V for Valerie

                     

 Max Hospital,

"Department of Oncology is to your right if you turn left from the centre of that Help Desk you see to the north of the Cardiology unit," bottle feeds the attendant. V scans her grim virginal face, apparently in gratitude, and mumbles: "You're spoofing, aren't you?"

Attendant: Eh?

"You based your information on the supposition that I'm a regular at the Cardiologist's; which, I'm sorry to disappoint you, I'm not. So, either it's a flimflam or you've been too clever by half," wheezed V.

Attendant: Miss, I'd appreciate if you could translate this.

V: Translate? Oh, ah, yes! I mean if I could survive this, I'm pretty darn good about surviving the Oncologist.

Department of Oncology

There's a long wait. V awaits the roll-call. She used to be like Voltaire's Pangloss who believed that everything was for the best in this best of all possible worlds. But now, the world seems pimped out in pretentious mockery; faces swirling in to whisper: "To be or not to be: that is the question." Exasperated, she attempts to lounge in the quadrangle of a wait room, awaiting the final verdict of very many rays that have merry-gone-round through various tangents of her body variously.

Abstract 1: A little girl is pacing the length of the corridor. Her hair's a shade of dark chocolate in twirls that sway playfully. V calls on her, struggles to trot past her but the girl is swift. She's crooning a familiar verse: "The Road goes ever on and on, down from the door where it began." V calls out again: "Hey, you!" The girl's too soaked up in the verse to listen. "..Now far ahead the Road has gone, and I must follow, if I can." V grabs her elbow and turns her around in a hurried sweep. "Oh, you!? I know you, don't I?" gasps V in deep consternation. The little girl smiles calmly and says: "Yes. Were you not me back in the day, some 24 years ago? But, my dear, I could never be you," and then merrily she gallops away humming. "Let them a journey new begin, but I at last with weary feet...will turn towards the lighted inn..."

"But, my dear, I could never be you. Not now. Never now," V tells the girl silently; and the long corridor echoes with the finality of their mutual admission. Of truth and time.There's a haze that engulfs the corridor and shrouds her vision. There's a black hole. Then, there's nothing.

Abstract 2:  Beyond the dull screeching and wheezing of the local metro run, there's a silence. It's a late evening autumnal hitch. Of the innumerable faces, cooped up listlessly, V could hear nothing but see the quaint quivering of their lips in unison as if to paraphrase some thought, some idea. She half turns to find him there; his little finger clasping her little finger: effortlessly, eagerly and firmly. They're close, but no cigar. They feel very close and they are very remote.

"So you still think the stream shall never find the sea?" he whispers.

"Shall. I am hopeful," she smiles. 

"Then how would you tell them apart?

"That, then, is inconsequential. Is that not?"

"Tell me more, more about the stream. She makes me merry."

"And the sea? Wouldn't you like to hear more about it? After all, the stream wouldn't have got far but for the sea. Would it?" and awaiting no answer to a question so indisputably definite, she bows out. When the doors open to let her out, she briefly turns to look at him: "So long!" and then there's a bright dazzling light that shrouds her vision. Then, there's nothing.

Abstract 3: V is lying on a raised table scantily wrapped in a knee length gown. The surgical lights overhead look like the volcanic gates of Mordor. There's an anaesthesia cart placed next to the table. The surgeons are in good cheer and engaged in what-you-call heavy medical parlance. An electronic monitor is placed on V's chest and the pulse monitor attached to her finger. The anaesthesiologist comes along, greeting politely: "Hey, hi Miss! I'm gonna inject this fine needle, about 10 cm long, into your spinal nerve. This shall be a bit difficult without your cooperation. So, I suggest you curl up your body and do not attempt any move. If you do, I'm afraid, I'll have to inject this again and again till you decide to do as I suggest. Alright, so here I go. You, yes you (to a nurse). Take off her gown." V attempts a Taekwondo reverse back-kick; the 10 cm fine needle, robbed off the proverbial bull's eye (lower back in this case), goes flying like a paper plane and lands tip down. Too fragile to prick the hard surface, the fine needle breaks its spine. Three men, hurriedly, come along and hold her legs, arms and curl her up as instructed. There's a prick, then pain, then some more and then... there’s nothing. V can see the scalpel, the very fine threads, cotton; but of them she could feel none.

She feels herself slipping away into the land of shadows; and in that very moment, a shrill cry engulfs the amphitheatre. "Hey, look! Here's your little Ninja with his hidden dragon! Now, now don't bid your taekwondo on him else the dragon will soak you with some hot beverage that might just bust your chops," says the gynaecologist flaunting her cat bird's seat. V looks intently, studying the baby's face from stem to stem. There's a bright dazzling light; it doesn't shroud her vision any more but drowns her woe and kills her foe: the darkness in her cornered soul.

"Patient No 8, Ms V. Your turn. Please carry your file and the reports," calls out the assistant to the Oncologist. Awakened from her reverie, V flutters to straighten up and hurriedly makes her way across the flood of ether.

The room's a pale green and well-lit. The specialist's eyes scan the reports thoroughly, narrowing at intervals to inflate and deflate the idea of mystery.

Specialist: So here we go, Ms V. To keep it brief and candid: we'd like to begin with chemo sessions anon. I suggest you get your hair cropped as the malignant behaviour of these sessions should anyway not leave much for an option. Or, any.

V: Is it terminable, doc?

Specialist: The disease - yes. In this instance, I cannot say.

V felt an urge to get to the other side of the long mahogany table, take his hands in reverence and appeal: "By light of heaven and ray of stars, save me! You know, oh you don't but you must - I'm a sucker for life."

But instead, V: How long?

Specialist: That, lady, I'm not qualified enough to predict.

V: Enough to see the seedling grow? Enough for litchis and then some more?

Specialist: (with a boyish grin) enough to fly an air-plane. Enough to love with no' much pain. Ha, enough for mangoes and much more.

V: (laughs) Enough then. I need no more. But doctor, can you really find a cure?

Specialist: I'm afraid, lady, I can't be sure. But if you hold out, we go to war. At least, make an effort.

V: We go to war. (She bows out.)

The Road

The car comes to a screeching halt. She peeps out: "Excuse me, where does this road go?"

Man in a 'Banana Republic' T shirt: Where exactly do you want to go?

V: Oh, I'd find it out later. But for now, where does this go?

Man: Are you a bit psyched out?

V: Possibly a little blotto.

Man: Then take a right if you want to go right, take a left if you want to go left, go straight if you want to go on and on and see how far you come from home.

She runs the distance in her mind and turns the car like a bottle of wine.

The Man: Where to, Miss...?

V: (chuckles heartily) East of the sun, West of the moon. Miss V, V for Valerie.

East of the sun, West of the moon

The little girl with chocolate curls, trots and trots and finds a way

Towards the moon and to the sun.

There she meets the man to say: "Let us begin and wind-up the run

West of the moon, East of the sun."

So long!

Rummy things

                                                         Excuse me, please.      

Akin to my 'High Holy Days', Sundays are usually rummy. Days when I laze around and watch a fly, a squirrel and cobwebs go about rummaging the sacred corners of my house while I loaf in the couch. A day when even an asinine "Hi Handsome" commercial rendered in that hey-Tom-look-I'm-a-bomb voice of a desperado, which on other days could twitch the inner linings of my stomach in revulsion, seems to echo with no immediate chain reaction. And precisely, the day when even an open faced Satyamev Khan serving pork tenderloins as moral laxative and pushing it down my stoned oesophagus doesn't succeed in turning my stomach. (Now you see why they picked a Sunday for moral purgatory? Hell, yeah. It's a rummy day!) Dash it! Where's my conscience?

My conscience, eh? So I've been scouring the pages of "River of Smoke" and like Opium is what Opium does, I am halfway through Deeti's sacred shrine in 1838 Mareech. Fisch! I could see my conscience etched there: rings of smoke in a wraith-like grin. Years later, the grin would seemingly convey my last words to this world: "Oh, you were such a waste of time." This reminds me of my younger days when I could barter my soul to be Eliot's Macavity - the scheming mystery cat. I'd twaddle around my hostel corridor several nights, join the clan in their late night tuck-hunts, delineate the moves, objectives and space: sway my head from side to side, focus my third eye on the Matron's room, walk stealthily across the corridor to some prospective cupboard ( occasional giggles, pardon me) and turn the master key. Later, they had me pegged as a fiend who'd "broken every human law and breaks the law of gravity". Once, summoned to the Principal's office, I owned up the crime (although when they reached the scene of crime, Macavity wasn't there.) and had to kneel down post assembly to the sunshine of many a foe. Mr X, quite a hit among the women folk for his full mouth Australian looks, breezily smirked: "So girl, you stole a pack of Uncle Chips? Next time, consider me." I smiled flippantly while my head spun with ideas of shipping him to Castle Black. “Say what again! Say what again! I double dare you. Steal? I’ll hunt you down and feed you your testicles,” my conscience let out a Gin Rummy. Sixteen years later, on this idle Sunday afternoon, I could see that rebel conscience in Deeti's shrine on a graying tower alone on the sea.

My spirit, which had hitherto been wilting, suddenly perks up. My ailing phone reminds me of a friend who'd be visiting late in the evening. I dash out in a jiffy with my little boy to fetch some meat. My mind trips a corner and the indicator goes right for left. And then buoy, I do rummy things (more like a good film which starts badly and never recovers) and I get to Shad's. Out of evil cometh good or something like that and I do reach this meaty little 'Middle East' I discovered a month ago. I must tell you - they make better Haleem and anything mutton than other Islamic quarters of the world. Well, let's not stretch - it is, indeed, delectable. The best pull - they let you taste (in fact, they aver you try) a spoonful or two of every palatable sin right there in the menu. So I take away a goblin's share and rush back. Rummy does things.

Our buddy powwow is a topping and ends with an edited version of “The Rain Song”. As if to draw an adequately dreamy parallel, drops of rain thump the window sill in rhapsody. I swear rummy things while my boy sings with the lark. Brim-full of gladness and love, we dribble-dribble-dribble. As we say 'Night, night!’ Plant splits me up and completely pours me out: “This is the mystery of the quotient – upon us all a little rain must fall.” Absolutely! I declare rummy with this run of an ace, conscientiously. Ace it!

   

                                         
                     The world I had known, Things I was sworn; I shudder at the thought of being reborn.

                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                               

                                           

Fill the Reckless: Chris Nolan

                                    On Chris Nolan and why he shakes me off my stupor.

                                     

So every time a film ends with a jump cut to black, every time I revel a trifle solemnly and every goddamn cell is shaken off its recessionary stupor; it is indisputably a Nolan stir-me-up. I think I recognize the touch now. Is it the beginning, the end, am I sozzled or what? That's that! Christopher Johnathan James Nolan. The fog which has lasted well 5 years, had vanished last Friday, and the sky is bright. Distant Bruce Wayne, absolutely charming, bows in acceptance: "By your leave!"

But what about Nolan? That, he is one of the cleverest plotter-the creator-the magician-the non- conformist, has been established with very little side split-ends. So, what of him? That he gives you a world, some impetuous and determined characters, psychological thrillers, employs an interesting storytelling technique; and before you know it, you are involved. Oh, boy! You are, you're subconsciously engaged in little spurts of his narrative. It is the job of an illusionist well done and credits to him.

But of course, there is a pattern. Nolan's storytelling is superbly distinct and non-linear; apportioned in acts. Most of them begin where they end, and wherefore to this end the characters move thereon is determined. So when Cutter in The Prestige (2006) speaks of the three acts or parts in every great magic trick, he seemingly echoes Nolan: The Pledge, The turn and The Prestige. Metaphorically, for me, the Batman trilogy is a perfect divvy of these acts and ends marvellously with this: “The Prestige”- The Dark Knight Rises.   

Interestingly, the protagonists in most of Nolan's films display single-mindedness, are extremely passionate about their respective goals, have some psychological disorder or obsession and are basically forked out in some parallel reality or the semblance of it. Remember Marion Cotillard and Leonardo in Inception, Guy Pearce in Memento, Al Pacino in Insomnia, Hugh Jackman and Christian Bale in The Prestige, Heath Ledger in The Dark Knight. Nolan explores the tension of these central characters in the external subjective reality of the world they live in and the internal objective reality they believe in or occasionally slip into. This is precisely what makes his voice exciting: the exploration of the known (obvious) and the true (unknown) world. So his main man will always have several contradictions, extreme psychological splits and an affinity to this parallel reality. And hey, you get a movie where one plus one doesn't always equal two (It could be four if all twos, as you deduce in logical reasoning, equal to four). Yeah, yeah. Something like that.

A bit of a personal bias would not be disconcerting then. The man is well read, sophisticated, speaks impeccably, has a thing for fantasy and phantasm, holds a degree in English literature, is a Bond freak and generally with it. And Batman and Inception and Magician and the Joker and....Nikola Tesla and.... No, wait, superlatively brilliant! My proclivity to announce-a-fine-man when I see one stands vindicated. Christopher Nolan has the valet's unerring eye for a thoroughbred (well, so do I for fine men), and his characters-colleagues are manifestly that. The other day I read about his red and green colour blindness and thought of the film noir. In a way, this medical deficiency has evoked a kind of cinema that doesn't signify red (symbolic of a pause-stop) or green (symbolic of a go-run YES) but one that keeps you on-the-edge, ready to crouch, to leap.

And the music, yes the music! You see, his films usually have a lyrical quality, a single piece being used effectively throughout to build up the tempo. The song, beat, rhythm starts with a faint note and builds up slowly till the scene is one with the sound; reflective of the mood. Remember the 'Inception' score? Hans Zimmer brought the 1960 French song to create a mood of nostalgia, gloom and sadness which reflects the latent turmoil of Dom Cobb played by Leonardo DiCaprio. 

If I go on a few lines more about Nolan, I'd go incoherent and begin to stutter in some unintelligible script. Fastest way to learn Chinese!

So, here we are. A distant Christian Bale, absolutely charming, bowed in acceptance: "By your leave!"  I gushed delightedly: "Non, je ne regrette rien." (No, I have no regrets.)

(Christopher Nolan and how he makes me stand still: in admiration, with delight!) 

I do the math: Apocalyptically.

                                               I DO THE MATH:  APOCALYPTICALLY
                                                                             

The Other day I thought of Nibiru colliding with the earth before Christmas.
I thought of earth spinning out of its orbit; empty spaces passing through each other.
I thought of the hottest summer on record; my city collapsing and dissolving into the milky way.
Of decadence of human relationships; of complete loss of all meaningful communication.
Of vagaries of human nature and annihilation of truth; of apathy, anarchy and frugal emotions.
Of lackadaisical fathers who run whore-houses of interrobang, of mothers running amuck in their abortive frenzy?!

The Other day I thought of Achilles in antiquity, rising in the island of Achillea;
My love of him unrequited: his heel invulnerable now, and Iliad no longer sung.
I thought of Carnations no longer pinkish-purple or white, red and yellow; and
Of Orchids never making it blue.

I thought of children going to war; Men from Mars riding Hungarian Horntails,
Of Vienna as the capital city of Sauron and evils of Morgoth; my visit arrested.
Of an emerald cut Solitaire or a marquise that never shall pride my finger;
Of Apples and Berries and a cult of amateur queries;
Of tube-wells and springs of petrol and diesel, and water being sold Rs 500 per litre;
Of Hashmis creating jobs for the plumber and Brad Pitts available at every nook and corner.

Devoured I sat mulling over the doomsday, when suddenly a finger ran over my forehead;
I turned to find a Knight from my tale.

" Where have you been?" I chuckled as he quite turned pale.

" Here by you, lady. Haven't you been really silly?", he held my hand.

" Oh, I could imagine them blowing up Macedonia, shaving seconds off each hour.
I could see a black hole swallow us up, people failing to emote. I could see Mayan Calendar work its days up."

" Think not of potential disaster, my lady. It's fatal and bunk and of no valid theory. Of all I Know, you are not to prophesize nor conjure up the astronomy to fantasize." said he with an alarming finality.

" The other day I thou... .....". He pulled me closer and held me tight and with such a conviction looked into my eyes.
" After all, its just the other day."

" How could you be so sure? "

" I head the department of Astronomy in Harvard and I know of Andromeda galaxy as they knew of twin towers."

Well then.
 
( Post Maureen sponsored Sunday article on Mayan Calandar. )
Shruti

Note: I shall give you the premise. It is based on what we now call cosmophobia and the doomsday prophesied in the Mayan calandar. This, of course, is a fuzzy logic and a silly concept. The writer suffers from this fear of impending doomsday and goes incoherent. All that she would miss (say a solitaire or a visit to Vienna etc ) after a black hole will swallow up the earth, is spoken of in frenzy. 
It's free verse and fear is depicted in incoherence of thought and speech.

Oh, Napolean Bona'parte!

Oh, Napolean Bonaparte ( said a friend in jest) was born apart;
Trained in artillery art, never did he wince to trim the lards,
Staged a coup d'état, and proclaimed his crown in farthest European yards.

I wonder what his mother said, while he droned Napoleonic war:
across the border- and as they say- pretty pretty far.                                                                
We'll talk about that in the end, but let us now discuss his reign.

In his praxis of hegemony, he did many a cross-country;
Spared no Boss in Europe, singing word for word of " Born to Run".
And therein lies the twist in tale, for he chose the Russians for more fun.

" Power's my mistress.", roar'd the military king;  and there you sense

   his arsenic poisoning.
The Battle of waterloo had him confined, in some island of British regime.

" Napolean, Napolean!, you bag o'nuts! what need to trudge 'em several yards?";
( Remember wh't his mama said, when all his droning crossed the bars!)
" Don't grind your bones, just play your part. Didn't I tell you, lad, you were born apart?