Prose before hos

A month of writing daily, heh? Should be proud of me. 

False. 

I want to talk about growth here, but you see, growth is not linear. 

I think for the first time ever, I felt like I was out of control; like my body didn't want to sleep despite the attempt at going to bed early and doing everything possible in my capacity to drive it to exhaustion. 

I settled in at 1 am and in between texting S and watching some fuckall show, I told him I'm trying to sleep early. 

"Good", he said. I'll talk about S in detail, he deserves it. He's earned a spot.

At 5:30 am, I had actively gotten up, paced twice, and wondered if I am incurable. Is anxiety that bad that despite my best effort I can't quite put my body to rest. My mind wanders around while my body lays immobile in the same corner. 

During my evening shower, I thought. Unemployment can't leave you to wilt with a mental illness. That's just pathetic. I've been through a lot more, strenuous crap. This can't affect me. 

I think the other thing is, talking to people. It could be anyone. Even talking on the phone is exhausting. I missed two calls and didn't feel an iota of regret. It's fine. I have nothing to say. People will understand. 

Despite that, I fixed another for this weekend and pushed yet another. Not out of anything but just, what do I talk about? Crippling anxiety? Or worse, being boring? 

Being boring is far worse than any other thing in the world cause once you've been declared a bore, there's no hope for you. Employment/unemployment doesn't cut it.

Feverish, without any ailment. Silent. Withdrawn. Gloomy. 

But not boring. Atleast my last memory in the mind of everyone I know is not boring. 

(Title reference; track of the day.)

"I'm hormonal and sick and fat and want to quit my job right this minute."
"Let's get a drink?"

I get done sending these texts to BoDa, Gurugram's answer to grumpy Yoda, and keep my phone down as soon as I hear my name being called from two directions. Can I Whatsapp images instead of emailing them? Can I also upload the same graphic meant for a cell phone screen to upload in 1x1 square frame on five different Instagram handles our workplace is running?

Why the fuck not.

BoDa calls me back in under four minutes, a delay from his standard under-two-minute rule of receiving texts that he deems to not address in the written word.

"...listen, the other day I had this girl over...someone I'd been texting and you know it was fine, okay. We're chilling at my place, she's got a drink, she gets up and puts some music on and comes and sits close to me. Next, she whispers in my ear, Do you want to dain-se? and I ask her "What?"

"Wait a minute, what did she say?"

"She said dain-se. Do you want to dain-se? I even asked her again but she said the same thing. I gave her the benefit of doubt. Do you think I've high standards? Is that the reason I can't date?"

At this point, I'd heard my name being called thrice from three different directions. BoDa, that bastard, has more dates in a month despite the arm candies he lands up with from time to time. Naturally, I ignore all the rest of them at work calling my name out and get up from my chair. This was getting interesting. BoDa's radar at an all-time low meant my priorities to this conversation had to be re-arranged.

"WHY DID YOU HAVE TO CALL HER OVER? WHY ARE YOU DOWN TO OUR LEVEL? DATING IS FUCKING HARD AND YOU RUINED YOUR SHOT AT THAT. YOU KNOW WHAT DO I HAVE TO MAKE DO WITH? MOPING ABOUT THAT MAN WITH DISPROPORTIONATE CALVES AND BODY. Look, there's nothi--hello? Hello?"

Motherfucking reception.

What is it about single people and their invisible yardstick of obnoxious, tight-assed standard that always remains far too high for other hot singles in the area to match? Is it the obvious stick up their arse that prevents them from taking a shine on others? Is it because they're floating in the ether to look down upon mortals who make themselves vulnerable around others? Is it because they would much rather prefer dying of loneliness than being with someone who can't pronounce dance?

The case has been going on for far too long.

Strangely enough, I've been looked at purposefully by people as someone who has things to say. By default, anyone who is single has things to say. I can pitch multiple pieces as to why I'm a great fit at this.

Been single for a little over 26 years and counting, I can count the number of heartbreaks I've had caused by men on a single hand. However, the number of heartbreaks caused by me in my own head (including mispronunciation of words, bad grammar, bad punctuation, no punctuation, bad breath, disproportionate calves to body ratio, belief in astrological rings, lisp, bad hair, no hair, grey hair, girlfriend, wife, bad human are some of the examples) is a little too high and the list, far too long.

A couple of nights ago, I was bantering with an acquaintance who I had the pleasure of matching with on a dating app about two years ago. We found each other at several Delhi do's and ultimately stopped feigning ignorance after I vomitted one too many times at his place during a house party he was kind enough to host to ring in a friend's big thirtieth birthday. The guy is every bit loony and delightful, a charmer and a total keeper. Last week, he shared a screenshot with me. This girl made a plan with him, to call it off fifteen minutes later and in the next fifteen block him out. This girl apparently only dates academics or oncologists.

newsflash- he's neither.

That was her selling point to him. "Hey, I can maybe date you despite you not being at my level."

I don't know the man very well and I definitely don't know the woman but man, you can't throw your weight around like this if you're in the wrong side of 20s in Delhi.

What used to be my standard to go out is now just a filter of the past. Is he an asshole? Okay fine, don't mind. Is he a sexual predator? Okay, I do mind.

What my committed friends don't get is that the market is dry. There's nobody left. The good ones are taken. The idiots are taken. Bad breath holders are also taken.

The ones who are left are all those of us who overthink. Who waste time on details. Those who unmatch the minute someone says "Hey!" because no matter how single and lonely I get, no great dating story begins with a bloody "hey".

The only "hey" that works in this world is for fucking horses. "Hey" by default is not for human consumption.

 If you skip past the bloody hey, it's not as if the battle is won. The standards continue to torment.

If he/she's needier than you- which is to say- shows the need to be with you, your own snooty self will dump his/her ass because how dare someone show vulnerability to you when you're praying to all agnostic gods together to hide your vulnerable, lonely ass infront of everyone you know at the restaurant, including the server who's now seen you come in with eight different men in the last quarter of this year.

That monologue has been me for the last one month. Minus a few details here and there, but it's true.

I can't get myself to date people who like me. I can't get myself to date people who don't like. I can't get myself to date people who can't type properly. I can't get myself to date those who can type (because the ones who can write put together an exquisite heartbreak- like no other).

What I'm trying to say in this convoluted, verbose, giant piece of turd like writing is that there's no hope for those of us who read this and can identify with the shit I have said.

If you don't identify with this, consider yourself saved and visit a church/temple to celebrate the same.

As for the rest of us, I'm going to hope for men to rain in every hallelujah I say.

It's not raining cats and dogs. It's definitely raining inappropriate men. Hallelujah.

Years ago, on the morning of a Math exam, I'd picked a fight with my mom. Maybe, it's my mother who picked the fight.

Your guess is as good as mine.

It probably had to do with food. I am convinced there would be no other reason.
By food, I mean forcing milk down my throat. The terrible association I have with school begins with milk. Being forced to chug a glass every morning. A large, steel tumbler, filled till the brim. The taste of milk reminds me of the drudgery that school was.

My grandmother tried making it better by adding tea leaves, and sugar (definitely, a lot more than I needed). This deception often lead to crying, and progressed to throwing fits of anger towards my years as an angst-y teenagers.

Which angst-y teenager began their day drinking milk? Not the kind who'd listen to Nirvana and feel oh, so smug.

I digress, but I vaguely remember this episode. I must have been 7-8 years old. Why I assume this age is because after that, I never quite understood math.

Morning of the math exam; rage of fit over milk. Before stepping out, my mother's last words to me -

"Have a bad day."

I recall, I aced that exam.

Since then, I insisted that my mother wish me a "bad day" before every exam I knew I was going to fail.

Over time, I think it stopped working because despite our best efforts to pass, I continued to fail those exams. In this time, I forgot about this "bad day" episode, rather the details of it.

Years later, instant re-collection happened.

I'm in the office. Inspired by the pep talk of a 21 year old intern on how I should confront and call out the bullshit, I make up my mind to do the same with someone I'd been seeing briefly.

I took the plunge. A few minutes in, his sincerity turned to shamelessness. I called the bullshit out again. In response, I was told -

"Have a good day."

"I will. Thanks."

And so, I did. I had a day I deserved.
No amount of disgust in both those wishes could stop me from having a great fucking day, on both the occasions.

Things I managed to achieve in the last seven days. Also known as my first week of productivity in 2018.

1) Blocked three people on Whatsapp and Facebook combined.
2) Ate a whole pack of chips. 123 gms of processed carbs.
3) Spent 3.9 k on books, which I have no space to store or hoard.
4) Met people every day after work.
5) Ate three different kinds of goat meat in one night.
6) Wrote nothing. Edited enough content to make me shoot myself in the head.
7) Worked out on 4 days out of 7. Out of breath on 2 days out of 4.
8) Drank 3 litres water on 4 days out of 7.
9) Cancelled vacation and sulked about it.
10) Cancelled another vacation scheduled for March and sulked some more.
11) Wrote shit on social media.
12) Acted like shit to people I like.
13) Made my bed 6 days out of 7.

All in all, a very normal week.

If you've not travelled in the last six months, outside of Delhi/NCR for pleasure, then shut this tab and go back. 

I returned from Pune, last week, to hear that Delhi was anticipating "Wettest July" in what seems (?) like a decade. Predicted by the met guys and having that conveyed by my mother only means alteration of some facts so if this seems dodgy to you, I'm passing the blame to my parental unit.

What's a fact checker and why does my blog need one?

Moving on, the misleading title is quite an opener to the problem of lack of getting any. In other words, 'Cobwebs on my Vagina', 'Drought in my Pussy', both contested and lost to the current opening title. I really need to look for a solution to problems such as, "Dude, we discussed weather so does that mean he's friend-zoned me?" but really, I am just so full of negativity, I thought let me pep up with some weather talk and what better than Monsoon to get the juices (gunk) flowing. (yuck)

I used to get dating. Much like I got the idea of taking a bus to school. There's a reason you indulge in camaraderie. You apparently save the environment from pollution by contributing to the noise when you shove 50 or more hyper kids in a bus and release 20 such buses in all directions to and from school every morning. If you care, I believe in home-schooling (also cause wow the fee structure is insane and I can possibly never afford to send my hypothetical child to school).

Now, I don't get that anymore. Or dating. Have the rules changed? Why do the kids travel in cars now? Why did my school stop sending buses to pick kids? Why do parents pay upward of a fucking lakh for their kids to learn colours and numbers? Somethings I will never understand. For everything else, there are rich fuckers paying their kids fee and making the rest of us question our subsidized convent education.

I digress, but my dear frenemy Mia Khalifa answers. Her version is almost rude.

"Darling, they all want your ass and you give them your hand. You're getting none back."

Bitch is probably PMSing and taking it out on me. I took the answer back home, as she drove me in her new shiny car, only to repeat that to SSA.

He had a better explanation (or maybe, I was just well fed), "You don't get a call back for second ones because you give out the complete package in the first."

"You know that makes total sense...the ones where I did follow up or like met the guy again are like the ones where there was so much awkward silence. Yeah, you're right...they weren't the kind of dates...you know...on acid.", I said while standing under the shade of a Peepal tree which did us no good in protecting from torrential downpour earlier today. In the last 48 hours, it's been humid and dry and no sign of the clouds. I step out of the house for an hour to meet SSA over a walk, and it rains on my parade.



When they said Wettest July, they certainly did mean having for it to rain on my actual fucking parade.

Is there a problem with placing your chips on the lopsided end? If so, then I missed the announcement cause I don't get this behaviour. If I put myself out on a date, I'm slutty and obviously "too into" the guy that I want "it" instantly with. If I don't, then I'm "prude" and how dare I have a "taste" for men. Have I not learnt enough from the idea of Tinder? Swipe, Sleep and Repeat.

But no. I want the wine, and for us to dine and the sixty-nine. So what if it takes awfully long time?

However, the rules have changed and clearly my manual was lost in the mail. To get some, you've to be aggressive, like a fighter. Destiny's Child didn't sing Survivor years ago for nothing. They forecasted a situation such as this to avoid dry spells of July.

I mean, it's half a fucking year and I've gotten NONE.

If you, like me, are having questions about me, may I publically announce that Mia Khalifa isn't getting any either. Despite a name like hers, she doesn't manage to go beyond cuddle.

"He says it's done and I'm like, 'Oh? Already? I didn't even feel it.' and then I never hear from him again...You know I should start like these classes on how to train people to have good sex. Like a whole school, how to initiate, how to take it forward and obviously how to have good sex. You should be my first customer."

Because yeah, the problem is me. To my face, I don't get any cause I have it tattooed on my forehead.

Which brings me to my fucking point, which I have been trying to find ways and means to convey. Men, women, everyone- BUCKLE THE FUCK UP!

You will climb mountains, trek to the fucking Himalayas, run a 20k marathon but when it comes to asking a person out, what the actual fuck happens? Does anyone ask you to give up your first born in exchange of sleeping with someone or going down on them? If so, please feel free to share. I'd be happy to empathise with your choices.

If not, then I don't understand. You'd do everything except for asking for some.

Because let's face it, dating as I know has become this- you text, you plan to meet, you ditch, you text some more, you forget, you text again, you feign excitement, you try to cancel, you meet, you have a good/great time, you never speak to them again.

WHY? Why would you waste good effort to do this nonsense? You're defying the laws of science because you're destroying energy...mmm good energy in this nonsense that you're putting the other person up for.

If you want to meet for "a" drink, say so. Tell the other person, "Hey, you know what, I have no intentions of following up cause I don't quite care. You still up for that one drink?"

Half the fucking time, I meet people out of politeness. At least, we can be politely honest with each other and say, "Hey, you know what I'm going to flake on you so let's end it right here. Let's save each other the energy and the process. Why don't we spend our respective time reading Camus and never talk to each other again?"

Trust me, that'd be romantic af.

But no, here I am, and here are your rules. I will be 'cool' and 'chill' and wait for the next person to nudge me to death to have some drinks, make conversation, waste energy and never hear from them again.

I wish I could eat and spend my energy digesting refined calories than writing this crap. If I tried, maybe even I could run for some 50k and do well, because dating for sure is harder than running a marathon.

In the last decade or so, I've learnt a few interesting things about myself. One of them concerns my co-curricular life, or time outside work. The only difference between having downtime and partying is who calls it what. All my parties are unconventionally wired, especially in context to the Delhi party circuit. Which is to say, no we don't swap babies/wives/boyfriends but we also don't gyrate to Wakhra Swag*. Your downtime is my wild party.
*Questionable example since in the last 100 days, I did actually attend a wild party and gyrate to Wakhra Swag with Mia Khalifa.

A couple of years ago, a friend extended the courtesy of inviting the little tartlet of my sibling to her party. Her reason? My sibling had played a track with us for a live recording at a TV studio. And so, she did show up and did nothing except to judge the fuck out of us all. A story, she narrates to everyone to this day, about how I'm a fossil, and friends with similar people.

The idea that we are all fossils and that our parties suck is extremely offensive to me. I, for one, love the parties we throw, and attend. Most of them include us sitting around with non-judgemental music (where one begins with Dizzy Gillespie and wrap the evening with Cat Stevens if we are an enthusiastic bunch) and drinking. It could be anywhere between a drink out of politeness to finishing two bottles of wine each, depending on the mood and the weather. If one is being completely wild, we'd go as far as attempting to dance to Bruno Mars (what?). Otherwise, there's karaoke or games, the kind where you indulge in harmless fun. Nobody gets topless, no snorting cocaine, no orgies that lead to HIV. Not to say that I haven't had my share of cuntliest parties (including slapping friends and coming back home with them, or gazing at stars while lying on the floor with a stranger).

But, at this point, I think I know what I prefer. A few hours of competitive Monopoly is better than reciting a star-crossed lovers tale of the boy who I can't be with because I refuse to not brush my teeth for a night (what?).

A few days ago, I was at a friend's Twenty Sex-th birthday and what an amazing day it was, all very well organised, managed. As fun parties go, there were bottles of champagne and other stuff which I skipped. The party had some party games as well. Party games are all fun and games until you get competitive. And boy, was that afternoon competitive. Think, an afternoon filled with polite conversation, a couple of rounds of Taboo, and lots of cake.

I was a part of the losing team, which should come as no surprise to anyone cause usually in my quest to being competitive, I make a colossal fool out of myself. In the list of top ten embarrassing moments, singing Dancing Queen by Abba to highlight Abba during my turn in Taboo is the latest qualifying entry.

However, nothing puts the fear of god in me than playing 'Never Have I Ever' in public.

Look, underneath this coating of snobbery lays a person ever so boring. I can be stimulated with a conversation about clean bedsheets, on hating Coldplay, as to why men won't ask for help to navigate and some such. I thrive when I'm amongst like-minded individuals. People who prefer to be observers than participants. Does that make me boring? Maybe. Do I mind it? Absolutely not.

Yet, it's only ever during parties that if someone initiates a game of 'Never Have I Ever', I go blank. I mean, the most exciting thing I did in college was to get 98.16 percent attendance in all three years.

That should tell you something about me.

I recall this same friend's party (which was judged and dismissed unfairly by the sibling) several years ago. We started a round or two of that- and thus came out material, as did the blush on my cheeks.

"Never have I ever pooped in the shower."

"Never have I ever sold crack, got caught by the cops, and lied my way out."

"Never have I ever slept with my best friend's boyfriend."

"Never have I ever have eaten my booger."

"Never have I ever urinated in public."

I have no recollection of what I said (and if at all I said). Although, I do remember a friend throwing up all over this host' lawn and I also remember crashing awfully early while everyone around me continued to chat.

All these years, I waited for an opportunity to say something. You know, something salacious. Something ludicrous. And I did get an entry to make, after all.

Around two years ago, this friend's friend feigned some interest in me (what?). Let's call him Abéy. Our boy Abéy was quite charming; if I had to review him he'd be a straight 7.25. We did the usual- talked till we exhausted all possible talking heads, went out and saw some sights (a very interesting Zomato review followed- hit me up you're interested to read), wasted each other's time until we got bored. It fizzled just as how it started, for no rhyme or reason.

Six months later, I'm sitting in the living room. Watching TV and drinking beer, or something equally mind-numbing (when I should have been writing my thesis). I get a call from the mutual friend and she says,

"Abéy has been jailed. It's all over the news."

I tuned to news, nothing. They were highlighting how drinking gau mutra clears pimples on your face.

Preliminary Google search later, it was confirmed. Abéy did actually land up in jail. His name and face splashed across most TV media channels, newspapers, websites etc. Turns out, he got into a bit of an altercation with a high profile political buffoon.

Most of Abéy's friends and well-wishers were all for, 'Fuck yeah Abéy, great going!'. Except, if you do actually look up his name, it tells you all about the time he was in jail. A move, I thought at the time, could be a disaster for someone's career prospects.

Last I heard, Abéy's doing pretty well for himself professionally. He also had Man Friday's attention at a party when our friend walked up to me and asked,

"Listen, isn't he the same guy who went to jail? Can you introduce me to him? You guys are friends right?"

(I did no such thing if you're wondering.)

Thanks to Abéy, if I'll ever get down to playing, "Never Have I Ever", I can confidently say, "Dated a man who went to jail" and lock a few jaw drops. Until then, I'll reserve my idea of partying to listening to Kendrick Lamar at best.