If that's all you will be, you'll be a waste of time...

... And so i'm back! With the usual optimism, the usual cheer and the usual gusto for everything that is life. And what better way to make a comeback, than with my '100 things to do before I die' list. Of course, it being December and the resolution-time of the year, makes it all the more apt.

(The list is a little incomplete, so keep 'em suggestions coming!!)

1. Run a marathon
2. Take horseback riding lessons
3. Learn to ski
4. Learn how to ice skate
5. Learn to water ski
6. Learn to sail
7. Become fluent in French
8. Learn conversational Spanish
9. Learn to say "hello" in 50 languages
10. Learn sign language
11. Learn Mandarin / Arabic
12. Learn to play the guitar with some degree of proficiency
13. Enroll in a belly dancing class
14. Compose a song
15. Ride in a hot air balloon
16. Go paragliding
17. Go sky diving
18. Go on a helicopter ride
19. Go scuba diving
20. Ride a mechanical bull
21. Climb Mt. Everest
22. Experience weightlessness
23. Go bungee jumping
24. Go white water rafting
25. Learn to fly a plane
26. Learn to play poker (or bridge)
27. Develop a talent for photography
28. Learn to make pottery
29. Learn to sculpt
30. Do woodworking
31. Learn to brew beer or make wine
32. Take up gourmet cooking
33. Paint - watercolors, oil, acrylics
34. Learn to repair a car
35. Make a difference in at least one person's life
36. Join a Big Brother, Big Sister Program
37. Join the Peace Corps
38. Get my article published in a magazine
39. Write the book I know I have inside me
40. Play a role in a movie or sitcom or a commercial or be an extra
41. Spend a week at a 5-star spa
42. Become a wine Connoisseur
43. Become financially literate and learn how to invest intelligently
44. Create enough passive income so that I don't have to work another day in my life
45. Watch the 100 movies on my "100 movies I want to see list"
46. Get married
47. Buy a home I love and spend time making it into the home I always wanted: with an inviting, joyous, comfortable, loving atmosphere
48. Start my Own Business
49. Adopt a pet from the animal shelter/ Keep a dog
50. Live in New York, atleast for a while
51. Live in a house by the lake or a beach house
52. Have a house with a terrace, a view, a library filled with books and a huge TV room
53. Be a spectator at TED Talks: an annual conference in California which brings together the world's most fascinating thinkers and doers, who are challenged to give the talk of their lives (in 18 minutes)
54. Meet the Dalai Lama
55. Visit Tibet
56. Spend a week at a Silent Retreat
57. Ask for forgiveness from all of the people I've hurt
58. Send my parents on their dream vacation.
59. Trace my ancestry
60. Visit the 100 places on my ‘100 places to visit’ list
61. Read all 100 books on my reading list
62. Learn to fly a plane
63. Have a star named after me
64. Make sure I tell my friends and family how much I love them so that when I DO die... they won't wonder and I'll be at peace
65. Be content with myself
66. Throw a dart onto a map and travel to where it lands
67. Spend six months getting my body into optimum shape
68. Get six-pack-abs
69. Get passionate about a cause and spend time helping it, instead of just thinking about it
70. See a favorite band/artist in concert
71. Drive a convertible with the top down and music blaring
72. Eat everything on BBC's '50 things to eat before you die'
73. Learn to bartend
74. Find a job I love
75. Get a tattoo or a piercing
76. Give up television and the internet for one month
77. Read the major religious texts for various religions
78. Throw a huge party and invite every one of my friends
79. Have my portrait painted
80. Spend a whole day eating junk food without feeling guilty
81. Give my mother a dozen red roses and tell my parents I love them
82. Stay out all night dancing and go to work the next day without having gone home (just once)
83. Shower in a waterfall
84. Teach someone illiterate to read
85. Ask someone I've only just met to go on a date
86. Donate money and put my name on something: a college scholarship, a bench in the park
87. Give a theatre performance publicly
88. Broadcast a show on the Radio
89. Kiss in the rain
90. Make a snow angel
91. Open my own restaurant/café
92. Attend an India-Pakistan cricket matc
93. Spend 3 months travelling around and getting to know India
    

Currently Reading: Bombay Meri jaan- Jerry Pinto, Naresh Fernandes
Currently Listening: Two points for honesty- Guster, Nothing ever hurt like you- James Morrison

Are the details in the fabric?

A depressive state is coming over me. Yes, me of the cheery smiles and the 'life is beautiful' outlook, I am feeling sad. And unsettled. And trapped. And panicky. And a million other things. I don't quite know what I am feeling. I don't think I can give it a name. It's a stranger to me. But a familiar one. It passes me often as I go on my day, my life. Occasionally I look into its eyes and realise truths I would rather not, only to quickly look away. Other times, I feel its presence and pretend to busy myself in mundane inconsequences-that black dress, that movie ticket, that cute guy. Yes I know this stranger. And I know why it lurks, even what it wants to tell me, remind me.

But how do I tell it, that I know! I know everything it wants to remind me. That this life I lead, is not what I signed up for, not what I thought was coming- This life of ducked heads in cubicles, blank stares at bright screens, this life of regimented comings and goings, this life that I still continue to fight for even though it makes me sad and disappointed.

This is the life where I dream of who I might have been, what I might have done and where I might have gone, And then, wake up to get ready for another cubicle day. This is the life where I chase behind things that I am told to care about: the paycheck, the security, the climb up the ladder, while I leave all that I really care about, in a corner neglected, second rated. This is the life where I lose respect for myself with each passing day for not having the courage to stand up to this life, to the world, to parents, to myself and get that life I yearn. This is the life where I don't even know what that ideal life looks life. I just know it's not this.

And knowing all that, this is the life I still continue to live- where I bury a little more of me, where I feel a little more dead with each passing day. I can hear Jason Mraz singing into my ear, telling me to "hold my own, know my name and go on my way". He says 'everything will be fine in no time at all'.

But I don't think so. I really don't.

Currently Listening: Details in the fabric- Jason Mraz, Prettiest friend- Jason Mraz
Currently Reading: Bombay, Meri Jaan- Jerry Pinto, Naresh Fernandes

Where do the children play?

Every thing's as usual. I'm sitting in office freezing and cursing the AC vent, as usual. The Killers are crooning through my headphones as I tap away at my keyboard, very much as usual. When the day is done, I will feel the usual gladness as I shut down my laptop. I will feel my ears popping as I go down 41 floors in the elevator, as usual. I will walk past swanky shoe and dress shops all advertising christmas sales, on my way to the MRT, quite as usual. I will stare blankly at my reflection on the platform doors at the station waiting for the train and then I will fight my way into the train and nod to the music on my headphones as I head on home- All very very usual. My life is going on as usual and nothing seems different. 

Yet something is. Different. I can feel it.

I can feel it every time I call home- In the insecurity in my mom's voice, in everything she tells me and even more in everything that she doesn't. I feel it every time google desktop pops up a news article on Bombay, that it thinks I may be interested in, and it always tells repeatedly of the carnage that happened. I feel it in the way voices become solemn and thoughtful anytime friendly conversation veers towards the B-word. There is something different and in a wrong way. Different about Bombay, different about me.

There is so much I should want to say, so much I should want to shout out, but I can't. Some part of me has stopped feeling, stopped caring. I look at the whole thing with a shrug. I have given up- on Bombay, on India, on any othr part of this world. I am giving up on ever feeling secure anywhere again. I am doing what Bombay-ites have been so praised for doing. I am walking on. And I'm not proud of it.