Christina's World by Andrew Wyeth

There's something haunting about this painting.

I thought the concept was brilliant.

It evoked many contradictory thoughts.

Remoteness. Disability. Unattainable. Despair. Futility.

Dreams. Efforts. Perseverance. Focus. Hope.

Then out spake brave Horatius,
The Captain of the Gate:
'To every man upon this earth
Death cometh soon or late.
And how can man die better
Than facing fearful odds,
For the ashes of his fathers,
And the temples of his Gods.'

- Thomas Macaulay

30+ C can seem unbelievably hot in societies that haven't heard of basic amenities like ceiling fans. It sucks being flooded in your own body fluids. You can't walk for two minutes without getting drowned in your own sweat.

Rain brought some much needed respite.
--

Some places are meant to be sunny. Paris is meant to be grey and cloudy. All the towers and buildings and monuments seem more majestic.

उम्र भर का साथ दे जो, क्यों वही प्यार हो…
क्यों ना मिट के जो फ़ना हो, वो भी प्यार हो…

At every step, you want to be fair to people whose work is intertwined with yours, and be simultaneously aware of your own self-interests and that they are not being compromised. It's difficult. Sometimes these two things are in conflict with each other. So without pushing, you try to give an option to others. If they choose something, it is their responsibility. I can't take responsibility for someone else's decisions. Even more so, since no one is taking responsibility for mine.

How does one save one's children from the big bad world? You can empower them and then release them, like seeds bobbing in gusty wind. You can not hold them back, but you don't want to let go either. You can never know what is gonna happen to them and how they will turn up. But you can't keep protecting them too. I just want to empower my kids to stay happy and positive whatever the extrinsic situation be, and not just keep it to themselves, but take out some time from oneself and make a difference in others' lives too. A streak of sensitivity is a must, especially when more and more people around you won't be. I guess the most difficult part will be to teach them how to be balanced and open. My mind goes back to what my parents did. I know it sounds like a self-compliment, but I guess Aks and I turned out to be quite okay. And if I could manage at least that much, I would pass. Sometimes I think I will make a good father when my kids are younger, but will be ghoulish when they will enter teens. That'll be the problem of being born to a control freak.

Am so much more sympathetic of my parents now than I was in my 20s. I understand more and more the challenges of parenting. You want to do enough, but just enough. Man, it's difficult.
--

My stay in paris is equivalent to a terminally ill patient who has eaxctly 365 days. He is sad, but anything but complacent and every fucking second counts for him. I am glad for this feeling without actually having to die coz it makes me hungry for newer things all the time. No day is like any other. Yeah, I am tired much of the time and sleep a lot in my spare time, but I think boredom can be the worst thing that can happen to life - it's worse than tiredness.

I thank whatever it is that brings me to experience such amazing places and people. Every time I think it can't get better, it does. I seriously don't know where does one go though, from Paris. The saturation point will come some day when new experiences will stop moving me coz I have been to enough number of unique places and the tiredness will come when I will not want to meet new people, and that will be a depressing day.
--

When you yearn for something very strongly, there's a tinge of sadness associated with the achievement of finally making that thing happen. One of the most unattainable things for me in life was watching a Grand Slam, prefereably the Roland Garros. I did that this summer. To top it, I watched Martina Hingis play. While I am still not over that excitement, in a very very small way, I am feeling complacent. I don't like that feeling. I think I have a clue why that might be happening. Though it was never listed, once I experienced it, it became a strike in my to-do-list. I need to forget about the strike and just remember the experience. But there's another thing. The joy of first time is always different from the subsequent ones. The first analogy that jumps to mind is that of the first kiss. While the feelings about the person you are with now might be the same or even more fervent, there's something about the first one that is always special.

Maybe rightfully so. If one keeps obsessing about a single thing throughout one's life, how does one focus on other experiences? Feeling a little satiated about tennis makes space in my heart for some other joys I would like to pursue. So after all, it's not such a bad thing.
--

My natural state of mind is not positive but of perpetual questioning. Fortunately, I have a tendency to gravitate towards more positive outcomes and thoughts rather than the negative ones. If I face a problem, I wouldn't say, 'forget it yaar, be positive, everything happens for a reason.' I will try to fathom out those reasons in excruciating details. But rest assured, those answers are almost always going to be positive. The secret is that I know where I want to go, so all this reasoning and logic of answering questions and arriving at answers is a big farce. It's like working a problem backwards. So, though I am not a very positive person naturally, I seek positivity, and hence arrive at that. On one hand, I know that I am deceiving myself, on the other I let myself do that coz I feel more empowered, coz the reasoning is not half bad, and coz it allows me to keep my logical swords sharpened.

Mini Reviews 2

Frances Ha:

This is the season of black-and-white movies. Though I couldn't enjoy Oh Boy as it was in German with french subtitles, I definitely enjoyed this one. You would think B-n-W will hide stuff, but that's not true. I kept focussing on cracks, crevices, folds, wrinkles. The distractions of the colour are absent and you take in the frames much more. It gives a nostalgic feel to the proceedings as well, an old-world vintage charm. I wish the movie could rise above the visuals. The trailer was lot worthier than the movie. What was good was Greta Gerwig.

Man of Steel:

It was a mistake going for this movie. Waste of my time.

We Bought A Zoo:

Nothing great. Predictable.

Stoker:

One of the creepiest and more graphically violent movies I have seen so far. People are made off with for absolutely no rhyme or reason. However, very stylised and aesthetically made movie. Which makes it creepier.

21 Jump Street:

We don't have to feel inferior. This one is a witness to what trash Hollywood can produce given a chance.

Mini Reviews

A quick thoughts on the movies I watched recently:

Before Midnight:

I was so looking forward to this movie. You know what's coming. Yeah, I didn't like it. I didn't like it coz I was expecting something else. Though connected to the the prior two, I wish Linklater had made this movie not part of the trilogy, but as a movie on its own, without any past baggage. And what a tremendous baggage it must have been. Don't forget. The trio (Linklater, Delpy and Hawke) had been nominated for Oscar in the best adaptaed screenplay category. Credit to them, they embarked on a completely different journey of the couple, which for me was unacceptable. It's way too depressing with a tiny hope at the end, which is not enough. As an independent movie however, I liked it. On a tangent, I like movies where the characters don't change their clothes. It gives a sense of intimacy and regularity vis-a-vis cinematic fantasy and grandeur.

Mud:

Indie, small budget, big starrer movies. Simple stories. What they say about acting, also holds true about storytelling. Simplicity is more difficult. Mud is essentially simple. But not effortless. It is a forced simple story. Would I mind spending 10 € on it? Absolutely. Thank god for movie cards.

The Great Indian Butterfly:

It's a hybrid between Before Midnight and Before Sunset. In continuation of what I said about the baggage of past in Before Midnight (this movie doesn't have any), it also works coz we get enough time to see the softer side of the characters and their dormant but extant love for each other. It works as a road movie too, set in Goa. The movie has beautiful undercurrent with a meaningful message throughout, which is obvious to the viewers but characters are oblivious to it and are dicsovering it through the length of the movie. Loved it.

Sam and Cat:

Trash. If I had seen this poster before starting the 1st episode, I would have stayed away. Unfortunately, I mixed it up for I Am Sam.

Star Trek Into Darkness:

This was my first Star Trek experience. Being a somewhat loyal Star Wars fan, I was averse to the idea of watching all the earlier 700+ episodes and movies. I am glad I started with this. I am not gonna check up on all the past episodes coz watching them after watching such a superbly crafted movie is not worth it. I haven't had many 3-D experiences, so that was another bonus. That I was never into superheroes, stars, galaxies and aliens will be an understatement. I used to scoff at them. While watching this movie, I thought of front-benchers cheering for Govinda in a David Dhawan movie, but then such is life. As it gets more and more serious and hectic, fantasy becomes your respite.