Go Goa

When I was in class five or six, we went on a family vacation to my Dad's favourite holiday spot Shimla. We travelled in the Toy Train, stayed in a gorgeous hotel, visited Chail and Kufri and did tourist-y things. 

That is the last memorable vacation I recall where it all seemed extremely simple.

Subsequent vacations to Jaipur, Rishikesh and even Muscat were adventurous but lacked the element of holiday. 

So when the Goa holiday with friends was propagated, I got excited. I was ecstatic, daydreaming during exams, using it as a bargaining tool to finish chapters, using it as a motivating factor. 

However, now as the fifteenth of January draws nearer, the thrill is slowly seeping out.

When the Goa vacation was created, I imagined days spent lazing, not worrying what we ate or what we wore, not having a schedule of places to visit or must do things, hours spent lying on the beach writing/filling my diaries, sipping at pina coladas staring into the sea. That's the image I had in my head.

Its increasingly becoming something far and far away from this image.

Shopping, clothes, accessories, suitcases, money, dresses, shorts, sunscreens, hats, things like body image, party behaviour, swim ability and adjusting are becoming the major issues.

The things I want out of Goa seem terribly different from the things that other people are going for. 

My reason is simple : I want a vacation from everything. I want a holiday from life in Delhi, some days to myself to process and think without being distracted by mundane things. I want to enjoy, laugh and have fun for five days without giving sparing a thought about anyone. I want to sleep. I want fun. No partying, no friendship, no family. 

Most of all I want peace.

Terrifying

The last three days have been particularly hard. It is not easy to deal with the real side of dreams. We were taught, dreams are endless but are they really ?

When  terms and conditions render them all but useless, does the integrity or the very essence that makes it a dream remain ?

In my head, the steps I had paved to my dream were enough. But I realize they aren’t, and I suppose it’s the worst feeling.

It terrifies me to admit this but I am back to square one now. What is worse, I don’t know where to begin. 

Stay

Some people leave, others come back and then leave and then there are some who just stay.

It haunts me

Nothing brings life into perspective like death.

Death is unpredictable, happens out of the blue. You don’t expect it; you cannot make contingencies for it. It hits you like a slap in the face. You stop living your life like you did the moment before that.

The perspective that hits you may or may not last. The attitude change may affect life as general or not.

You just hope that the perspective lasts, that it stays like a filter or perhaps a pair of glasses when you see the rest of your life. Because that is the only way you would do everything without a care about the consequences.

Death shocks you, the suddenness of the event gives you goosebumps.

She may have been sitting in front of you one day asking her Dad on the phone to book tickets for the movie and the next you have a text in your phone about the sudden demise of her beloved father.

The jealousy, the anger, anxiety, evil thoughts, hatred, envy, scepticism and the resentment it all drains out of you. All that is left is shock and perhaps shreds of pure guilt for having such thoughts.

And then you think about all those people who are dear to you and what if something like this happened to them?

What would you have changed or done more or said more or perhaps just loved more.

Lessons

Star World, it seems has taken upon itself to educate the younger generation about the joys of TV series extending beyond five seasons.

It recently came back with Grey's Anatomy, everyday at ten o' clock.

I have not been watching everyday mostly because I cannot stand Meredith and Derek. To tell you honestly, I am waiting for Hunt to return and spar with Yang. I like my love stories with a little fight between the lovers and not with the others.

Anyway, what I have realized is that life is not like Grey's Anatomy. Save me the roll of  eyes saying "told you so".

I did think so. I thought you could describe your feelings to someone as it came to your mind without thinking, that eventually you could fall in love with your friend and it could be all you wanted and a hundred other things you assumed.

I was eighteen. I was naive. So yes, my younger Grey's watchers don't expect life to unfold like Meredith's.

You cannot express your feelings to another person as they are in your head. They need to be moulded and created accordingly.

So even though it may seem so easy to go upto another and say what you think, here are repercussions to that. 

Things about me

I pray for this every damn time !
Except when its Mum.

DT

We were talking about studying abroad when he asked, Why I preferred the US over any other country ?
At first I could not think of any specific reason so I told him I had family there, more than anywhere else.

Even after that conversation ended, this stayed in the back of my mind. Why did I prefer the US ?
I do have close family there but I knew that wasn't the reason, neither was the fact that I saw it on the TV shows.

A few weeks later, flickering through channels, I came across Vijay Amritraj interviewing Donald Trump. It was at that moment that it struck me, why the US formed such an integral part of my dreams. It was when Trump started talking about what a success Apprentice had become that it came to me, like an epiphany almost.

The fact that I had given up on the one dream I have had since I was fourteen. I had given up on it because of the dismal dark place that my career was heading towards during graduation.

Now I am at a better place, I am going towards a better one. So even though I may not have a twelve year old postcard stuck to my table that I daydream to but now I am taking my dream back.

Trump is on !