Of becoming an arthur...

How does one become an author? Is it a journey that can be charted, with fixed points to mark the way? Or is it from a string of moments that blend, one into the other....seemingly disparate at first, but all leading to a point of culmination....into something that begs to be remembered, to be captured, to be posterized?

This is a question which does not truly need an answer because it is only a means to talk about something that's come about in Winkie's world. That he is now writing, and furiously. That his love for Harry Potter is expressing itself into the words of a sequel that he uses to indulge further, into this pleasurable fantasy land or witchcraft and wizardry. That it takes up where the last book left off , with Harry all grown up and with children and quite unaware that a new threat is rising....that Voldemort actually has ancestors, who might want to assume the mantle of his legacy of terror and destruction. Enough said, else I might give the whole plot away.

Suffice it to say that for 30 minutes every morning before school, and for 30 minutes after, and for every snatch of 5 or 10 minutes in between, Winkie works on his novel. And has earned himself the title of arthur from his brother, who with just that one word has shown that parts of his babyhood still remain with him. That all is not grown up. :)

As a fond, clucking mother, I feel like indulging in those little vapour moments, seemingly disparate in their connections that may have secretly led to this point, when the torrent of words is flowing. I think back to his days of self publishing books....of Indra and the rain story. And how many a staples were used to bind together that torrential shower. I think back to a writing workshop he attended last summer, with a friend, who believes that words are fun and can dance at your fingertips, should you make the effort to make friends with them. And infuses her students with a love for it. There must have been some of that still in him. I think of the fun writing class he attends every week before school. And how in the very first class, they had an idea relay, where one child wrote a sentence, and the next child built on it and so on, until they had this really zany story at the end, where everything crazy was suddenly possible, with all their collective ideas.

I think of my own story writing attempts from a week ago, just in time for Halloween, and how he was fascinated with how I had done it on Word, with underlines and bold fonts, and he wanted to use Word too....to write his own story. Ah!!! That is the point that set it all in motion, giving everything else hiding under the soil a chance to germinate. And how he literally took off from there...how making the time to write was effortless, because there was passion preceding it. When you love something, you will make the effort for it, come hell or high water. It's as simple as that. 

As simple as it was for us to come up with a pen name for him. Jaggery Bigsy Jenkins. 

Jaggery...because I had nicked him that a few weeks ago. To remind him to go back to the sweet version of his self, whenever he felt very little like it. The condition was that every time I called him Jaggery, he would have to smile, no matter what. And he does.

Bigsy...because he's the bigger boy of the house....by virtue of birth order, and other things too. 

Jenkins...because it goes with the Jaggery before it. Say it together and it makes sense. 

The Bigsy was an insert for middle name status. Together, they create quirk and interest. In my head, at least. :)

And so....the arthur writes. While I tussle with complex thoughts of how I will go through the editing process. And weigh needless, but still fun questions of whether his script should be untouched for publishing, or he be exposed to all the processes involved in the writing schema. Because, Christmas is coming around and I would like it make a gift of it for him. Because he anticipates being done in a month. Because it will be fun to see a title to your name. Because, it would make a cute coffee table book. And because every arthur, no matter how small, deserves to be in print, for the sheer courage of attempt and initiative.

Love is...

...unpredictable. Big realisation of the day.

What I thought of as love, actually came with many conditions to fulfil. It came from a selfish part of me which had certain illusions and conformed that love to fit the illusion of the time and day. It sprung from a need that I had, flowing to the people who I thought could fulfil that need. I painted it with the colours that I thought brightened it and made it pretty to look at, and fragrant to breathe in. I went with the ebb and flow of it because it kept changing course and intensity over and over, and I kept talking myself in and out of it.

And whenever I talked myself in, it was with the misguided notion that one day a higher form of love would come...the penultimate thing....just to have something to look forward to. But of course, nothing of the sort happened. And yet, everything of the sort happened. But before that was the full and complete disillusionment.

In people. In relationships. In ties. In roles. In trust. In life. In me.

So much so....that I "lost" myself. And cliched as it is....I just didn't know who I was anymore. I couldn't make up my mind about things. I was constantly in a state of mental conflict. I couldn't figure out what I really wanted....leave alone how to get there and how to get out of this place. There was very little self love, because of which I had nothing much to express to the world outside. Maybe that was why I didn't write here so much. Writing here was always about clearly connecting to the true me. When the truth of the me itself was in question, the question of writing didn't even arise. I sounded jaded and tired even to my own ears. The very simple bare bones question....of how are you...would throw me into a knot. I would spend hours agonising on how to answer it. What words to conjure up from the mystique of the air to explain what was happening. What WAS happening?

Its fanciful to think of it as awakening. But in a bare bones way, it was that. Its typical to give this problem a name and call it a mid-life crisis, but maybe it w.a.s that. And its perhaps a little sad that I did the only thing I could think of. And it was that. But it was also brave. But more than anything else, it was the only way I saw then. And I took it. In that it was simple.

I wrote to people in my life. People whom I had known in different capacities and met at different points of my own path and whom I thought had seen some reflections of me. I wrote them and asked them to tell me....about me. Anything that they could think of. The good, also the bad, and especially the ugly and all those little little things in between. I asked with tremendous trepidation and tremendous hope, somehow knowing that I would have to leave myself that open and that vulnerable, to truly break through whatever I was going through. And that's the beautiful part of it. Because when you do that.....when you really, well and truly bear your arms open and cry out....whatever you held in tight fists falls and clatters to the ground. It makes a din and takes a while to die out completely. And then it does.....and there is silence. Which s..l..o..w..l..y expands outwards....clearing the rubble. And creating space. A complete breath of a space....and openness. A cradle lying in wait for that soft little bundle of purity to come rest in it. Find its home.

I am being poetic, but this is truly what happened to me too. I found love rapidly flowing in, filling up every nook and cranny of my heart, sealing the crevices, embalming the wounds. And it was not love as love alone but in different forms. The unswerving loyalty of a childhood chum who had nothing but the best of memories ....the affection of a sibling who took the time to write, even if there was no need to. The anger of a friend who thought I should care two hoots about what the world thought of me. The patient consideration of a more distant family member, who decided this was an important enough mail to send out, on a busy day. And the complete pure love of a friend, who said to know you....is to love you.

They told me many things about myself. Many of which I knew and some of which took me pleasantly by surprise, since I did not know it had been there in me. That I could be so defensive. And mistrust. And injure myself so completely with my self critical ways. And others too. In fact that was the one consensus note. That I was my own worst enemy. It is amazing how many people wrote that. And then not everyone wrote. And not everyone did I expect a response from. But I heard what I needed to hear and got the medicine I so desperately sought. And I accepted it in both the palms of my hands, looking at it wondrously before lapping it up, hungry as I was for identity.

It can be argued that your sense of identity lies with you. And yes, that is true. It does. But we also leave behind bits and pieces of ourselves in the people we meet. It is unknowing, but certain. We are all walking legacies in that sense. Never quite knowing how we impacted and imprinted the soul of this existence. And when you ask for help...sometimes, all you're really doing is asking for that piece of you back. Or a reminder that that piece of you still lies with them. Safe. Cherished. Empowered.

I got all those pieces back. And I used it to piece myself back together. Again, its poetic to say that, but it is the truth of what happened. And as I began to accept myself....it began with rage. Acceptance, many times, begins with rage. You have a healthy sense of anger at what you've become and how you got there. You point some fingers just to subsume that emotion. To fuel it. To back some intent into it.

And then, even that dies down. You start hearing your own voice again....and rejoice in the re-introduction. You start listening to it. You make others listen to it too. With a fire in your eyes, that says you won't back down. And then, even that fire dies down. But by then it has already welded the steel of grit and determination.

Awakening has spirit. And a wave of energy which can carry you in it. But like a wave, it will ebb and you have to be ready for it, when it does. Because without your own intent to back you at that point, you could easily capsize again. Which is okay because the next wave will come by....but why wait to strike, when the iron is already hot? I am kind of at that stage right now. Where I am trying to build my intent to back up my spirit. To have my awakening mean something.

Which brings me back to love. And how unpredictable it is. And how much we love people through lenses that are custom fit to improve our own sight. With narrowed walls that close in and don't always let you breathe. With an intent to always gain something from it.

Today love means something different to me. And more than anything else, it means accepting the truth in whatever form it comes. And loving it because it is the truth, with every nature of the truth, which is to teach you about yourself. I have to accept it. It is what led me to me.

Making it your very own...

I was sitting down with Winkie yesterday on a writing assignment. There was a subject theme and a writing focused on it. And I knew right from the start what a big challenge it was going to be.

One, me and writing have been friends for awhile. And I've always said about how I am writing in my head all the time. So give me a theme and I am in heaven. Which makes it that much more hard to sit down to guide Winkie along in his writing. To hold back and not jump in. To guide and not gravitate him towards a path I think he should take. To use his own words and not give him clues to mine. Its wretchedly hard. 

But one breath at a time, I think I managed it. I kept asking him questions and with the words he came up in answer, we used that in his writing, trying for form, for clarity and a direction. I would take deep breaths every few minutes to keep that balance going and be patient as he struggled his way through...getting over writer's block and struggling with synonymous words that were more descriptive and for rhymes, for it was a poem that we were doing.

And then came the biggest hurdle of all. It was the final line and the final thought and in my head, it had to be big and full of bang and reach a crescendo of thought and heart. I kept giving him little prods to keep the thinking wheel turning....but he struggled and struggled and I was running every risk of jumping in headlong with the closure. But by a stroke of miracle, I stopped. Instead, I turned his paper around and said....

Write all the words you can possibly think of in this context. Don't think....just write and fill up the page.

This was easier for him to do. From the simple to the overstated, from fun to fanciful, from silly to superfluous to soulful, he wrote words in a flurry of mental activity. And then I circled the ones from his list as a suggestion and starred the one that was my favorite word on his page. Connection.

He smiled at me. And we thought some more on how to use it to wind down his poem with. And by this point, reining back while still being involved was an art I had learned at least a little. We finished it. And he was spent. And so was I. 

But I was also riding on the crest of a wave of a beautiful recognition of Love in the process. How much I loved my son, within the selfish parameters of a mother and also the more selfless parameters of it. How much I wanted him to succeed in his endeavour. But more than anything else, how much I wanted it to be about the journey of self expression....of thinking, feeling, struggling, finding, using, enjoying and exhilarating in the process and the end result. And because of how deeply I wanted this for him, I was willing to struggle through my own tendencies to interfere and instruct. To bite back on my own compulsions so he can taste the victory that would be sweetest from his own cup, and from his own pouring of it into the cup....clumsy as it may have been at first, but how much of focus and concentration and peace and mindfulness it would have afforded him in the process??!!

And oh! How God loves us in this very same way. And in a way that is even more profound, pure and patient. This whole life has been afforded to us as an experience....our very very own. We can do what we want with it. We can stumble, we can fall, we can rise, we can walk. We can repeat them in many cycles of recovery and we can take our time with it. There is no 'one hour' to finish the assignment. He has given us several thousand lifetimes. There is not just a few words to choose from, but an entire vocabulary of it. There is not just one person to sit with you and guide you, there are several countless souls who have been instituted to aid in your experience, and abet the mystery of riddling you into thinking they were a foe, when it was friendship, and a friendship when they actually couldn't have your back anymore. And leaving when they should have stayed, and hovering in the background the entire while when you thought it was your loneliest time on the planet.

And there is not just a pencil and a paper, but a range of tools....each one at the tip of your finger, to be called forth and employed at will and in the blink of an eye. A song, a ballad, a painting, chanting, graffiti on the wall, tantra, whispered longings and fervent prayers, a conversation of heart to heart and the confessions in a box, the silence of being with a soul mate, the laughter that is in abandon....and every emotion and experience that points the path to your heart. 

And there is not just one word he will choose and give back to you as a favorite, in a shortcut. Nay. You have free will, even if it comes with the weight of pre-programmed compulsions. The choice to choose is always upon us,  in every situation. Only, it is not an easy one to make. But nothing easy has lasted long. And nothing hard has ever left you, but with a beautiful imprint on your own evolution. This is a breathless, timeless, endless Love that can never be fully understood or paid back. But pay it forward....we most certainly can, perpetuating the cycle and the season of love. And it can begin with or be in the middle of....a mother, helping her son write his poem...

To the deep end and back...

You need the fog to lift completely so you can see exactly where you have been and the clear trail that led you there. To see exactly where you are standing now, the very spot where your feet have stolidly clung to the ground and are still keeping you, giving a vantage and steadiness. And you can breathe....clear, pure gulps of air, not laden with the mist and your chest can contract and expand, breathing in survivial and out the negativity and despair and sadness and hopes past and in... and out... and in... and out....until nothing more is expelled other than the physiological impurity of circulated air.

And once the breath has steadied and the last remaining shreds of moisture wispy clouds has cleared.....then you can look around.....and ahead. You can even squint your eyes to try and see what's on the anvil and beyond it. And you can take your first tentative steps forward. Fresh from the weight that you had carried all this while and once recently shed. Fresh from the memories, stark and bleak, making every prospect out there tinged with a faint rainbow...of survival and strength. Fresh from the knowledge, that you can get down....really down, while keeping up a semblance of functioning, and when you've served your sentence, you can also get up, truly up....and have it be the real thing. The first steps, thought tentative, are tinged by this legacy of survival. Sometimes you fear that those very steps can reverse direction and lead you back.

But thankfully, the fog has already cleared, and a few steps back won't throw you off the grid. If anything, it will give you a few more paces to be able to launch yourself into a sprint, should the instinct arise. And why should it not? When you faintly espy a rainbow in the horizon? When everything has a look of freshness and recovery? When the path forward is clear and the next foothold can be charted? When the load has been shed and you are lighter and more nimble. And the more you run, the more the specks that clung defiantly to you get knocked off by the breeze and the sheer willpower of living beyond existing!

Of lists and life...

As I was straightening out Winkie's bed the other night, I found this tucked under his pillow. A little notepad of things to do. A list for his little tasks. Something he can look at first thing in the morning as he wakes up, and remind himself. And just like that I was awakened.

The days that blur and pass dizzyingly by in the 9 to 5 auto mode, came to a grinding halt. Feelings buried deep down rise to the surface. And I feel....touched. Not in that warm, fuzzy way. But as a range of emotions sloshing about in your heart all at once, touching it, waking it up....forcing it to recognise itself.

I am a little sad that his life has already entered that place where keeping a list has become necessary. Where it is measured by tasks undertaken and completed. Where accountability  is called for. Sigh. Independence is such a short lived thing. An illusion really. Though innocence might have a longer life span.

And then I feel pride. That he was finding a method for management and using it to stick close to the lines of self-conduct. That he was getting organised.

And then amusement. At the line items on his list. And how he dates each one. And how important those things are to him. How getting it done matters.

And then reflection. At how we all have our lists....well, the control attemptors anyway....and how we put on the list, things that we deem important enough to do, that we cannot afford to forget. And how if we put together all our lists over out lifetime, we can maybe even see a pattern in them, a thread that connects each one, and weaves the story of our lives...well, the active bits of it anyway.

I love making lists. Its the only way I can keep a hold on things and stop my mind from taking over me completely. I have lists for things I need to do like get car sticker, and library book drop and e-school sign up and so on. Things that I don't have to do everyday, but they come up and can just as easily be forgotten. I  make a list of things to do before a big trip and a list of all the things I need to pack that I just can't do without. If I am hosting, I make a list of what food I want to cook and keep ticking it off after each one is done. I make lists at work for scheduling myself, on excel and outlook calenders. But my favorite is on a regular sticky note, stuck on the side of the monitor. There is something about writing the task down physically that makes you feel like you are truly committing to it, and something about physically striking it off, that gives you a sense of closure. And then that finally tear and toss, that feels like liberation. And achievement. And superhuman-ship.

Welcome Dear Winkie, to the world of making lists. As you embark on this journey of a life of doing and performing, I wish for you every success, but tempered by every possible measure of balance. That while you make lists to get out of your head every once in a while, the list doesn't become you. That striking each item off, doesn't become your vocation. That the tasks you get done don't become your sole identity. That the thought of doing it all doesn't keep you up at night. That every once in a while, whether it be on your smart device or notepad, you can be master of the fine art of tear and toss. And drift and dream. Ever.