Shifting Priorities

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Thus ends my second year of blogging. When I flip through the posts like I used to once upon a time with my personal diary, I feel it's more or less like looking at old photographs - you remember exactly what you felt when you smiled and struck a pose, when you sighed and wrote a line. They bring back the sweetness, the bitterness, the pain, the pleasure, the madness, the anguish, the euphoria, but without affecting you any more: many of them have become milder over time. You've recorded the good things in life, indeed shouted from the rooftops; hid the lows between the lines because you don't want people to really know or don't consider it important for them to; though you suspect that some day you would want to secretly peep at them. So you write them all down in your own way - regardless of whether or not the reader comprehends them - because you're used to writing and it's your only mode of expression.

The year is in the process of giving way to a younger one, bowing to the applauding audience (also to the ones raising their fists at it) at the end of a show that included marriages, fearsome sicknesses, achievements, new arrivals, farewells, crises, loss, satisfaction, displeasure, conflicts, betrayal, the whole drama that constitutes a Bollywood masala, and on a larger scale, scams, games, leaks and other matters of scant importance.

December caught me off guard, with the sudden appearance of unfinished chores all over the place and pangs after pangs of guilt for wasted time, though deep inside, when I really bring myself to look at it, the wasted time was not wasted at all - they often turned out to be precious memories to treasure.

For a moment, I pull myself back to three or four years ago. I try to convince the younger Me as to where I will be at the dusk of 2010. I see myself shake my head and reply, "No way!! Impossible!" But then, there was also a time when I thought marriage, motherhood, and other certainties of life were impossible as well.

The highlight of this year had been Shifting Priorities. What I considered important kept running hither and thither, my heart butterflying after it, with my targets trailing behind like a thread caught in the wings. I sincerely hope the wandering priorities find their home in the coming year, as I have grown rather tired of the efforts. The sputtering motorcycle is exhausted. Age and Life have caught up sooner than expected! There is no running away from them, not any more.

What am I talking about?
The year had been kind. The people have been kinder. The circumstances couldn't have been better. And Gravity, bless Gravity, has been pulling harder, especially at the corners of my lips.

So let's clink the glasses and usher in the New Year.

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