around and saw you moving….
Shadow it was, your shadow that was moving
Creepily it swept past me…the shadow so bright

Roll out the imagination you loner on the street,
Stop wandering like a wastrel, romanticizing with stars and hoping to embrace the one that might fall
Stop taking those blind turns you fool, don't you know you might get run over without the sound of a horn
Stop gazing into emptiness; it won't take form of beautiful palaces
Stop looking behind at the footprints the rain has just washed away; they aren't going to appear again, a lost trail
Stop looking sideways, there isn't a soul like you around, either they are dead or too alive to be real
Stop waiting for the road to end, the route has a mind of its own, a plan undisclosed

Let that imagination take over the grim night, it will paint you rainbows and butterflies
With those green meadows and lotus ponds, hay colour sunshine and orange skies.
Roll out that dream, you loner on the street, night won’t last for too long and the day will be too busy for painting the canvas with surreal strokes….