40

Music has led you back to this place.

It's the same song, or three. It's the same mood of the night. It's the same rabbit hole that you went haring down all those years ago.

Indraikkum Yendraikkum Nalla Naal Dhaan.

And just like that, one stray line, a whiff of a long lost memory, leads you down to where you haven't been in a while.

A long while.

Hello.

Maybe this is generosity towards yourself. Maybe this is weekend desperation. Or maybe it's just an ill-advised overdose of sugary substances before sleep.

Maybe. Or not. Who cares.

You are here, might as well make the most of it.

Isaithida Yennai Thedi Varanum.

Might as well see if the words will come to you.

Unbeckoned. Unforced. Unfettered.

See if there's rhythm in that stride. See if there's fluency in the fingers. See if there's want or if you're wanting.

(Damn, that bass guitar feels so good on the ears)

See if inspiration can still sail you along miles into your memories. Or will the wind wrap around itself leaving you high and dry?

Kisi Na Kisi Se Koi Kuch Toh Keh Raha Hai.

You just want to sit silently. You just want to remember the cherry red of a hard new SG Cricket ball, recall its leathery heft in the hollow of your palm. You don't want to think of the clothes in the balcony or that they have to be brought in from the rain.

You remember a hotel room in Perth almost 20 years ago and getting your hair cut by a woman. You just want to smell the morning on the grass in Hannover. You even want to watch the monsoon make its way high over the Western ghats.

There was a time when time was not so precious, but life was still a matter of life and death.

But then here you are, might as well make the most of it.

Kizhakkumugam Veluthuvittaal Irulukku Mudivundu Engalukku Vidivundu.

There's light sliding under the blinds, seeping through like water slowly overflowing out the bathroom door. There's a yawn, and another, and another. There's no escaping dawn, is there?

A few more hours before the household will haul itself up on its feet, and song will have to cede to sobriety.

Soon the lists will be on you and listlessness will ensue. Soon you will linger around laundry. Soon you will go back to where you just came from.

But hey, at least for now, here you are.

Make the most of it.

:-)

35

And just like that, you're 35.

It's past midnight before you get a breather.

And you feel like listening to songs you've not heard in a million years.

Almost as if you wanted to see if a tiny fragment of you was alive and well.

Why did it take me so long just to find ... ?

The emails kept piling up all day.

Wishes from people who knew you before you knew yourself.

Wishes from people who know very little of you, but wishes all the same, to keep you warm on a cold winter's day.

A kind soul sends you flowers.Another sends you a beautiful card.

A friend takes the time to write you after years. And then there are those who don't expect anything but still make it a point to call you.

It is true. The kindness of strangers is the purest.

Do you spend your life / Going back in your mind to that time?

You know you're capable of equal parts magic and malevolence.

You know you can be both hero and hustler.

You intimately know beauty and betrayal, duty and disappointment.

You know everything there is to know.

Yet you know so little.

And would you save my soul tonight?

And just like that, you're 35.

It's sunset and he's walking on Mount Road, towards the Nungambakkam flyover.
 
The traffic is heavy. It usually is at this point in time. People heading home. Heavy bus traffic, honks blaring. Of course, he can't hear anything, he has his earphones plugged in.
 
The buildings yield, the traffic thins, the road widens and that's when the sky opens up.
 
Glorious evening sky over Madras.
 
Sodium smooth and radio blue, crow speckled, leaping from east to west.

Almost as if all that the sun wanted to do that day was lie down and die, and let itself bleed slowly across all of eternity.
 
Sattendru maarudhu vaanilai ...
 
There was a time when such unbearable beauty would have torn his insides apart, left him feeling unhinged and unmoored, filled him with an urge to tell someone about it, tell someone that the world was beautiful and that life was thrilling.
 
Somewhere, somehow, all of that has changed.
 

***

  

Harini.
 
He was sitting at the Ispahani Centre bus stand, earphones streaming songs from Minnale.
 
His office used to be around here and he would often catch a bus from this very bus stand on a Friday evening to go to the beach or just take a tour of the city.
 
It was drizzling and he'd cycled through the other hit songs from the movie and was a little absent minded when Ivan yaaro started to play.
 
Roughly two minutes into the song, he sits up, pauses the player, slides the song back a little on his phone and replays it.
 
There. No mistaking it.
 
He pauses the song, and plays that bit over again.
 
Nenjae nenjae unnai, ullae vaiththadhu yaaru ...
 
Almost as if Harini, otherwise peppy and playful in the rest of the song, threw a little bit of her soul into that one line.
 
Almost as if she wanted to lay herself bare for that one line, her voice straining, searching for that bit of pain to paint a pointless line with.
 
Yaeno yaeno yennai, paarkka seidhaai unnai ...
 
There was a time when lines sung like that would have turned him inside out for life, left him feeling a little less desolate and made him want to lay himself bare to someone in return.
 
He smiles to himself.
 
Somewhere, somehow, all of that has changed.