Winter rain

Chilly wind, the smell of wet earth, lush green and the sound of raindrops pitter-pattering, everything outside washed and glistening, the pigeon on the windowsill and the grey, dark, melancholy sky.

The first rain of the year.

There's something so profoundly and beautifully inspiring about rain, maybe because its a reminder of one of the many facets of the beautiful planet we live in. The urge to embrace and express this beauty through art, words and music hits with the sound of raindrops. We channel our beauty through that of nature.

Rain is Raag Brindavani Sarang played on the sitar, watercolour paintings of flowers and leaves and dewdrops, a fountain pen running across the pages of a notebook, and the intricate but simple beauty of mathematics and the laws of physics.

It manages to unchain thoughts we otherwise couldn't express, talents we never knew we had.

It's a beautiful sunday I'm fortunate enough to enjoy, curling up with some good old Famous Fives I never get tired of. They take me back to my childhood, transport me to another time while the cold rainy wind blows in.

Valentine's, blah blah

Valentine' week has begun and either I am getting old or I find Valentine's day and the associated crap overhyped. It was probably fun and a big deal in college but Rose day and Teddy Bear day? Mostly a huge marketing gimmick to make people buy roses and teddy bears and thousands of gifts. Cute for some people, not for me. A whole week of mushiness and trying to outdo each other with gifts - horrifying! Well, probably not surprising since I prefer to keep human contact to a minimum.

Of course it is fun to have this one day when you plan something with your partner, but I sometimes think it's something like a saving grace for people who don't bother to do it every day. It happens. The story behind Valentine's day is actually sweet, but it probably makes more sense for couples to celebrate a day that means something to them. Like an anniversary. Though it's understandable that normal people (unlike me) will look for an excuse to celebrate.

Or maybe I'm just too distanced from civilization and being cynical. Or irritated because I have to talk to people before I drink coffee after I wake up. I'm binge-watching Castle (I have a major crush on Kate Beckett) and reading too many food blogs (I am in love with food).

I recently watched Frozen and I love this song. 

Virtual Reality

I should probably be living in another decade, not this one with all the social media. Doesn't anyone else find it exhausting and invasive to be in contact with people all the time?

This is why I don't own a smartphone with an internet connection. Of course there are a lot of useful features like GPS and the ability to get information about all the restaurants in a 10 mile radius, but I can actually survive with them. And despite persistent badgering from every single person I know I refuse to install Whatsapp on my phone. Look at it this way, people did quite well before cell phones were made.

Technology is taking over our lives. Almost nothing is private anymore. Its great to share, but it's come to a point where we think a memory is wasted if we don't take photos and write about it and post it for everyone to see, but what we don't realize is that maybe we're not living the moment itself, and the memory will stay just as a long-forgotten photo we'll probably never see again rather than in our minds.

It's also very irritating when people are fiddling with their phones at social gatherings. Fine, you may be a little bored, but the objective of a social gathering, like a lunch out with friends or a dinner with family is to communicate, or make an effort.

It's actually ironical that social media, while enabling us to be closer to people is actually distancing us from them. When someone is on our friend list, we become complacent. Because we are already tagged as friends. Why do anything more?

Other than that, it's tiring. It's too much. One social network is enough for me, and I simply can't be bothered to make Twitter and Tumblr and Instagram and a thousand other accounts, just because everyone else is doing it.

I don't want to be accessible all the time. If people really want to contact me, they will. If I want to contact anyone, I will. I need to have an excuse for not talking to people when I don't feel like it, or when I'm doing something else and that's impossible to do if I'm visible 'online' all the time.

I'd rather have a real life and not a dominant virtual one. There is a virtual me, but it's not a copy of the real me. I want to live for the moment, and not for a photo or status update or a photo, and make real memories stored in my real self than memories made for the sake of my virtual life. It's not a very easy distinction to make, but once you think about it, you'll start to understand what I mean.