Anonymous Entries

IT HAD BEEN ALMOST two years since she had known him. It had all begun that rainy evening when she had posted her first blog entry on the Internet after a bitter fight with her father. She was mad. Like a hurricane she had swept away from the room and onto the one place she knew she would be heard. The world of close knit strangers - Internet.

‘I don’t know what to write here…’ she had typed in like a lover trying to explain why she needs to break up with her partner. Her mother’s death had not been easy on her. She was twelve back then. She was twenty four now.

It was then that she had met him - Anonymous.

Anonymous had left a comment – ‘Don’t worry. It will come.’

She had smiled in response with a colon and a closing bracket - :)

And so it had begun. The two year long association. A relationship so platonic that at the end of it none of them could really define what it was they shared. They didn’t want to.

She was who she was. And he was Anonymous. Both single children with a troubled past.

She would religiously update the blog site. Filling it with detailed descriptions of her day. Her good, bad and ugly experiences at work and at home about her father who she was convinced never understood her.

Anonymous would plug in soothing words of comfort the following day. Explaining to her how hard it really was for children who lose one of their parents. A sibling can actually be a blessing in these times, he would say. He understood. He had been there too.

She was glad she had an ear she could relate with. What began as a spot to vent her frustration soon became an archive of questions and answers. It was like a modern day version of the Bhagavad Gita where she was the weary Arjuna and Anonymous was Lord Krishna. The all knowing omnipresent entity who gave her all the answers.

‘Don’t worry. It will come,’ he would often say without specifying what ‘it’ really was. She never asked.

He soon became her guide. Her mentor. Her philosopher. Her friend. A friend who did not demand. A friend who did not expect.

The connections she had never found with her own father were baring themselves with this stranger who had come from the unknown and was shaping her sanity back to meaning. The coherent strings of leading a life without regrets were being stitched into her life’s fabric.

And it was all because of him – Anonymous.

With time her blog became a private place. No one else was able to see it any more. Just the two of them knew where it was and what it was for. She began archiving the entries by date. She added new sections to her page like – ‘My Favorites’ which listed some of the best 'Anonymous responses' to her most troubled queries. She found peace in reading them.

‘Don’t you ever get tired of baby sitting me like this?’ she would ask like an innocent child at times.

‘No,’ he would write back ‘this interaction is a selfish cause for me. I am learning a lot from you as well. So in one way you are baby sitting me.’

They would exchange symbols that denoted laughter. One colon with two closing brackets - :))

Sometimes it would be the more popular – LOL - Laughing Out Loud.

As their relationship was about to complete two years her father got terminally sick. He had been suffering from heart disease and soon he was hospitalized. She spent a lot of time with him. They had never really bonded since her mother’s demise and it seemed that the prospect of death was the only reason anyone really bonded in the family.

A sad prospect.

Yet she continued updating her blog.

‘Sorry for not being here for so long,’ she would say explaining her situation.

Anonymous was probably occupied too since his entries suddenly stopped coming in. ‘Maybe he got tired after all,’ she said to herself.

She wept the day they had completed one week of no interaction. Silently. In the woman’s bathroom at the hospital.

‘He is gone,’ she said to herself ‘like everyone else in my life.’

She walked back to her ailing father’s side. The old man took his daughter’s hand and whispered ‘I am sorry. For everything.’

She smiled back not knowing how else to react to that.

‘This heart is a weird thing,’ he said. ‘It is giving up on me but I don’t want it do so yet. Not without spending some more time with my little one.’

She smiled again as her eyes got misty. ‘I am scared pa’, she said.

‘And I am sorry,’ the old man continued ‘…I have not responded since a week. They don’t have a computer here so it is hard. Don’t worry. It will come…’

..ShaKri..

© 2006-2007 Originally published as 'Anonymous Entries' / existing in pieces, Shashi Krishna

Sexual Harassment? Me?

LIVING ALONE CAN BE BOTH A BLISS and a bane. I share this rather embarrassing tale with all you lovely folks so that you can appreciate the fact that, if it applies, there is someone in your home living with you. It also enlightens another little nugget of wisdom of the importance of self awareness and most importantly the vitality of an alert mind of what is happening around you.

The year was 2003. A lovely year with a great summer. I was back home visiting my folks and enjoying the fact that I was getting excellent home made food thrice a day. A great way to say a temporary good bye to the otherwise mediocre pieces of edibles I used to call ‘food’. No I did not miss that one bit. This was paradise. Having been by myself for over three years I had pretty much bid a teary adieu to comfortable life at the furnished apartment I called my ‘home away from home’. This, in effect, had added more value to the few weeks of blissful dependence I was nourishing myself with. The self-indulgence was so great that I had actually forgotten such as a basic thing as to how to use an alarm clock! As I said, it was absolute paradise.

So here I am one bright morning getting ready to head out. A small gathering of friends from college had arranged a movie/lunch date and I was eager to check it out. One of my closest buddies was to come over and pick me up at 10AM so I was ensuring I was all set to go.

The feel of the warm shower hitting the fatigued molecules nestling inside my tired skin felt wonderful. It was as if tiny water angels had flown in through the shower head and started scrubbing my every living pore with eternal affection. The dirt and debris of the previous day was sliding down my exhausted soul and vanishing in a musical whirlpool at the corner of the sun soaked bathroom. The steam the shower was emanating disappeared into the bright blue outside as I soaked myself under this endless stream of magical beads. Healing beads.

A good fifteen minutes of this paradisaical cruise and I was ready to start my day. Refreshed and awake I turned around to feel the bath towel hanging further away so that the freshness can be dried to fragrance.

Uh oh! No towel to be found. As I cleansed my eyes off of the dripping beads from heaven I realized that in my hurry to get into this bathroom fable I had forgotten to pick up my ‘exit license’ as it were. No big deal, I thought. I rubbed down the dripping drops and casually opened the bathroom door and walked up to the bed where I had left my crisp bottle green drying towel. I tip toed to ensure I did not slip and fall down spread eagled on those ‘vitrified tiles’ since I had been told they were break easy.

This story ends here. Nothing more to it really. My friend came by and picked me up. Turned out the plan had changed and we went out to have lunch and spent the afternoon at another friend’s place sharing jokes and stories.

A few days later I woke up to a rather jarring commotion from the living room. Not sure what it was all about I walked wearily downstairs and found that my parents were arguing about something. Dad was convinced what mom was saying was wrong while mom debated her point was true since she was the one who had heard it first.

‘Heard what?’ I intervened putting on my spectacles and rapidly blinking a few times for better vision.

‘Nothing…’ dad responded looking back at the newspaper in an attempt to simplify the matter.

‘What nothing! Tell him! You are not alone now, you know! Realize that!’ mom continued unperturbed. ‘Don’t you wear any clothes back in your apartment?’ she went on.

Coming from my mother it had to be one the most random things she had ever asked me.

‘What?’

‘Just close your room's door when you take a shower from today, OK? There are other people in the house here. You guys go out and pick up God knows what nasty habits. Now I have to spend another month looking for a new one’ she whined before heading back to the kitchen.

‘Dad…’ I said settling down next to him at the dining table ‘What is she talking about? What happened?’

‘The maid apparently spoke to your mother yesterday. She saw you walking around completely naked the other day and it scared the living daylights out of her. She promptly came and complained about it, I guess. She said she can’t work in a place where there is no respect for women.’

I stared back blankly at my dad without a word in response.

‘She also said,’ he continued flipping to another page ‘that she did not like such inappropriate behavior from men. She will not be coming from today.’

‘But…I didn’t even see her! Where was she?’ I revolted back in a hopeless attempt to redeem myself.

‘Oh don’t worry,’ dad continued with a dismissive smirk. ‘She saw more than she needed to. And that’s that. You want some coffee?’ he said handing me the newspaper.

..ShaKri..