Games children play…
As a child, I must confess, I had a slight affinity for packing my bags and bidding adieu to reality. It wasn’t the sort of imagination that inspires children to grow up and metamorphose into bylines, regularly found on science fiction magazines. It was more of an unabashedly absurd sort. The kind that many times coaxed me to make up silly games during roadtrips with family. I used to imagine that the telephone wires on the highways were in fact deadly iron wires, designed for the sole purpose of barbarically cutting through the landscapes. I stared out of the window, watching endless sheets of razor sharp wires slicing through large trees, often pausing to take a shot at the blue skies too. It was breathtaking. Not the fact that this constituted to any sort of visual poetry, but no one could deny that it was an exceedingly strong attempt by an 11-year old to crawl out of drudgery, kicking and screaming. More kicking than screaming.
Mom’s Mom Almost Ruins Love For Mangoes
I remember my first trip outside Chennai. It was a drive down to Kancheepuram. The place where my ancestors originated from. I cringed back in horror as the car whizzed past St. Thomas Mount, my last known destination. It was both scary and exciting. Much similar to how I felt when I discovered that the flesh inside mangoes was tastier than the skin it hides beneath. You must know, as a kid, soft and supple objects sent shivers down my spine. The only possible explanation I could think of was that I had a nasty experience, watching my grandma hopelessly battle lunch. Dinner too. Alaska has more tanned people that she had teeth. Thank god, she skipped breakfast for the last decade of her life.
Odd Fellows Rest 