#DirtyThirtyExtravaganza

Every year, I write a birthday post, in which, I do a quick recap of my year. I talk about what the year looked like, what I would like to do better in the one coming up, what I would change, yada yada. Some sort of a stock taking - you know? This year, I got nothing. Quite simply, 'New decade, New Stories' is my mantra for now.

But, I will say this, I went to a Backstreet Boys concert with the best girlfriends in a gold sequins dress, and cried when they performed a row from me. If that isn't everything I needed from my big 3-0, then I don't know what is.

30, let's do this, I got plans for you.

Broken

I can't say when or why

I can't even tell you how

But in a fleeting moment I knew 

Maybe it was the resounding snap

Of a broken connection

Or the deafening silence

Of the words that weren't said

But I knew in that moment 

As an unfamiliar melancholy took over

It was the feeling I associated

With losing something 

I didn't even own

Almost

It's always an almost. The thought that keeps you up at night, and the conversation that leaves you restless. Mostly because that thumping heart needs validation. Someone to look at the plans you made and the lines you drew, and tell you, I see you. Nobody taught you how to mourn something that never was. And yet, here you are. Holding onto pieces of this made up life, sifting through them, finding clues in jagged edges and misfit jigsaw puzzles. I wish I could sandpaper down all the parts that prick, into beautiful moulding that you can show off. But I can't. So I will do you this instead. I will validate you. I will tell you that I see you and I mourn your loss.

To all the sparks that burnt bright and lost shine, and the ones that perished in the darkness of their being, I see you. For the tiny moment that you spread your wings and fluttered, you warmed my heart and uplifted my soul. I might look back on this tomorrow and not remember you for who you were but I will always remember you for how you made me feel. 

Skeletons

You couldn’t have known it was coming. There are no warning signs, and sure as hell, there is no way to preempt it. You aren’t sad, lonely or frustrated. It’s a regular Tuesday, you walk into office with a coffee in your hand and a spring in your steps. Except out of nowhere, a void shows up in your stomach. An empty feeling that whispers slowly in your ear about everything that went wrong, is going wrong and is about to go wrong. You shake your head and hope the feeling shakes off. Instead, all you do is shake up that cupboard in which you had stuck this skeleton. It comes rambling out, ungraceful and pathetic in its escape. Dragging with it every painful memory you believe you had left behind. Your failures and regrets show you how you constantly get things wrong, and your loneliness drives the point home. So you sit there, shaking internally, wishing for this to pass. Heads down, eyes locked to your monitor, you try and push your mind to work through the words your brain isn’t even comprehending. To the world, you are just busy. Maybe slightly agitated, slightly bothered, just stressed, maybe? Only you know that somewhere in the corner of your mind, the neatly placed Lego structure you call life, is crumbling. Some people will tell you it’s just sadness or premenstrual syndrome making you crazy. But you’ve been here before. You’re not sad, you’re disinterested. You’re not feeling low, you’re feeling nothing. It isn’t any feeling at all. It’s the exact opposite. It’s the lack of, that consumes you and expels you into the sort of nothingness that you think you deserve. 

Newly Single Girl’s Guide to Survival

While I am not newly single, I know people who are. I kept thinking what could I possibly tell them? And I guess, all I got is, it doesn’t matter if you broke up or he did, if it’s bothering you I think this could help. It helped me and I am only trying to spread the love

• Cry: Fergie famously sang, Big Girls Don’t Cry. By all definitions, I’m a big girl and you know what? Fuck that! Cry. Cry into the night, cry at sappy movies and cry because your aunt twice removed shared a video of something emotional on Facebook. Get it out of your system. Nobody ever said it was good idea to bottle up your issues, it sucks and you’re entitled to as many outbursts as you want
• Chocolates and/or ice cream: Nothing instantly lifts your mood like something sweet. So find your poison, find you passion and ‘treat yoself’! Don’t listen to people that say chocolates never solved anything. You don’t need that kind of negativity in your life
• Girlfriends: Find your core group that doesn’t groan when you say, for the millionth time, “can you believe him?” or worse “I think we can be friends”. These are your rock solid cheerleaders that’ll make you feel like a million bucks when you have snot flowing out of your nose and Cheetos in your hair. These are also the people that will never gloat over how they “told you so”. They might bring it up much later over cocktails and a gigantic brunch but not when you don’t need to hear it
• Drunk dancing and/or karaoke: Grab your girls, grab some drinks and dance/sing the night away. Get out there with your ‘squad’ and have fun. And if in the middle of it you feel like having a cry, do that too. Just get out and socialize. It gets better
• Music: Listen to Divas, old and new, and listen to how powerful they know you can be. Channel it, believe it, live it. Also, these songs are so good for drunk karaoke, in your pajamas, eating ice cream
• Make up: I’m not particularly into clothes or shoes or bags so my go-to was make-up. In case those are your jam more than make up, buy those! For me, it led to so much make up! Only surpassed by the countless hours of beauty tutorials on YouTube. I bought that contour set and that red lipstick. Why not? I realized, albeit very late, that I needed to focus on myself and present myself in the glossiest of wrappings. Not because I wanted him to regret his decision. No, it was because I needed to remember that I wasn’t actually as dowdy as I usually left home looking like. Look beautiful, feel beautiful, be beautiful!
• Pajamas: For days when you don’t want to look, feel or be beautiful, find yourself the most comfortable set of pajamas. Preferably, ones that are sturdy enough to take 3 days of lying in bed and eating Cheetos at a stretch, should you so choose to do
• Ignore people: You know what the easiest thing to do is? Make lists for others to follow after the fact. Nobody but you should be able to tell you how to deal with whatever is happening in your life. So throw the lists and formulae out the window and do what you want. You want a revenge body? Channel your inner Khloe Kardashian. You want to walk around in pajamas, do it! I’ll send you pictures of me in pajamas at Walgreens to encourage you. Want to bitch, rant and moan without annoying people? Start a blog. Get that haircut, manicure the life out of your nails and don’t overthink that rebound. But for the sake of everything that you hold dear, identify the people who are there just to revel in how miserable you are, and cut them out. Those are the people not worth having in your life. Take the trash out and know you never needed me to tell you everything I just did. But if you did, I’m here!

Healing

She knew healing was tough
Between broken bones and torn ligaments
She had managed to mend it all
What she never had to mend
Was a broken heart
She looked for answers in all the wrong places
Between google pages and books on anatomy
But the prescription for sleepless nights and heartache
Would not be as simple as painkillers and rest
Of the three things that she'd need - time, patience, and the ability to forgive
She would never be able to do the last
If mercy was sold in stores
She would buy it in bulk
And tell herself everyday
I forgive you for the pain

2016, a recap!

This year has truly been one of extremes. Every emotion that I've felt, I've felt with all of my being. Sadness, anger, hope and happiness have found a way to weave themselves into all the stories I have to tell and also the ones I don't. I started my year surrounded by my cousin and his family, being told by my nephew that he loves me. 5 months later I saw myself moving into his house with all my bags and baggage. 8 months on, I find myself looking back on 2016 with the kind of contempt that I only reserve for Kale, and maybe beetroot. But to be fair, 2016 has been a teacher of epic proportions! So, Thank You 2016 for

•  Showing me just how much love I am capable of giving and receiving. It has been a humbling experience
• My increased focus on writing. This year might've been my most active writing-wise and one in which I ended up experimenting with more writing formats than I have up until now. It has been a rush to know I have at least one creative bone in my body, if I may say so myself
• Friendships that stood the test of time, and the ones that didn't
• Finally allowing me to feel settled. A new job, apartment, roommate and car later, I'm ready for 2017. Almost anyway!
• Renewed closeness with my cousins and extended family. I have depended heavily on them over the last 1 year and really tested our ties. Thankfully, we thrived
• Showing me the large army of family and friends that will rally behind and uplift me, should the need be
• Allowing me to learn how to forgive myself. Sure, I’ve had more than a few moments I wish I could go back in time and undo, but I’m no time traveler. All I can do, is hope that those I have hurt can forgive me just as I am learning to do so myself
• Showing me how to have a tad bit more grace in times when I would rather not. I’ve not had things served up to me on a platter but I’ve also never had to work with things going in the opposite direction. Hopefully, this would be the year when if things go wrong, I’d be able to accept them better
• Teaching me to be grateful and humble
• California!! I would’ve never moved here left on my own accord. But I did. And thank god for that. Weather, family, food and friends – what more could I want with life?