A Rainy Day

Cirro-cumulus

When I woke up this morning, it promised to be an ordinary day. The sun was shining brightly, the day was warm. Not warm enough to be uncomfortable yet. However, the heat was building up. By afternoon it would get stiflingly hot and humid. A few hours later, as I was going about my day, I happened to glance out the window. The sky was a surprising grey instead of its usual azure.

Cumulus

I like sunny weather as much as the next person, but cloudy days have their own appeal. When the Sun is obscured by the clouds, in the dull light, even the ordinary becomes mysterious. The clouds themselves are a delight to observe. I love looking at clouds and imagining them resembling elephants to cars to people. In school, we learnt that there are different types of clouds. Cumulus are the most commonly observed clouds.They are cottony, cauliflower shaped. Stratus clouds have horizontal layering. They look like parallel layers of clouds in the sky. The low lying dark grey clouds which shower us with rain are called Nimbus. The word nimbus itself is Latin for 'rainstorm' or ‘rain cloud’. The thin, wispy clouds seen at high altitudes are Cirrus.

I find that afternoons are the best time for cloud gazing. As I looked up at the sky this afternoon, I tried to recognise the clouds. They were menacing and dark grey, seeming almost to touch the top of the cell phone tower in the distance. They had to be Nimbus. It definitely looked like it would rain. The temperature had noticeably dropped several degrees. It was a welcome relief from the heat. There was a light breeze ruffling the long stems of bougainvillea bushes in the garden outside. I threw open all the windows to let the cool breeze in. In a few minutes, sure enough, it started drizzling gently. Tiny specks of rain dotted the ground, not enough to make it completely wet. The air was filled with the refreshing scent of wet earth. I breathed in deeply and took in the view before me. A couple of pigeons had taken refuge from the rain and were sitting on the grill outside the window, sheltered by the parapet. The plants in the garden looked greener, the flowers brighter, as if they'd got a fresh scrubbing. Just the day before, they had been dusty and drooping. Today, dancing along with the breeze, they seemed to have come alive to new life. It had grown quiet. The sound of vehicles on the road outside was muffled by the rain. The faint laughter of children playing in the rain was the only other sound to be heard. As I stood at the window, with the cool, damp breeze on my face, I felt content and at peace with the world. I could spend hours, just standing like that, basking in the beautiful weather. I wanted to capture the scene before me so that I could look at it later and reminisce. I took a few pictures, but they were nowhere near as picturesque. They couldn’t replicate the vivid colours of the surroundings, the sudden chill in the air and the now fading smell of wet earth.

There's something to be said about listening to music on a rainy day. The notes of the song mingled with the soft pitter patter of rain lends a surreal quality to music. As I was singing along with the radio, I felt my spirits soar. Rainy weather, good music and a good book to curl up with, constitute my idea of a perfect afternoon. Add to this, piping hot ‘dal vadas’ and ginger flavoured tea, and what we get is, my equivalent of the high life. :-)

The Zerocks' Warning

It all started on that fateful day, a week ago, or was it a month? I don’t know, I’ve lost track of time. I was doing my daily chores when suddenly there was a blackout. I ran out of the house into utter darkness. I could hear voices of my neighbours nearby. Everybody was as confused as I was. Suddenly a dazzling light followed by a deafening roar attracted everyone’s attention skywards. The source of this commotion was a gigantic UFO which was hurtling towards us at an unbelievably fast pace. There were excited and nervous noises from the people around me. Some people even started frantically clicking pictures of the flying saucer.

But my intuition told me that something was not right, this UFO certainly didn’t bode well.

Now the UFO was very close to landing and I realised for the first time how huge it was. The very sight of it sent chills down my spine. It was spherical having millions of windows which emitted light of various colours. Faintly, I could make out grotesque silhouettes of alien creatures. The UFO finally landed in a large, open wheat field. The crop burnt on impact. People rushed forward to get a closer look. I tried to stay calm and watched the proceedings from a distance.

A strange thing happened. The upper part of the spherical UFO drifted upwards and about ten aliens glided towards us. The creatures were taller than us having three large protruding eyes, about a hundred crooked teeth in broad jaws and ashen green skin, an oblong head, pointed ears, about eight feet tall and wearing billowing black robes. I took note of their arms and hands which were longer than an average human’s. Their hands had four fingers, including a thumb, complete with nails. In spite of their hideous appearance, they looked intelligent and ... evil.

I rushed forward. The alien creature who seemed to be their leader took out a strange instrument which was cubical and made of a metal which I was sure wasn’t found on earth. The leader grunted something to his kinsfolk who grunted back. All of us stared on in utter shock and anticipation. The alien leader pressed a button on the instrument and a strange sound filled the atmosphere which sounded vaguely familiar to the bird calls of a thousand birds, all jumbled up. This was odd. Birds are found only on Earth, right?

This sound was queerly pleasant to hear and I began to feel drowsy. My mind started getting clear of thoughts. People around me were experiencing the same kind of feelings. We began to feel a strange sense of relaxation, like we had been freed of all worries and tension. We began to forget who we were. It was then that I panicked. But there was nothing I could do about it. The intensity of the sound increased and it had drastic consequences.

We didn’t know who we were or where we were or where we belonged. We couldn’t do anything except what was put into our heads. We simply behaved like robots used to fulfill selfish motives. We had forgotten all about it until a crash came and the spell broke.

Our drowsiness was washed away and we began to come to our senses. The leader of the alien group addressed us saying, “Hail Earthlings!” We were now able to understand what the creature was saying. Probably, the pleasant music that emanated from the cubical instrument enabled us to do so.

I went forward to face the alien leader, who said, “We, the Zerocks from the planet of Xena have come here to Earth not to destroy it. In fact, we have great regard for Earth. It nurtured our ancestors trillions of years ago. Our ancestors later migrated to the planet of Xena which is just a few light years away from Earth. The history of our race goes back to time immemorial. For a long time, we had been living on Xena, which was bountiful.  It provided us with everything we needed. But then, we started exploiting the resources recklessly. Xena wasn’t going to bear this ill treatment for long. When her fury was aroused, she sent terrible dust storms, volcanic eruptions, cyclones of swirling masses of poisonous gases and quakes. In such a situation, life wasn’t possible on Xena. So our ancestors began to look for alternative places to live. They found Earth to be the most suitable planet for life, after Xena. Thus, for about a century our ancestors resided on Earth. By then the fury of Xena had subsided and our ancestors returned to Xena.

“Since then, we have kept Earth under tight scrutiny. We observed the evolution of  humans and other organisms. Disturbingly, you humans are repeating the mistake we committed. You are destroying your Earth, Mother Nature and her resources. Already crises such as global warming and ozone layer depletion are causes for great concern. Their consequences can be really disastrous.

“I, on behalf of the entire race of Zerocks, want to warn you, Earthlings. Be careful! Should there be a day that the conditions on Earth are no longer suitable for inhabitation, all species of Earth are welcome to Xena, which is thirty times as big as the Earth. Atmospheric conditions in Xena are similar to Earth’s. I am just expressing my gratitude to Earth for what she has done for us by protecting our ancestors in their hour of crisis.

“If you are in need of our help, just press the red button on the box,” he said, handing the cubical instrument to me. “My name is Zurin Zorh.”

I was speechless. This was so amazing, so shocking and also so amusing. All my fears had been in vain. These hideous creatures had actually come here to help us by providing an alternative place to live, not to capture us and take us away to some spooky planet. I was so relieved that I began to laugh. I couldn’t stop myself. Suddenly, all the people around me started laughing too.

Finally when all the laughter had subsided, I thanked Zurin who was watching us in surprise.“Thank you so much, Mr. Zurin Zorh,” I said. “We would be glad to avail your help. Our scientists are trying to figure out ways to combat global warming but they are not making much headway. Give my regards to all Zerocks.”

Zurin nodded and said, “We leave in peace then. Farewell.”

“Farewell,” I said, “on behalf of all organisms on Earth, and thank you.”

The Zerocks were already gliding back to their spacecraft. The sphere suspended in thin air got attached again to the main craft. With a deafening roar, the UFO rose in the air and soared away to Xena.

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Happiness

Happiness is a highly coveted thing. All our actions are ultimately targeted at attaining happiness. Yet, we find that we aren't happy all the time. Feelings of true happiness are scattered between several feelings of being 'just okay' and some feelings of being 'not okay'. That is probably why these feelings of true happiness are valued so much. I'm sure everyone must have experienced the down in the dumps feeling when we feel that everything in our lives is going exactly as it shouldn't. We are reminded of how insignificant we are. Really, just a barely visible, teeny tiny dot in this infinite universe. We feel helpless. Like it's us against the world. We fear that whatever we do will never be good enough and that eventually, we will fade away into anonymity without any major accomplishments. Lyrics from The Rembrandts' song 'I'll be there for you' (Made famous by the hit TV show F.R.I.E.N.D.S.) comes to mind: 'And it's never been your day, your week, your month or even your year...' It seems to have become the soundtrack of our life. 

That is a pretty bleak picture, isn't it? It's a good thing this feeling is not permanent. How long the feeling lasts depends on us. We could allow despair to get a firm grip on us or we could wriggle free of its clutches. Whenever we feel blue, there are things we can do to feel better temporarily. Here are some of the things that have worked in alleviating my misery, in no particular order:

1) Dancing! I've never been much of a dancer, so when my friends pulled me along for a DJ night at work, I was apprehensive. Initially I stood there, very awkwardly, marveling at the others who were dancing so effortlessly. What finally made me join in was the fact that, everyone there was dancing which such abandon, as if it was just them and the music, without caring who was watching. It took me longer than them to shed my self-consciousness. But I did choose a simple step and started dancing. It was getting dark and soon, there were only the flashing, colourful lights to illuminate the scene. So that was a plus.(:-P) I realised that while dancing, I forgot all my worldly worries, even if it was for a short while. It was an incredible feeling.

2) Music. There are some songs which can lift our spirits no matter what mood we are in. All we have to do is, turn the music up, preferably in surround sound, and lose ourselves in it. There are songs that we fall in love with in the first hearing itself. And then there are songs which don't seem extraordinary initially, but which grow on us with time. As the music reaches a crescendo, we can feel our spirits soaring too, and melancholy takes the back seat. This happens to me whenever I listen to any of Evanescence's songs. If we get to listen to live music, there is nothing like it. I had been to a concert recently and the atmosphere was completely electric: The loud thumping music, floodlights exhibiting the Tyndall Effect in the night sky, people singing along and cheering the musicians who were enjoying themselves just as much as the audience.

3) Reading. This has always been my preferred mode of escapism. Whenever I'm down, I turn to authors like Douglas Adams, P. G. Wodehouse, Jerome K. Jerome, in order to regain my sanity. The works of these authors are so rib ticklingly funny that they can pull us out of the worst of moods. They are liberally sprinkled with figures of speech like 'paraprosdokians' (Greek word meaning, beyond expectation). It is a figure of speech in which the ending of a sentence or phrase is surprising or unexpected in a way that causes the reader to reframe or reinterpret the first part. (Definition from Wikipedia) An example: "Trin Tragula–for that was his name–was a dreamer, a thinker, a speculative philosopher or, as his wife would have it, an idiot…" (Douglas Adams). Then there are some sentences which are so exquisitely bizarre, that one can't help but burst out laughing: "Flying is the  art or knack of throwing oneself at the ground and missing!" (Life, the Universe and Everything, Douglas Adams) 
"Nature, stretching Horace Davenport out, had forgotten to stretch him sideways, and one could have pictured Euclid, had they met, nudging a friend and saying: Don't look now, but this is exactly what I was telling you about a straight line having length without breadth. "(Uncle Fred in Springtime, P. G. Wodehouse)

4) Doing something for others.  can go a long way in making us happy too. It doesn't have to be fancy gifts. Even simple gestures like smiling at people and greeting them, writing letters to loved ones in this age of texting, just listening to people, can be very uplifting. 

5) Being grateful. This is suggested in almost all self help books. And it does work. Things are almost never as bad as we think they are. Counting our blessings can help us view our problems from a different perspective. 

6) Doing things we are passionate about. It could be anything from singing, writing, cooking to outdoor activities like trekking, playing, shopping. Anything that makes us glad we're alive.

The feeling of being down in the dumps comes with a feeling of helplessness. This helplessness is because we allow life to happen to us. Instead of being proactive, we react to life. In the ocean that is life, we try to fight the waves instead of swimming along with them. We can't control everything that happens to us. Trying to do so would be futile, but there is something we can always do to better our current situation. Just doing that much can be enough to make us feel better and can get rid of the helplessness. There is no real key to happiness, like there is no pot of gold at the end of a rainbow. However, with some effort, we can make happiness a habit. We would be surprised to find that the simplest of things can make us quite happy: watching silhouettes of birds flying in the colour changing dusk sky, eating a hot meal, making a child laugh, singing in the shower at the top of our voices, watching a cricket match at home with the entire family! 

So here’s to happiness.

Picture courtesy: http://brucerosenstein.com/tag/happiness/

On Being an Introvert

"I don't want to come to the social gathering with you," I told Mom. "There's nothing for me there. I'll only get bored." 

"How can you get bored when there will be so many people to talk to!" said Mom incredulously. "You need to learn to 'mingle'! Don't be so anti-social. No man is an island, you know", she chided. 

This is not the first time I'm hearing this. And not just from Mom, although, anti-social is a bit harsh. What I am is an introvert.

The word introvert has Latin roots. It is derived from two words: intro meaning to the inside and vertere meaning to turn. So introvert means, to turn one's thoughts inwards (in spiritual contemplation). However, if we look up the word on Google or any dictionary, the most common meaning that comes up is: a person who likes to keep to oneself, who minimises social interaction. Introversion should not be confused with shyness. Shy people tend to be afraid of interacting with others. Introverts on the other hand are not afraid. They would just much rather indulge in solitary activities, like reading a book or watching their favourite tv show at home. Introverts will never be social butterflies or the life and soul of the parties they attend (which are few to begin with). They shun the limelight, they don't go seeking social interaction. It is not something they prefer. But when such interaction is absolutely essential, introverts can often articulate their thoughts much better than others, for the sole reason that they spend a lot of time thinking. They take time to open up to people who are new to them. They have few friends but these are the people they can really be themselves around. It is almost like introverts are different people around their friends, though not too different. They may be labelled as quiet or silent, but no one would call them anti-social. They are perfectly pleasant people.

This world has an extrovert ideal (Quiet: The Power of Introverts in a World That Can’t Stop Talking, Susan Cain). Introversion is often associated with lack of confidence and sometimes even rudeness and indifference, though nothing could be further from the truth. Gregarious, hail-fellow-well-met people, who know how to talk, who are extremely comfortable being in the limelight, who make spectacular presentations, who are party animals, are considered to be more intelligent, more confident. They’re more popular and they easily win people’s hearts. The squeaky wheel gets the grease. This is a popular saying which conveys that the loudest people get the most attention. This is pretty much true, especially in today's corporate world where first impressions count so much. You need to sell the brand that is you, in order for people to take you seriously, in order to get that coveted promotion, in order to get the appreciation you so crave. Extroverts definitely excel at this. It comes naturally to them. The task of having to proclaim their achievements is exhausting to introverts.

This is not to say that extroverts are in any way better than introverts, or vice versa. They are just two different kinds of people who have different 'wirings'! They have similar capabilities, but different tendencies. I know this now, but during my teenage years, I suffered from a terrible complex regarding my introversion. Public speaking and group discussions used to terrify me. Impromptu presentations made me nervous, I needed to prepare well in advance. I was afraid of ‘putting myself out there’. I didn't prefer group gatherings. In fact, I still don't. Talking one on one is more my thing. I had friends with whom I hung out, but after a certain while, I felt like I needed to go home to be by myself in order to ‘recharge’. Many people found this unusual. Why would anyone want to stay home and read a book when they could go out and have fun, they asked me. I’m all for going out and having fun, but in smaller doses! I suddenly came to realise that I was surrounded by so many people who were socially more adept than I was. These were the kind of people who were preferred by everyone. It was not that I envied them, I liked them too, just like everyone else. I just wished they would give me the same acceptance that I gave them. I had been on the receiving end of several remarks, from family, friends and acquaintances alike, which affected me very much. Some of the remarks were actually funny. 'Why are you so quiet, is everything okay?' (Uh, maybe because I like it that way?), 'You don't talk much do you?' (Well, duh.), 'I'm counting the number of words you've said today!' (Do you really not have anything better to do?!).  'You have zero communication skills.' They led me to wonder if there was something seriously lacking in me. It was a major blow to my confidence.

At the close, I will just say this, whether introverted or extroverted, in the end, the important thing is to accept ourselves the way we are. If we do that, what other people say won’t sting us quite so much. We must also not be led to believe that any one personality type is better than the other.

Image used from; https://blogdramedy.wordpress.com/2013/11/26/life-introverted-learning-to-appreciate-life-as-an-introvert/ , via whitneycarter.wordpress.com