Bunny Rabbit Reprise

I can dye my hair blue, I can get another tattoo
But it all seems so pointless when I don't have you.
Who do I impress, who do I charm?
Everyone except for you only causes harm.

I can revisit places that no longer exist. Pick up habits of the past.
I can move to a new world and move right back.
Nameless, faceless, they come and they leave.
What is the point of it all, when I don't have you?

Sing to me in my sleep tonight.
Invade my dreams.
Bad marijuana.
Black nail paint.
Your obsession with metal music and my intolerance.

Twisted nick-names.
Insulting but heartfelt.
Why make me dream when you can't fulfil them?
What is the point of all this, when I don't have you?

The creases on my face become more prominent the older I get.
But you beautiful, beautiful boy, you'll never grow old.
And tired.
And cynical.
And alone.
And lonely.
You'll never again need to fall in love.

And now, after all these years, I realise that I don't want to either...

Third Day of a Seven Day Binge

If you think about it, it's kind of fucked up to have Marilyn Manson on your playlist for sex. I get off on violence and cannibalistic urges. What to do.

I like it rough.

I like it hard.

I like it impersonal.

Carnal and dirty.

Animalistic.

Raw.

But passionate, oh so passionate.

I'm the kind who'd fuck your brains out and turn around and go to sleep. No cuddles. No romance.

I don't trust love.

I trust pleasure.

Endless pleasure.

The pleasure that stimulates my cunt, stimulates my brain.

My window to a different dimension.

Orgasms that show me the way.

Into the light, the white light.

Take away my power over myself.

The gates won't open otherwise.

The walls won't break down.

Kiss me as hard as you can.

Kiss me everywhere.

Mean it.

But how can I get there if the journey is gentle?

My body is the vehicle to my salvation.

You can scratch it.

You can sink your teeth into it.

Hold it tight as you send me into another world.

But at the end of the day, can you love someone you have sex with?

Can you have sex with someone you love?

memorium

All my losses have made me a bitter person.
The loss of innocence.
The loss of love.
The loss of loved ones.
The loss of a will to live.

Sometimes when I'm lying in bed trying hard not to break down and cry, I anticipate my cat curling up on my leg and gently purring me to sleep. But he's not around anymore. I miss him so much. I miss him like a mother misses her child. I try to think about what an eventful, what a privileged life I have, I don't have to worry about two square meals a day unlike so many people. However, deprivation is a relative thing and just because I don't live in extreme poverty and sorrow, does not mean that I am not suffering. It does not mean that my suffering is irrelevant, not painful enough.

Slowly but steadily this depression has taken over all the cells in my body. It now dictates who I am. It controls me. It causes me to isolate myself from everyone around me. I've built myself a nice wall and I allow nobody to break it down anymore.

I like to think of myself as a princess sometimes, waiting to be saved from her loneliness and her unending tragedies. I have waited to be rescued for quite some time now and I'm starting to think that there is no saviour, there is no prince to my story. It's just me, alone, all alone. I will either have to rescue myself or perish nameless and faceless, not to mention loveless.

Where is my will to hold on?
It never existed perhaps.

Sweetest Taboo

I think about you sometimes these days, now that I am alone.
Your eyes.
Or rather, your gaze.
The way you looked at me and leaned in to kiss me.
Your chin.
The hair that fell on your face.
Your flavoured lip balm.
Your soft lips.
The softest lips I have ever kissed.
Your gentle body.
The goosebumps on your skin.
As I made love to you for the first time.
Our first.
Our last.
And the in-betweens.

Secret kisses.
Secret love.

The way you made me explode.
The way you made me cry.
Pleasure.
Pleasure.
Pleasure
Endless pleasure.

Your beautiful neck.
Beautiful bosom.
Beautiful hips.
Beautiful soul.

The taste of you in my mouth.
The taste of you in my mouth.
Seems like a memory from so long ago.

Why did it end?
Why couldn't you make up your mind?
I would have kept you safe and you could have kept me sane.

Can he love you like I used to?
Does he know your weak spots?

Paradigm Shifts and Maintaining Your Sanity

My life's is at an unreal juncture. Musically, I'm achieving all the little goals that I had in my head. And yet it does not heal me. I have a gig, a pretty major one, a week from now featuring the best musicians and the best music that has come out of Kolkata recently. I still don't know how I figured, how my songs figured in that list. It's somewhat nerve-wrecking having to sing songs by songwriters who I have admired and idolised all these years. I am super nervous. I am super excited. But the melancholy grips me like a blanket on a cold day. 

What am I doing wrong? Am I not working hard enough? Why am I in so much pain then?

All these opportunities that come my way, what good are they when my soul refuses to come out of the dark abyss that it's taken refuge in. 

Courtney Killed Kurt

Shallow lives, shallow sense of self

"We're on the map, yeah"

"We've made it"

Look at all these shiny people.

Look at their opulence.

Their quick wit.

Their seductive ways.

"We're on the map, yeah"

"We've made it"

They eat off our palms now.

They fill our heads with praise.

Shallow shallow shallow shallow.

So shallow.

Nauseatingly sweet.

Unnatural.

Be the Love of my life.

Bring me down.

Tear me apart.

Devour me whole.

Kill me.

Kill me please.

Kill me before I kill myself.

I cry and cry and cry and I laugh sometimes.
How could my life possibly get any worse?
Every living being that I love and one that loves me back dies on me.

Do you know how broken a mother feels when her baby dies on her?

My loss is so deeply personal.
Nobody can help me recover from this.
I am alone.
All alone.
All those who claim to "love" me are just vultures.

There were good days and there were bad

it didn't matter in the end

the hole in her heart

is where her demons hid.

So strong, to the world

So fierce and brave

The little girl grew up fast

Learnt never to love again.

They cut her 

They burnt her

Yet she lived

It was her curse

The only way out of her hell was indifference

Live and Learn

There are few things more heartbreaking than a sick, possibly dying pet. I have grown up around and with a dog and a whole bunch of cats. So I don't know what life is like without having them around. My dog died when I was quite young. She was old and sick and it seemed like a good thing at that time-to watch her go. She would accompany my grandfather as he picked me up from the bus-stop and everybody would go gaga over her from the school bus. I have been told that when I was younger, she would sit beside my cot and keep an eye on me. She'd growl and bark every time relatives or acquaintances would come near it.
Dogs make the best pets, they say. It is quite true. Cats can never be your pet. They become the eccentric family member, the non-conformist, never your pet.

Shoshi was found when he was barely a month old. He was the cutest, jumpiest little thing. I brought him home in a shoebox and fed him some milk and a little fish because I was unsure how old he was. On his first night at home, I was absolutely petrified like the mother of a newborn baby. I made a bed right next to me and put him there to sleep. I kept the lights on and woke up in the middle of the night to see that he was missing. It turned out that the fucker, barely a month old, had climbed down my bed and was frolicking around under it because he could not sleep!

To see him reduced to a bag of skin and bones, barely breathing breaks my heart into a million little pieces and I can only stand beside him as doctors and their assistants try and do their best to revive him.

It'll be a miracle if he survives. I'll have to hold my breath for the next couple of days. Let's see what fate has in store for him. He's too young to suffer. Please don't make him suffer, universe. That's all I'm asking for at the moment.

Observations, part deux (?)

• Life feels liberating without a phone, social media accounts etc etc. I think I'm going to be phoneless on purpose for a while now. Facebook makes me sick and a twisted individual, but it's okay, it's amusing to see people so content having achieved so less in their lives. Girls who take selfies everyday and post them with song lyrics as captions don't annoy me anymore, I feel sorry for them. Boys who stalk/prey on women via facebook are always going to be doing it virtually because in reality they lack the balls. 
• I'm done trying to get people to love me. I have never been the one to compromise when it comes to work, family, etc and it's wrong of me to compromise when it comes to relationships. I feel like I owe it to myself and I deserve better than what I've been getting. Love is a sham. Love makes you weak. It fills your head with unrealistic expectations.
• The first incision is always the hardest, the most painful. Mostly because you can't quite anticipate the amount of pain you're going to feel. I feel like an emotional, insecure teenager with body issues cutting herself to feel good. Would you rather cut yourself or do bad drugs? Or both? 
• Lonerism is a good thing. It gives you time to figure out who you really are. If it were upon me, I would never leave the confines of my room. I'm scared of the big bad world outside. I'm afraid of the men who will lure me and break my heart. 
• Everything is always about sex. The older you grow, the more complicated it gets. Your cunt craves for what your heart warns you against. It's easier to get laid when you are young, you don't care about consequences of who you choose to sleep with.
• Am I a slut for enjoying sex as much, if not more than, a man?
• My soul mate is dead. My soul mate is FUCKING DEAD. There, I've said it! Chances are that love will never be my thing. Maybe I'll find fortune and maybe I'll find fame, but that is where the buck will probably stop for me. Neglect breeds strange feelings. I don't think I'd like to procreate and transfer all those fucked up things onto a new generation.
• I love animals and food more than people. People let you down, always.
• One day when I'm 30, I'd like to be dead. Or sooner. I just want to say what I have to say and then exit gracefully. There's only a certain number of years one can live alone, on their own. It becomes painful after that. I feel out of place almost everywhere. I don't think I belong. Or is that because I've had a broken heart for as long as I can remember and I've forgotten what it likes to be happy?
• I can't seem to remember the last time I was genuinely happy. Maybe when I met my best friend. We were sharing our sob stories. There's something incredibly comforting about having someone around who won't judge you for what you do and who you are. Wish I could meet more people like that. 
• Tripping indoors is still not my thing. I'm too much of a vagabond to trip in a room. I need to be somewhere outside, under the sky. I could spend my entire trip looking at the moon. Everything I see and everything I hear and everything I feel, it's all in my head. These are manifestations of my thoughts. I control my trip. What does enlightenment feel like? Powerful, confusing and lonely.
• I'm going back into my shell again. I'll come out only when someone coaxes me out of it. Half-hearted attempts aren't good enough for me anymore. I've been under lockdown for 4 days now and I don't want it to end anytime soon. This is my honeymoon with myself and nobody is invited.
• Everybody is selfish. Everybody is a liar. I'm not everybody.

Drunken Monologues

It takes two to tango

three only spoils the game

have some

have some

have some shame.

drunken monologues have no worth

drunken monologues, set in stone

"if I could physically feel your love

I'd love you with every bone"

The good men are gone

only the louts remain

am I

am I 

am I going insane?

drunken monologues, how it starts

drunken monologues, every time

"I'd give up the whole world for you

if you ever choose to be mine"

Where is my will to play along?

Where is my will to save myself?

kiss me

fuck me

then keep me on the top shelf.

Drunken monologues,

just because I can.

"You're a waste of my memory.

You're not even a man."

After an evening of drinking and having songwriter to songwriter conversations, I realised that I underestimate myself most of the time. Which is a good thing I think because I'd rather be a wallflower than a pompous yet untalented bitch. Support comes in from all quarters when people see a spark in you and I can't let my inner demons take control and take that spark away from me. 

Everything outside my bedroom feels like a stage. I have to pretend to be fine, I have to pretend that I'm perfectly sane and perfectly happy. It's like a gig. No matter how bad things are in your band, no matter how underconfident you are or how everything is faulty, you have to play your music and camouflage all the negatives for your audience. They must never know what really goes in that head of yours. My life is just like that. It's turning out to be quite fun that way too. 

The good thing about being young is that I can make all the possible mistakes because I have time to outlive them and learn from them. 

My cunt is my third eye. Men have the equation all wrong. All the secrets of this universe lie in the cunt. You can only experience salvation if you have a pure heart and the courage to let yourself go. Most people will never experience the things I have because they're too busy trying to keep up. Keep up with their daily task of wasting themselves, wasting away. The power of this infinite universe lies in the cunt. Anybody who's ever had a spiritual experience would be able to tell you that. It is the gateway to the other dimensions. But do I need somebody to open the doors for me when I travel to the other side? As much as I need a Siamese twin! 

Wisdom Teeth

The blood that runs through my veins,
feels contaminated,
feels inadequate.
I'd bleed myself dry if you wanted me to.

I'd do anything.
I'd do anything to be alright.
I'd do anything to be alright with you.

The thoughts that cross my mind,
seem shallow,
seem banal.
I'd spend a lifetime in darkness if you wanted me to.

I'd do anything.
I'd do anything to be alright.
I'd do anything to be alright with you.

These demons on my back,
this burden on my chest,
I'd do it and then do it again,
Just because you want me to be the best.

I'd do anything.
I'd do anything to be alright.
I'd do anything to make you alright again.

Toxic

Loving me is like a disease, every person I know who has loved me has had bad things happen to them.
But it's not fair. Why do all the good, nay, great human being have to go through such struggles?


He is such a great boy. He is such a great human being. He does not deserve this. It breaks me to think that such a devastating thing can happen to him. I know he'll make it though. I know he'll win this battle. He has a pure heart and a golden soul, he'll make it. It's only a matter of time.
He's young and it's still in the primary stages. His body can fight it off. I believe in him.
All cells in his body are pure, as his heart is. His aura is golden, virgin. Please make him better. Please make him un-sick. Please spare him. Not him. Free him. He doesn't deserve this. He deserves so much, so much better.

Good things happen to good people.
Good things happen to good people.
Good things happen to good people.


I believe in you, universe. Please make this happen. I shall lose faith in you forever otherwise.

The Tenth Day

It was a few years ago, our last together, when we accidentally stumbled onto each other. 'Durga Pujo' is the magical time of the year when miracles happen. Miracles and chance encounters have happened for as long as I remember. That was the last year a miracle happened, for me. I met you. Of all the people in the world, it was you I bumped into and I wish I could do it over and over again.

What if soulmates really do exist? What if you were my soulmate? Does that mean that I am destined to be alone forever, now that you're gone?

I hate this city during this time of the year. I hate stepping out of my house. What is the point, it's not like I'll see you somewhere, amongst the crowd. The last time we met was probably when I fell in love with you. You looked at me with such kindness, such compassion. The lust that brought us together was replaced by a sense of belonging. We someone fit into a perfect mould together. Our connection was so surreal, so strong and yet neither of us knew that this wouldn't last forever.

I wish I hadn't turned you down when you asked me to be your "girlfriend", I was scared and I didn't know that the time we had together would be so short. I wish we could have settled down eventually, gotten married and even have a kid maybe. We used to joke about things like that, things like how I'd make one lousy wife and you'd be a shitty husband and how we'd be the worst possible parents for a child. The jokes have stopped now. My reality is that I'll probably land up alone, trying to navigate my way through a series of bad relationships and meaningless sex.
I wanted to grow old with you, I wanted you to be a part of my life. I know you're still around watching over me. I know you're happy when I am happy and you're sad when I am. But I miss your embrace so much.
Sometimes I want to stay in bed and sleep forever to ease the pain of not having you around. I try and replay our first kiss over and over again in my head. But the details are getting blurry as time passes me by, your face is starting to fade.

Maybe in a few years, when I'm done living this life, I will come and join you wherever you are. The white light found you before it found me but not even death can keep us apart forever and it is only a matter of time till I find you again and this time I'm not letting go...

Come Inside, Come Around

I lay there on the bed-vulnerable like a domesticated animal. He wasn't around. He never was and he never will be. My eyes red and puffy from all the crying and my throat sore, I wondered why my life had come down to this. I was losing all control and like a diseased limb, I realised that I had to cut myself off from his toxic behaviour, before it was too late.

There were many firsts with him, things I now wish I had saved for someone else, someone who will take better care of me. But what do you do when your heart is broken over and over again by the same person who promises you that this infact is the last time?

Men often prove their superiority over you by making you feel like a whore and he was no exception. I let him come inside me-a first (and probably the last too) and while I could feel a connection as he thrust his manhood into me, it was only temporary. I was discarded like garbage the minute he pulled out. He was done. The act was over. I meant nothing to him anymore. That was all there was to it-I was his sex doll.

I cried myself to sleep that night. I was alone in a room far away from home. He was right outside laughing smoking drinking and having the best possible birthday one could ask for. I was his trophy on display that he left for others to see. He didn't hug me to sleep like I thought he would. He didn't comfort me even though he knew that that night was a milestone in my life. He didn't defend my honour. He didn't defend my pride. He didn't defend my womanhood. I was his prostitute. I was his slave. It had always been that way. I was too blind to see otherwise. But I know now. My epiphany, though painful, happened during these last few days. I cannot control how people behave with me but I can control who is in my life and who isn't. It hurts like hell, but I have to let go off people who don't and can't take care of me. It's not worth the pain.

It hurts when people let you down. It hurts when someone you try to make love to ends up leaving you feel like nothing but an outlet for their sexual appetite. I was probably only just that to him. Everything else was lies-lies that he rambled to get what he wanted from me-my body.

I am no longer attracted to him and I no longer crave for him. I may be wounded and my heart may have this void but I guess it's better to suffer alone than be with someone who doesn't treat you right.
They say that being brave and keeping your heart open to love is like playing Russian Roulette these days. I've been shot down over and over again. It's okay though. I still have a lot of love to give to this world, it doesn't matter if it's not him. Someone else will come along in my life soon. I can sense it.

When he tries to kiss the next girl in his life, I hope he remembers the pain he caused me and I hope he can't shut memories of me lying on the bed weak and vulnerable when he thrusts into the next girl. I hope he becomes a better person some day. I can't wait forever though.
I've moved on.
I'm gone.

Cheater Cocks (and Sometimes Pussies Too)

http://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2012/07/23/the-cheaters-guide-to-love?utm_source=tny&utm_campaign=generalsocial&utm_medium=facebook&mbid=social_facebook

I read this poignant piece today and it reminded me of what a horrible, horrible thing infidelity can be. Love is fleeting, it comes and goes when it pleases, but trust is the glue that holds the relationship, any relationship, together. I wake up some mornings with a heart filled with love and only love. I find no flaws, nothing sets me off. But there are days when I feel bitter and quite frankly, tired. I want to end it all, erase the slate and move on, onto greener pastures perhaps.

It's human nature to get used to a pattern. My pattern is getting used to people who are usually all wrong for me. I fall in love so easily and yet I can't stay there. I snap out of it. That's what my problem is.
My first boyfriend and I went out for nearly a year till the hues of the relationship changed to more morbid, cynical ones. Was it the sex? Of course it wasn't the sex! We were too young to be fucking. It took us a really long time to get there. I was vacationing somewhere during that summer, away from him. We'd talk once in a while. I could sense something was amiss, but I didn't read too much into it. 'I'll be back soon', I'd tell him. 'I'll be back soon', I'd tell myself. Everything would be dandy again.
They weren't. My absence had driven him to ask a girl out on a date. What's the big deal? You'd think. But for me it was. The action didn't bother me, the fact that he felt the need to hide it from me even after I confronted him did. Things had somehow broken, they weren't the same. My ego was bruised and I did my best to take revenge on his minor infidelity by teaching him a lesson. I kissed his best friend and slept with another friend of his. He found out. I wanted him to find out. He dumped me. I wanted him to dump me. His heart was broken. I had achieved relative success. But in the process, my heart was broken as well. I didn't want to cheat on him. It was a bad, bad decision. Instead of fixing the problem, I had only made the cracks appear wider. I learnt my lesson. I'd never break someone's heart just to teach them a lesson. Why did my boyfriend have to ask someone else out? Was I not good enough? What did I lack? I tortured myself over these things long after the entire episode was over. Why did I have to break his heart just because he broke mine? I asked myself but there was no answer.
How could I be so unkind?
We tried to make things work again years later. But it just wasn't the same. The sanctity of the bond that we once shared was lost somehow, amongst all the blaming and the lying and the crying. We did what two sensible people would do-bid each other goodbye and exit from each other's lives.

I navigated through relationships and meaningless sex for a while after that. But I was never really happy. I wanted someone to hold me, someone to tell me that I'd be alright. I wanted someone to love me for who I was and not because I put out.
I had just started singing at Someplace Else when I was 18. I was the new kid on the block. I met a boy on orkut who seemed cool. I was infatuated with him despite his questionable reputation. People looked at us when we were out in public with questionable eyes. 'What's a girl like her doing with a guy like him?' they'd always seem to be asking silently. But I paid no heed. Looks weren't everything. There was so much more to a person than their looks. I've always been a firm believer of that. I liked him. I was almost falling for him. During the pujas one year, I remember being rather drunk and fooling around with him. He whispered the taboo words as he lay on top me. "Don't say it if you don't mean it." I said crying. "I love you" he said again. I was crying like a child in his arms before I knew it. I couldn't feel any love. I knew he didn't mean what he say. I knew he didn't love me. But he insisted anyway. I fell for it eventually. After putting up with the boy's emotional torture for months. I gave up. It happened one night, the night before my class 12 psychology board-exam. I broke up with him, unable to take his emotional blackmail anymore. I drank all the alcohol I could find and turned up for the exam with a hangover. But I was glad I did what I did. I moved on from him to the next one.
A few months later, when a common friend told me that he went to his ex-girlfriend and fucked her the very day after he asked me out, I let it go, pretending like it didn't bother me.
It did bother me. It bothered me quite a bit. Why would a boy go sleep with his ex-girlfriend the very next day after asking someone out? How could someone be so cruel? So disrespectful towards love and relationships? I don't know what happened to him since. I don't really care anymore. It's strange though, that even if I do think of him when summarizing my past relationships, it's always the lying and the cheating that comes to mind first.

They say that girls and boys cheat for very different reasons. I don't know if that's true. But I have cheated so many times in the past that at one point I remember thinking of myself as such a stud because I was able to pull it off. I was sleeping around and even though everybody knew, they pretended like they didn't. My epiphany came one afternoon when I went to a friend's place. I swore to myself that I wouldn't succumb to his charm. I'd stay true to the boy I'd been dating then. Sure he was a little dull, but he was sweet and he cared. But I broke my promise to myself. I slept with my friend. I couldn't resist. I had reached the lowest point in my life. I needed to detox. I swore to myself that I'd mend my ways. I did.

I put up with the boy who beat me everytime he felt jealous. I put with the boy who humiliated me in front of friends, constantly belittling me. I put up with the boy who once urinated on me. I thought it was my penance for my past. It was my karma getting back at me for breaking hearts. I took it all, never complaining. Maybe I wasn't destined for a great romance. You could make a BDSM porno out of my love-life at best, never a Mills and Boon novel.

The good thing about time is that it heals most wounds. I no longer feel like the villain in a relationship and neither do I feel like a victim. Emancipation is a strange thing, you find it in the strangest of places. My emancipation comes from the fact that I have the ability to forgive. I find it comforting to forgive those who hurt me. I pray that those who I have hurt over all these years forgive me as well. That's the only way to move forward.

I don't forget though. How can I forget the look on his face when he saw me kiss someone? It broke his heart. It broke my heart to see him so shattered.
I never forget. I never forget how lonely and unloved I felt when his friends told me that he was cheating on me and it had been on multiple occasions, not once like he claimed. I wouldn't want my worst enemies to feel that shattered.

As someone who has cheated and been cheated on, it's the suppression of information from your partner that hurts more than the act itself. I respect those who have the courage to admit to the fact that they've cheated. I respect those who have the courage to seek forgiveness. Lying about it doesn't make a person clever or smart, it only makes them a coward, spineless, gutless. Men who lie about cheating are no men at all. Women who lie about cheating are no women at all. But hey, that's just my opinion. Cheating is rather relative. Some people think it's okay to flirt with as long as it's healthy and no actual physical cheating is involved. Some people think it's not. Some people don't think it's cheating when they sleep around, as long as they love only one person and some people think that is a rather absurd concept. For me it's doing something that I wouldn't want my partner to do. It's suppressing information, no matter how insignificant, because they might suspect something. If I'm, say, out drinking at a party with a friend and there's nothing going on between us, I should be able to tell my boyfriend. After all I have nothing to hide. But having said that, at the end of the day, all I want would be to spend some time with my boyfriend and him alone, instead of going out and meeting others. Because that's just the kind of person that I am. The whole world may want to get in my pants, but I usually always have my heart set on one.

Anyway, I'm not going to wallow on all the things that went wrong in the past because being the forever optimist that I am, I firmly believe that someday, I will find that perfect man who will love me and only me. He'll tell me that he loves me and I'll believe him. I wont feel the need to keep my options open and he'll be more than glad to be with me and me alone.
Maybe I'll be able to make love to him and not get bruised, so bruised in the process. In my relationship utopia, there aren't a hundred Adonis' and Hercules', there is one. Only one. The one who makes me goes weak in the knees. The one who means it every time that he loves me, but most importantly, one who'll have his eyes on me and me alone, as will I.

Till he comes along, I can only wait the endless wait. But I am hopeful that he's around the corner somewhere and it's only a matter of time before our story begins.

I think I'm ready to be in a relationship again. A real one this time. I want to dive into it with all I have and not look back. My heart is finally free of all the baggage it had been dragging along all this while. I am finally free. I'm not afraid to love.

Love, come to me, I am ready for you.

Big Two Three, etc etc

I turned 23 years old yesterday. It was more eventful than my 22nd at least. There was a highly potent rum-punch and no Honey Singh music in shady nightclubs. I had a few close ones over. I got my guitar after months and months of an agonizing wait. I stayed up all night, long after everyone was gone, playing my heart out.

People wished me luck, wished me well. It was all very nice. I got a few unexpected wishes along the way as well, which genuinely made me very happy.

Familiarity sometimes is a great thing. It brings comfort to the broken heart. It brings relief.

But today is not a special day anymore. I am back to my reality. My birthday is over.

This past year has been eventful for me. I've scaled new heights and I've sunk to new lows. I gathered the courage to meet the Monster. He was just like I remembered from 10 years (11 actually) ago. But he seemed shorter (or did I grow tall since the last time?), he seemed unsure of himself, he was no longer suave and charming. Heck, if he asked me out today, I probably wouldn't even have given him a second chance. It was so hard to imagine that this man, now 27 (or 28?) years old caused me so much pain, damaged me so badly. I felt nothing for him. I felt sorry for him. I didn't feel attracted to him anymore.

A decade and many guys later, I can safely say that I am no longer afraid of him. I no longer need him to validate my existence. I was a stupid child but I've grown up since. I've grown up enough to know that it wasn't my fault. I was a victim, yes. But I will not let that define who I am. I will not let him define who I am.



So 10 years later when I met another man, who reminded me in so many ways of him, I knew I was taking a big risk. Everything was a blur. I wanted a fling. He wanted love. I wanted love. He wanted himself. After two months of talking to everyone around me, but never me, he sent me a fancy package out of nowhere to compensate for all the things he put me through. I thought to myself if this is what I had become over the years-someone who accepts gifts from people who leave them feeling betrayed just because it's a good gift. I asked myself how I could still love someone who never loved me in the first place. This was the exact same mistake I made 10 years ago. Why was I stuck in the same loop? Between involving all my friends and close ones, he made one fundamental mistake which gave him away-especially to people close to me, who care about me. He would always talk about himself, what he was going through, how lost and lonely and confused he felt. It was never about me, it was always about him. Him, him, him, him. Me, me, me, me. I, I, I, I. Never a we, never a her.
He tried calling me to wish me from various numbers yesterday I think. I wish I didn't have to be so cruel but sometimes you have to break someone's heart to mend yours. Where was this desperation during the last couple of months? Where was this love? This affection?

I've learnt, over the years, that most people will not be nice to you. They will be cruel, selfish and unkind. But I must never do to them what they do to me. It is wrong and it makes me no better than them. Just the same. I forgive but that does not mean that I will forget. I must never forget.
If you let someone hurt you once, it's their fault but they do the same again and again, it's becomes your fault.


So anyway, I'm breaking my silence today, despite my closest army of friends advising me otherwise. I think it's time to salvage whatever little dignity that is left of this situation.





Dearest A,

You say you're hurting, but do you know why? Do you know what causes the knot in your stomach, the lump in your throat and the sinking feeling in your heart? Is it because you miss me or is it because you feel hurt and rejected? Do you know the difference?
You may lie to the whole world, make me the villain to your tragic love story, but can you lie to yourself? Can you sleep well at night knowing that you did what you did with me, without thinking of its consequence?
Did it ever occur to you that maybe I was in love with you too and that every time you hurt me, especially over little things, I let it go? I gave you the benefit of doubt. I gave you a chance and another one and another one after that. I kept giving it another shot. Hoping that somehow you'd change. Somehow you'd stop making excuses instead of taking responsibility for the things you did wrong instead of hiding them under the carpet. But you didn't mend your ways. You merely took my being away for granted, made your excuses bigger and grander. Even today you're still the same, you're just trying to convince the world how you have been wronged, but have you really been wronged?

Do you know what it's like to be crushed by the one you love? Do you know what it feels like when someone goes out of their way to make you fall for them and then proceed to act so indifferent, so cruel?

I'm a simple girl. I have very basic needs. I don't want a man who'll bombard me with fancy gifts. I don't want a man who is rich and successful. Or even educated and well-read. I want someone who loves me and is as devoted to me as I will be to them. I want a man who doesn't make me feel insecure. I have the whole world doing that to me. I just want someone who'll treat me gently, who'll be kind. Someone who'll coax me out of my depression instead of letting me waste away.

I have been in and out of love and it's never worked out well for me. The first person I loved raped the fuck out of me. The second person I loved died. The third person I loved chose our work and friendship over our relationship and the last one was you.

Just like you, I had dreams about us as well. I thought I was happy and I thought I had the right to dream. But hey, just my luck, nothing ever works out for me. So after a long period of crying myself to sleep every night thinking about how we made love and how I let you inside the deepest corners of my heart, I sort of just gave up on you. The love we made was beautiful. Our kisses were special. I felt alive when you touched me.
Sometimes I also let you be cruel to my body. I figured if you scratched my back, spanked me really hard till my butt had imprints of your palm on them and bit my breasts, you wouldn't be cruel to me in real life. I thought you'd be as nice to me otherwise as aggressive you were with me in bed. I submitted to you. I gave it my all. I made love to you with every cell in my tiny and frail body. But I guess you never saw things from my perspective. I guess you never will. I have worked really hard over these last few years to restore my pride, my sense of self. I was broken beyond repair during my adolescence and I thought you'd understand how fragile I really am instead of me screaming it out to you. It took a lot of effort and determination on my part to not break down and cry in front of you. I didn't want to leave a bad taste in your mouth. I didn't even want your love. I loved you, without expecting anything in return.

It took a lot of courage for me to drop everything and run away with you from the rest of the world. Be it the drug-trips or the actual travel. I did a lot of things with you which I was saving to do with my Prince Charming. I thought you were the one. But my Prince Charming cannot be someone who hurts me everytime he doesn't get his way. If he is, well then, I don't have much to live for. All my beliefs are lies. Why did you set me up for such heartbreak? What wrong did I ever do to you? I was committed to loving you and just you.

There was an evening, long time back, when I had first told you that I was moving back home, away from you. You tried to talk me out of it, but being the stubborn person that I am, I did not listen. You probably won't remember but we started to make out sitting on a bench shortly after and you kept getting more aggressive, you bit my lip harder, held me by the neck as your other hand slipped inside my t-shirt and squeezed my breasts. It was fine at first, but you just kept getting more forceful. You pinched my nipples so hard that they hurt and it wasn't a good kind of pain. There was a scar on my chin from the sucking and my breasts felt sore, like somebody had just beaten me black and blue. I am no stranger to finding pleasure in pain. But this was pain of the humiliating kind. I knew you were upset about me leaving and that was probably you venting it out on me without even realising. I teared up a little sitting right next to you that day. I felt so shaken. How could a man who seemingly loved me so much be so cruel to me? So indifferent towards my feelings? You probably couldn't understand why and how you made me feel so, so cheap and so I let it go. Days passed by as did months and moments similar to that one came and went. I didn't think it was a big deal eventually. I blamed myself for not being open enough, for being insecure. I thought I was letting my baggage from my past burden my relationship with you. But why was it that I was always blaming myself and never you?
Because that is what love is about-blind adoration for someone even though they are the ones who are wrong.

You may think that the worst you've ever done to me is slap me during our acid trip together. But that wasn't it. The worst thing you did to me was to break down my sense of self.
After I lost my virginity quite tragically, I saved a few things for the right man when he came along. I thought it was you. I went ahead and rid myself completely of all inhibitions, just to make you happy. I assumed you'd do the same by showing me some mercy and some dignity. After all, I wasn't asking for much from you. I wanted you to be kind to me, I wanted you to be truthful to me.

Lies, some white and most completely unnecessary caught up with us. If you sow the seeds of a relationship based on lies, how can it grow? How can it blossom?

I don't know why I have such bad karma when it comes to love. I have loved and loved with all my heart, but I haven't been loved back the way I'd like to be. I guess the fault lies in me. Maybe I wasn't good enough for you. Maybe I wasn't adequate to calm your roving eye. It's okay. I'm not perfect. I guess one day I'll find me a man (or woman) who will love me for who I am and be satisfied with me and not explore options while still with me.

Do you know how bad it felt when I saw you hug some random girl who you didn't even know, before my gig?  It probably wasn't a big deal for you. You probably don't even remember. But it really hurt me. Your incessant need to be overtly friendly with members of the opposite sex may be a good thing, but it made me feel so inadequate, like a defective toy that the owner doesn't really care about and infact searches for newer, better toys to play with. In my (then) 22 years of existence, I have never felt insecure in a relationship before. I've never had to try so hard to get someone's attention.
Out there in the desert, if you had seen me do the same, how would you feel? Would you let it go, thinking you're reading too much into it? No,you'd probably fuck the shit out of me, take your anger out on me. Like you did so many times.
In the car. On the roof. In a hotel. On my bed. On your bed. On the floor. In your friends' home.
I never said no. No matter how degraded I felt.

Maybe I should have. Maybe I should have put my foot down.
Like the time we were vacationing together and you woke me up one morning wanting to have sex when I didn't. I didn't say no even though I didn't want to wake up and fuck. But I wanted you to be happy above all else. So I didn't firmly say no. I played along, like I was fine. I figured these are some of the things you need to do to keep your partner happy and your relationship going strong. Why is that I was making all these unspoken compromises and not you?

I know you probably don't even realise what a flirt you are. It's not your fault. It's who you are. You have an unnecessary need to please everybody around you, especially members of the opposite sex. I've met loads of boys like you. I say boys because men don't make their partners feel bad about themselves, inadequate somehow. But I didn't realise you were one to fall in that category. It appeared that all the beautiful things you said you me, you said to a hundred others. All the wonderful things you did for me, you'd do for a hundred others.

You were always special to me. I was never special to you. The only difference between me and the other girls was that I was letting you fuck me, not them. I always thought of myself as some rather broad-minded when it came to relationships. I believe I still am. But my ego does not permit me to be with a man who doesn't make me feel good about myself. Someone who makes me feel insecure and unnecessarily jealous.

All these days of us not being in touch, you went to everybody I know and told them of your heartbreak. But why not me? You tried calling me from different numbers yesterday, but where was that desperation a few weeks back when I was forced to block you? Where was that love? If you were hurting so badly why is it that you never called me from another number, sent me a message or an email or a letter?
You didn't want to wish me yesterday. You just needed and excuse to talk to me and hear my voice. If you really did want to wish happiness and joy for me, you could have atleast sent me a message from the numerous numbers you were calling me from. It wasn't about me. Even on my birthday, it was about you. Your needs.

I'll tell you where your love for me was, for all these months. It never existed in the first place. You mistook lust and sex for love. I wish you didn't have to drag me down with you though. I was perfectly happy being lonely before I met you. Now I'm heartbroken and lonely.

I've decided to stop dating, having sex and meeting new people for the time being. It hasn't done me any good, case in point being you. I need to stop being so involved and invest so much time on other people. I need to focus on myself and my needs for a change. I risked everything for you and it sort of blew up on my face. It doesn't make sense to fall in love so easily and subsequently lose my will to live.

Thank you for your birthday gift. I can't accept it. I haven't opened it yet although I know what's inside. Everytime I look at it, it just makes me feel like you're buying my forgiveness with things. It hurts that you chose to send me a generic, impersonal gift. After all that we've been through, you don't even know what makes me happy and what doesn't. If you want me to forgive you, then you should just ask. I've been told that I have a big forgiving heart. I can't hate people even if I wanted to. You need not have given me something for my birthday to compensate.

I've forgiven you in any case. You don't have to buy me gifts for that. I am not the one to hold grudges. I've forgiven you even though you're not even sorry. But it's okay. Maybe you'll be a better person someday, as you grow older.

I hope you find love and I hope you find peace. I wish you all the luck and happiness. May you only experience good things. But please don't hurt someone without reason. It's not right.


I fell in love with you and never quite out of it. I hope I have been able to leave myself behind inside of you in some small way. I hope you read this someday. Or maybe you wont. Don't read too much into it, I have a knack for saying things as they are and hate mincing my words.
The first time I trusted you completely, I let you make love to me. I let you enter me. I let you go where no man has ever been before because I thought my dreams were coming true. But now it feels like a long forgotten afternoon that amounted to nothing but heartbreak for me. Anyway, my feelings don't matter to anyone. So I keep them locked in a jar-away from everybody.

I feel really bad. I turned out to be the loser in your game. I opened up to you like no other. I am a very private person. I don't like letting people in. But I made an exception for you. I wish you'd understand how hard it has been for me to pick up the pieces of my broken heart that you've left behind.
The scars on my body still exist. Some of them are quite prominent too. I feel ugly and unwanted when I see my body in the mirror now. I feel like trash which has been used and discarded by someone. These are the exact same feelings that I felt 10 years ago. So you see how gravely disappointed I am, with myself?
I don't blame you for making me feel this way. I brought this upon myself. I should have known better than to trust you so much. I'm a fool you see. I'm a fool when it comes to love.

All these days, weeks, months of not talking to you, I was still hoping for some kind of a sign to show me that you really cared. I thought you'd do something to sweep me off my feet, make me love you again. I didn't want a hundred people constantly tell me how much you were missing me. I wanted you to tell me. I wanted you to convince me. I wanted you. It was always you. But I was never the one.
I'd wake up every morning hoping that maybe you'd call, or write me a letter, or send me a message. But you never made that extra effort. I guess I asked for too much.


Thanks for everything.I can't forget all the great moments we've spent together. They've changed me as a person. I really hoped you wouldn't break my heart. It's okay though. I don't want any bad blood between us. I'll love you like a memory never to be forgotten. Being with you has taught me to risk everything for the one you love. Sure it may not work out the way you want it to. I'm still an optimist and even though it'll be a long time from now that I can start trusting people again, let them in like I did with you. I still don't have any regrets because I know that I loved you without prejudice, with all my heart.


Always in love, but will never say it out loud again.
S.

The D-Word

I woke up on the floor with no memory of what had happened and how I got there. Seemed like I had passed out while fixing myself a snack. Well dinner at 3am, actually. I helped myself get up, go downstairs and curl into bed. In-between trying very hard not to lose consciousness again in the process, I realised that this was what my life was always going to be-helping myself get back on my feet every time I fall. I have no one and no one has me.

I really wanted to get away from this city after I was done recording the album. I really wanted to clear my head after what was one of the most intense weeks of my life. But recording is an expensive process and even more so when you don't have a sponsor and neither are your parents rich and influential. I (we actually, not me alone) spent whatever little money I had saved. So I'm stuck here with a million little things in my head, which is making me go crazy.

My depression has been quite uncontrollable for the last week. I just want this phase to get over so badly. I hate bothering to tell people about my depression because very few people take it seriously. Depression is not a feeling, it's a disease that eats away every cell in your body as time passes. "My boyfriend forgot our 5-month anniversary, I'm so depressed"-no you're not depressed, you're just upset. I hate how loosely people throw around the word like they really know what it feels like to be depressed.

There are times when I don't leave my room for days at a stretch. I cut myself off from the outside world. I don't talk to anybody. I don't eat. I don't shower. I just lay in my bed praying for the day to get over. Until I wake up the next day and it's just the same, no better. I don't know why I am so incredibly sad. I cry and cry for hours when no one's around and yet I feel no better. Every morning has a fresh start they say, but all my mornings are the same. It's just crying against the pillow for no apparent reason and then going back to sleep again.
Sleep it out, sleep it out, I tell myself. But it doesn't work. I try writing new material, but my voice chokes as I try to sing.

I remember my self-mutilation phase when I was 15ish, I'd take a blade and make incisions on my skin just to stop feeling all the pain that I felt in my heart. But I was never one of those teenagers slashing away just to get some attention. I'd keep my scars a secret, in places which you wouldn't notice at first. I can't do the same now. I feel like I still owe my body some mercy for what I've put it through all these years.

The worst part of depression is that it makes you forget all the good things about you, around you. The melancholy overpowers whatever little good thing you have going on in your life. I know I should feel lucky to be where I am today, but I can't help but feel like all that motivational self-talk is just bullshit.

I know I can get through this. I have been through this feeling so many times before. It's just that I'm growing older as everyday passes and the struggle to be happy is just getting harder with every fit.

I want to fast-forward to the future when I'm with someone who understands my depression and loves me inspite of it. I can be quite adorable otherwise. I promise. Although my depression hangs over me like the shadow of death. I want to be able to share my grief with someone, anyone. That's all I want from life sometimes.
I guess that's why I always end up making the worst possible choices when it comes to relationships. I think I give my heart away too soon every time, make love with all the passion that I have inside me only to be greatly disappointed by the big void that nobody seems to be able to fill. The fault lies in me, maybe I'm too needy, too hopeful that someone will fix my depression for me someday. Maybe I have to do it on my own-get over it and not let it get to me instead.

I have lived for days at a stretch without any human contact. I have literally not spoken to another soul for days at a stretch at one point. That was the lowest I have ever sunk. This time it sure feels like a close second. I wonder what difference it would make to other people if I didn't exist at all. Would they notice at all? Would they care? Would they remember my face and remember all the seemingly good things about me?

All the calls I get on my phone are either work-related or people calling to talk about themselves. Nobody wants to hear my story so I tell no one anything. People on social networking sites make witty comments and logical arguments every time I post anything and yet none of them know me. Or maybe I should say none of them have any idea what really goes on in my head, who I really am.


"I am fine. I am good" that's what I tell the world bravely,even though I feel like I've been broken into a million little pieces. I really don't know how to fix this on my own. Therapy's not helping either. Like I said before, maybe this will what my life will always be like. A strong, confident person to the outside world who'd drop everything to help someone else out, but irreparably damaged inside. Only I know how hard is to be suffering from a disorder which no one else seems to understand.

Anyway, why am I even writing this? Does anybody even read this anymore?

Goodnight cruel world.