Hollow from the inside…

Its been a long time, without you my friend. I’ll tell you all about it, when I see you again.

I really missed bogging all this while. I had so many posts in my head everyday but really, I really couldn’t muster the time to grab the laptop to type. I love blogging.

A lot has happened over the past few weeks. To begin with, my better half got my mobile phone fixed. Thanks to him, it works like new. Well almost. But it is much better. No more virus bugging me every instant. Battery is much better. I also got a cool back cover for it.

There is a destination I aim to reach in the next year. So got our stuff together and made our move. Hoping God lets everything go smooth. Big Goals ahead on this on!

Who said God doesn’t answer prayers. Sometimes you don’t even have to ask. My son got circumcised  a couple of weeks ago. My sister in law visited us for two days. Her dad asked her to wake up one late afternoon. After much mumbling, she sweetly said,” Daddy please let me sleep, I din’t catch a wink all night”. There was so much emotion and sweetness in her voice. My heart ached for my dad. At that very moment boundless tears flew out of my eyes. When will I get a chance to say something like that to my dad. (My parents and siblings live abroad in the KSA). Lo and Behold! The very next day my dad called up saying Grandma isn’t well and he is coming to India in two days time. MY EXCITEMENT KNEW NO BOUNDS. One ache, one sigh from my heart, and God sent my dad instantly overseas. Right to my house. Grandma is in a vegetative state with no medications. Just waiting for her time. Only I, only I know that God sent dad for me. And not for any other reason. I hugged my dad hard when he came. I couldn’t stop my tears . He has gone frail, but stronger in faith. His enigmatic charisma beheld my eyes and heart in awe. I love my dad. I missed him so much. I got to bond with him for a week. And then he bid goodbye. He went back to mom and siblings last Tuesday. (Well, now I am missing mom)

It has been very hot this summer. Temperatures really shot up. I have become really tired of constantly washing sweat filled clothes. And the current keeps cutting off. Two days back, hubby and me decided to move our furniture around to give a fresh look to the room. Beneath my dressing table he found a mouse. A dead mouse. It did not stink. There were no insects around it. It was dead. Along with the other dust I swiped it into the dust pan. I got a moment to look at it closely.

It taught me a lesson for life. Stagnant things become hollow from the inside. Stagnant things are dead things. There is a huge difference between being Constant and staying Stagnant. Life needs to have principles to be governed by for consistency. These should be imbibed to evolve in life. To move in life, even if it is moving behind or ahead or sideways.

That mouse got stuck. It couldn’t figure out a way out of its situation. So it sat stuck. It died. And the summer red fire ants ate up every single nerve, organ, everything of the mouse. Except its outer body. They permeated through its skin and ate it up. They left it hollow. When we found it, it did not look dead. It appeared very much alive. It’s when I shooed it with the broom, that I found it was dead, and hollow.

I got goosebumps at the realization. Never stay stuck, never. Always evolve. Always move ahead. Always, always keep moving.

 

On the Wall.

Walls are awesome. Weird statement, I know. But I am fascinated by walls. Each time I look at a wall with leisure, my brain begins ticking as to what can I do to make this wall look outstanding? So, to satisfy this appetite I worked upon two walls of my room.

I tried my hand at a corner vector and two Arabic calligraphic designs and words.

All it took was a pencil, an eraser, ruler and glossy black paint. And TIME 🙂

After much surfing on google images, I found this really intriguing corner design and worked it up on the wall with a sight modification.

I couldn’t get my hands on a paint brush, so I used an earbud to do the painting after the outline.

The Arabic word here is Al-Hubb. It translates to the emotion of Love. (And hence the little crayon red heart).

 

After a while, another wall of my room was bothering me. It was just to empty. So I did this. Its a reproduction of an image I came across on Instagram.

This is “Muhammadur Rasul Ullah” in Arabic. A part of the Kalimah, that states Muhammaed (P.B.U.H) is the messenger of Allah.

 

 

Designing

My mother is a very creative lady. I admire her to the moon and back. She has always designed clothes for me and my sisters. Beautiful frill layered frocks to tops and shalwar khameezes. She even wore a lot of her own self designed clothes. She modified plain sarees and blouses. I remember she transformed a plain white shalwar khameez by hand painting it flowers with fabric paints!

I have always been fascinated by her work and wished I could do something similar. Inspired by her I attempted my first Saree and Blouse modification.

As part of our cultural tradition my parents have given me many designer sarees. Among the lot, my mom personally chose some plain georgette sarees for me.

I began with the Green one.

Exif_JPEG_420

Exif_JPEG_420

Exif_JPEG_420

I bought a golden zari-work lace from the famous Lad Bazar of Hyderabad, India. It was a plain lace altered with a pattern of leaves and small flowers.

I bought golden stones and emerald stones along with Fevicryl Fabric glue. I stuck the emerald stones on the lace. As for the golden stones, I pasted them on the saree in a polka-dot fashion with exact measurement to give it a polished look.

Exif_JPEG_420

Exif_JPEG_420

Exif_JPEG_420

Exif_JPEG_420

 

It took me about three months to complete the entire saree, given that I worked for about an hour or two per day.

Next, I purchased an elastic shimmer velvet blouse from amazon. I used the remaining lace to transform it.

Exif_JPEG_420

Exif_JPEG_420

Exif_JPEG_420

Since the Pallu, covers the front, I worked only on the sleeves of the front side. Using both the stones, I pasted flowers. The remaining portion of the lace were used as border/piping on the sleeves and lower back. The back side looked a lot plain. To give it a fancy look, I cut up individual patterns of the lace and pasted them in an organised manner.

The finished blouse looks like this:

 

I plan to wear this on a future ceremony in our house.

I have many more ideas and sarees and dresses to design or remodel. Will post them as I do them!

 

Catching Up.

Well, its been quite a while since I posted. As the usual tick tock of my time continues, I tried my hands at different creative things this while. I just couldn’t fit the time to post on my blog in my messed up schedule.

My baby is being potty trained. And my toddler is having tantrum issues.

So the next few bogs will be about some sleeve-rolled-up stuff I’ve been doing for some time.

 

I write again.

I have been away for a while. Enjoying my sunshine to its fullest.

God answers prayers.

I started taking math tutions  for an 8th grader. This can also be read as my coffers getting filled once more! Well, no actually, I did this to kill time and make the most of it. Math sums have run my dusty cogwheels again. After a long time.

I am also teaching my bro-inlaw Accountancy subjects.

Amidst this, I enjoyed the love being showered on me by my better half.

Like nature, after the day, the sun sets. The darkness comes out.

And like summer gives into rain, my good days faded a bit and now the rain has begin to pitter patter.

I find myself very weak at this point of life. Physically. My legs hurt. A lot. Not just hurt, its such a dainty word. My legs PAIN. Around my knees especially.

My FIL constantly belittles my parenting. It goes to my head and demotivates me beyond words. I am trying to raise strong kids. I don’t want them to grow up as tantrum throwers and cry babies, craving attention. And in the midst of this, both my kids are 3-4 aged and they EAT my head. I have so much pent up frustration, that I eventually yell at them. I am trying very hard to handle all the aspects of my life. Pulling together cooking, household duties, washing, cleaning, ass wiping as soon as I wake up, everything, along with a little bit of teaching, and somebody tells me on my face that I am doing parenting level -1.

I am trying very hard. I am among people, who when I am given a choice I would abandon at first notice. The amount of negativity drags me into the mud daily, that I let my tears run in the shower. I am holding myself with a piece of thread. Hope. Just Hope. That things will be alright. Giving time, some time.

The first showers of the year began on Wednesday. The literal rain. The sound of the droplets excited the child in me. But that died sooner than I wanted it too. The adult-ness of life, quietened me. I just watched my white candle melt away.

A distant cousin of mine won an award for poetry. I am happy for him. But deep down, a voice in me sighed deeply. I was a poet too. I thought I buried the poet in me. I buried Rose. Or so I thought. She yelled from within, yesterday. Under the sky with the fading sun. Rose woke up within me. (Nope I don’t have MPD, Rose is my poetic nickname). Why did I stop writing poetry? I don’t really know. But when I did stop, everyone else was writing. I have always wandered towards paths not taken. Well, I have now fallen in a pit. There is a way out that is visible to me, but it has a rope that I have to climb. A rope that I have been trying to climb since October 2015. God knows I tried my best. I keep slipping halfway through. God help me out.

Another thing that beats the brains out of me is my dysfunctional mobile phone. In this such a modern day and age, I am stuck with two hopeless mobile phones. Lava A79 and an even useless Nokia XL.

My Lava A79 is struck with a virus that attacks my phone as soon as I turn on an internet connection. I lost contacts, messages, and so many things in trying to wipe format and reboot the phone. And just as the bright screen gets on, I am hit with the virus again. And yeah, my daughter decided one day to pull out the charger cable while my phone was charging. The inner pins of the phone got slightly twisted. Charging that phone now is pure torture.

Nokia XL? Its Nokia. Incomplete version of an Android. The phone fell last year, so there’s spiderweb cracks on my screen held together by cellotape. Battery drains as fast as it charges. The browser dies on me often.

I also lost my 8GB memory card.

I can continue writing so many paragraphs on things going wrong with me right now. I spend the whole of yesterday crying at the same time hiding my tears from my loved ones. Hard things can’t be ignored for long. My human heart shrieks out from time to time.

Nothing is in my hands. Everything is going by flow.

My tuition kid flunked her math exam. Because her basics are poor. And we dint have more than a week to prepare for the exam. Failures in life punch me in my belly.

I haven’t. But I have failed as a mom, failed as a daughter, failed as a teacher, failed my health. I am masking myself infront of my parents. I can’t tell them my problems simply because they can’t solve it. Instead they would just worry. I don’t want to put the bag of worries on anyone’s shoulders. But I am also getting tired of fighting this battle like a lone brave soldier. I am not brave. I am just a broken person held together by hope in God and love from my hubby.

I have  got to stop myself from withering away into emptiness. Time is dragging.

 

Calming a raging storm.

Chaos hit me once more. It keeps hitting me. And sooner or later somehow I come out of it.

This time it looked impossibly. Everything, Every.Single.Thing, in my life right now is broken, leaking, poor, damaged or over. I am tired of this “I don’t need money just love” funda that I thought I could live through. I can’t.

I am stuck among negativity, revenge, cutting throat sarcasm, sweetened slavery. I don’t even know how to word my other problems. No matter where I am turning to, I am finding a dead end. It is very hard for me.

I cried for half an hour in the shower.

When life along with the soul is disturbed, nothing can be done. Maybe something can. I am turning around everywhere to find closed doors. I cannot, not in any freaking case, I can’t be where I am. I don’t even want to think of any reason to regret. I want to go. I am not meant for this. This is not who I should be. This is not what I should be doing.

My hands are tied. I want to shut my ears.

My soul is screaming inside my body. It is so hard, so very hard to calm myself down. Nobody, No freaking soul around me can calm this storm inside me. I am praying to God.

The silence is deafening. I am feeling so lonely.

I live in a house, with people in it. I have kids. I have a good husband. I have food to survive. I am thankful to God for all of this.

There is a scholar I greatly revere. He constantly stresses on having good character, mannerism and goodwill. Lack of all this along with a double dose of unthankfulness and negativity ravages in the house I live in.

I yearn. My soul yearns…..for peace. For calm. I want to redo and restart my life afresh. I want to have makeover of everything I am doing.

I recently read and article, that if you feel you are in a place that you feel is NOT THIS, then go get what you want. I am in the NOT THIS part of my life. I want to do something. But what I don’t know. I am living in a pathetic society, pathetic mentality, limited resources, no options, nothing.

Everything is so hard.

My kids aren’t making things easier for me either.

Hanging on by a withering thread of hope. Waiting for some freaking light to shine down me and get me out of here.

I am DONE. SOOOO DONE.

 

Dead Close Up.

Three days ago, my sister-in-law lost her father-in-law. I do not know much about him except what my SIL used to say about him. I met him on two occasions. Both the times, I found him to be a smiling man, with a lot of knowledge and seeking for more. I found him to be someone who recently discovered the sweetness of Faith. He had a good aura to him. He seemed fatherly to me.

He passed away three days ago. A sudden shocking death at the end of Friday prayers. An attack snatched his soul from his healthy body. He was never on medication.

Death doesn’t tell everyone and come.

I along with my husband’s family, went for condolence. His body was brought from the hospital to his wife’s maternal home. We went there. It was a big roomy old house.

As I entered the central room, there were women. His family and relatives. Sobbing. He was laid on a single cot, wrapped in clean white sheets. My heart trembled immensely. I had never seen a dead body. I saw him that day. They had uncle’s face uncovered. I couldn’t look at it. I just couldn’t. His wife sat beside him on a chair, crying inconsolably. Their daughter was sitting at their feet crying.

I did not ask my eyes to cry. The tears came on their own. I couldn’t look at uncle’s face above his nose. I just couldn’t see his eyes. Closed as they would be. He appeared as if he was asleep. I went and hugged aunty. I asked her to pray for him. And pray for herself too. For patience. I was crying from my heart. I didn’t care what anybody thought. I had met uncle only two weeks ago. Smiling and discussing how bad politics in the country had become. And now he was here lying before me. Not moving. I couldn’t take my eyes off aunty.

She was saying that he always gave strength to her, and now he himself weakened himself to death. Why?

As I sat a few chairs away, I was hoping with all my heart that uncle would get up and laugh and say Ha! Ha! I was just messing with you all. But he didn’t. He just lay there. Still. They covered his face with the sheet. And aunty kept crying.

You marry a man, with no idea about the future. You leave behind everything for a new beginning. You hold his hand, and mould into a lifestyle that syncs you both to perfection. And then one day Poof! He is gone.

When they lifted uncle to take him away for his last rituals, I wept again. Fresh tears. Where are you taking him? Why? Bring him back and ask him to wake up. Aunty needs him.

Later in the night, in the comfort of my bed, I couldn’t sleep. Death doesn’t scare me. You are going back where you came from. It is just what death does to those related that tears me apart. Everyone moves on though. Only those who really loved and cared would find a hole in their lives that no amount of consolation from anyone can fill it for them.