Where am I now?

It is very cold right now and the sky looks awfully crowded. Usually, when I am in my room, where I mostly am all the time these days, I cant see the sky: the window is too high and the view is blocked by a lumbering concrete block that is either Jefferey or Harrison or Smith or some other name. And today, on this rare occasion as I sit atop a vantage point, the sky is nothing but a dreary blottage of snow, fog and foul winds. And this isn’t the good kind of snow either. It is big and clunky. It hits my face like scoops of shaved ice being hurled by a dissatisfied customer.

Why am I talking about this now? I am supposed to be writing about where I am, and my feelings about it.

For some reason, I am unable to form a coherent thought, structure or even a metaphor around that prompt. I guess I am in a place that is all too familiar now. So familiar that often, and definitely right now, it does not merit special or concerted attention on my part. I feel it is a good thing, getting used to a place: its sounds, smells, passing faces, young swinging bodies, and strictly mediocre weather. Although, I will sorely miss it when all of this changes, as it is bound to. My guess is that it will change sooner rather than at a distant point in time. And soon there will be a new flight stairs to climb and a different window to look out of. I will still refuse to buy a bedframe, because it makes no sense at all. Hopefully the window will be lower, and there will be nothing blocking the view. I may start cooking again. Only this time, I will experiment with all different types of grains I have been familiarized with over the last one year. Ancient, Ancient American, Indian, Ancient Indian not from India, Traditional, not so cheap ones, and ones which roll in your mouth like millions of insectoid eggs. It has been a year of someone else feeding me: with some love, lesser salt, and no spice at all. The last bit perturbs me a lot, the absence of spice. Simply having spices on the shelf is some solace and helps this large empty block feel habitable. And that is where I am now I think: home. In some sense, I am always home. So far at least.

Although I wish the snow would stop. I am used to dark nights. And the snow reflects the light all around and the world feels like a photograph taken with a grainy filter with high contrast. I dont think I will ever get used to that. Or the lack of salt and spices.

Finish

Weather doesn’t bother me anyway. Or does it?

In all of the things that I would be inclined to call my lived-experiences, the notion of weather is not something I would be too hasty to add. In this, I am fairly consistent. Had you asked me this question a decade ago, the answer would have been the similar. A decade and five years ago? Yes. Yesterday? Same. However, it is a sentiment that comes either from sheer carelessness or as another brick in a facade with an audience of one. And that is because this feeling of mine would crumble at the slightest scrutiny.

This is not the place or the time to get into the meaning and affect of what we/you/I/they/everyone considers to be ‘weather’. What is absolutely certain, by most conceptions of the term, is that I am a body and soul acutely shaped by the vibrations in air around me. Whether I am always or, if at all, ever aware of this, is a different matter altogether.

But it is immensely clarifying, the swathes of memories come rushing back like a chaotic cascade of images, sensations and blurry visions.

There I am in my dark room. Morning light is still far away, but the night sky is flashing electric white. High above me, thunder rolls and charges the air. And I am praying. I am praying for torrential rain, so that school is cancelled. Somedays my prayer would be answered. On others, I am trudging through waist high water trying to avoid currents which overwhelm my tiny self.

It is Christmas now and Jesus is coming. As he does, every year, for a long time now. I wonder if he has any thoughts on the weather. I am excited. The midnight church service may be the drabbest birthday party ever, but it is the only occasion to wear sweaters. I am too young to notice the pretty girls, but good looking people are beautiful in warm woolen clothes. Soon it will be the sun that will occupy my mind. It is Good Friday, in a profoundly oppressive April, with not a hint of goodness to it. And then there is May; made bearable by long swims, tanned bodies, heavy meals and heavier naps.

Time marches on. As does my body.

I am older. My feelings have words now. They come and go in waves and patterns. They grow frequent, intense, and more mundane. Just like the floods. Beautiful people are now richer, as are their clothes. I notice the girls and their stolen glances. But the time for sweaters is gone. Christmas is still in December, but that is all there is to it now.

It’s Delhi- the capital. My immortal body has begun its gradual descent: fueled by inactivity and gluttony. This is the true winter, a segregated one. Months demand allegiances in differing clothes with increasing levels of thickness. This cold unforgiving city, here the dead are the safest- their crumbled bones in stately monuments immune to the biting frost. I discover Spring and remain unimpressed. But summer comes and breaks all records. I am impressed and suffocated. My skin hates me.

And then there is America. Of which I have much and nothing to say at the same time.

Much because my bones chill and I yearn for the sun. Nothing, because I hate yearning for the sun. A creature of habit and old rivalries. I learnt to talk about the weather, but in a way that seems to bother no one at all. Talking without speaking, mostly to nod and commiserate. I read research on the air, treatises on the ocean and the wind. About swirling seas, dying trees, rising storms, and tragedies yet to come. Now I know more. And yet, if you were to ask me if the weather bothers me- I would hesitate even if for a moment- to assent .

But my skin has memories, some of which are whole and accessible. Others may be lost to it, to me, and to you forever. As is often the case.