Superhero Movie

You wanted to see a Superhero Movie. I wanted to see a Superhero Movie. Everyone else wanted to see a Superhero Movie, too, but then they went without us so we went later.

We spoke on the phone in the morning before going for the Superhero Movie and you asked me, when did a Superhero Movie turn into the Superhero Movie?

Does it really matter, I asked. It was hard to hear you clearly because the phone lines had been dug up a little. There were craters the size of thirty children going around the mulberry bush. Elephants, the government reported. Just, like, elephants, you know. Falling from the sky.

Because nobody in their right minds would go watch The Superhero Movie, you retorted.

Halfway across the world renowned actor Drake Bell sat down to a quiet early dinner with his immediate family, unaware of the cruel oblique jibe at his expense. There was too much butter on the shrimp.

I reached the theatre a whole forty minutes early. There was a lot of time to spare so I sat around with a suitably thick tome to swat at the air with. After what seemed like eternity I looked at my watch and realized I’d only killed ten minutes.

You called with twenty-five minutes remaining. I’ve just woken up, you said.

It’s a fine sort of day to have just woken up to, I supplied. I decided to walk while I talked. There was a temporal anomaly where the mall's central promenade had been; people walked into the blue-green haze and suddenly found themselves bitter and resentful, wondering where the best years of their life had gone. A minor leak, a man standing on a wooden crate was yelling into a megaphone, we were laying gas lines and there was a minor leak. Nothing to see here. Move along. 

I sidestepped the anomaly. 

All of this for a stupid superhero movie, I grumbled.

I had forgotten all about the stupid superhero movie, you confided.

Halfway across the world renowned actor Drake Bell waited until the rest of his family was asleep before creeping down to his study. He picked up a salt-shaker half filled with grade-A Bolivian snow and helped himself to a toke. He looked at the walls, decorated with prime-time Teen Choice Awards, none of which he’d won in this decade. He decided to help himself to another toke and then some.

It was decided that you'd make it by the skin of your teeth and we'd watch the movie minus the irritating trailers that we'd wanted to gasp at.

And what if I don't make it in time? You inquired.

Come on, I exhorted. It's not like we haven't had our fill of superheroes.

And that was true: the only known superhero alive at the time was a young man from Tampa Bay, Florida. He called himself Horsedick Fuckaton (spelled Fuckathon in EU countries) and was victim to a severe case of functional retardation. He was also the metahuman equivalent of a truckload of Supermen on steroids: a Godlike entity who couldn't tell apart his various abilities, let alone control them. 

Each and every one of his adventures caused billions of dollars worth of property damage and almost always culminated in the gruesome deaths of at least a thousand people. It had come to a point where criminals stayed at home just so they didn't have to be guilty of causing the spontaneous implosion of an entire housing complex because ol' Horsey couldn't discern between his left hand and his right.

We could always Google Horsey's latest exploits and feel terrified, I reassured you. The elevator to the top floor had been wrenched clean out of its moorings and skewered into the ground like a flagpost, six miles away in an open field. Some government official was probably on site, lying through his nose. 

It felt good not to know for certain.

Halfway across the world renowned actor Drake Bell hit himself upside of the head to clear the ringing. Then he realized the ringing was the alarm of the battered sedan into which he’d plowed his Porsche. He felt himself up and down before ascertaining his only injury was a moderately severe nosebleed; but he’d had that since before he got into the car. He opened the door, fell outside like a discarded juice carton, and then fumbled to his feet before continuing down the nearest darkened alleyway.

I'm sorry I made you miss your superhero movie, you said.

That's all right, I suggested. You'd turned up seventy minutes after the movie was supposed to begin. I'd tried reading my book for all of five minutes before taking the temporal anomaly for a spin. I felt too woozy to be upset. I also felt a strong urge to watch Nirvana live.

No, I feel like I wasted your time, you said as you typed out yet another text to yet another friend - your fifth or sixth in the past two minutes.

You don't, actually, I said in a more perfect world.

We were standing outside now. I felt fine. A little less woozy but in control.

Pardon me? You looked at me politely. Your fingers on the keypad never slowed down.

It was just another Superhero Movie, I remarked. In a season when superhero movies are a dime to the dozen. It had more to do with spending a bit of time together. Maybe it wouldn't have been awkward. Maybe it would even be worth it.

You stopped texting and looked at me intently, in this perfect world I had in my head. The intensity of your gaze increased considerably as I took off my jacket, revealing red and black tights underneath. I raised one fist towards the sky and then I was off - over the buildings, the concrete hills, the rivers of smoke - far, far away from the realm of your all-too-human eye.

Halfway across the world renowned actor Drake Bell slumped against an overturned trashcan and waited for his breathing to regain some semblance of normalcy. Then he took the .38 Magnum he'd yanked from the Porsche's dashboard and put the barrel in his mouth. He'd already cocked the hammer and squeezed his eyes shut before he realized he could not do it - he could not possibly die with that terrible overbuttered shrimp as his last meal in this world. He waited momentarily to see if he'd change his mind before tossing the gun in the nearest garbage can and starting upon the long walk home.

The story ends quite unsatisfactorily.
Which, in retrospect, happens to be the point behind this poorly-constructed narrative.

We don't live in a perfect world. Or else Horsedick Fuckaton would have choked to death on his own umbilical cord. And Drake Bell would have the best shrimp in garlic butter sauce he'd tasted in his life; and then he could off himself less than a hundred meters from the carcass of his beloved Porsche.

And I could afford to be a raging alcoholic with writerly ambitions. And you could be utterly self-absorbed and insensate, because we'd know ourselves with all of our problems and failings.

And there wouldn't need to be the tantalizing promise of some larger-than-life icons sweeping up our trash for us and making us whole again.

You'd see what I've seen all evening - what drove me to try something as preposterous as this in the first place.

All we have - all we really ever had - is each other. And no matter what our problems might be, we can take them on. You and me.
The way we were before we became this twitching mess of neuroses and inability to communicate with one another, let alone relate.

We'd watch the stupid Superhero Movie because we'd have three hours in a darkened theater to hold half a million discussions that the world wouldn't have to share in.

We'd have reaffirmation.

And the Superhero Movie could go back to being what it is - a stupid goddamn Superhero Movie - rather than a metaphor for all that is wrong with our world right now.

Paragon

After what seemed like forever the escalator began to slow down.

There was a pair of wrought iron gates somewhere in the distance above me. I gripped the rubber rails tighter. The sound of screaming had all but receded; the proverbial tunnel of light had turned into a wall and then a blanket, covering everything with a layer of whiteness that hurt the eyes to look at.

An old man stood between the last tread and the gates. He was dressed in a rough-looking bathrobe that almost reached his ankles. His beard cascaded over his chest like molten steel at some foundry. His eyes twinkled with the sort of blue warmth I'd only read about in stories.

-Vaibhav, right? he scratched his beard. He was probably speaking in a human voice-I saw his lips move and his throat work up and down in time to his words-but every syllable echoed in my head with the sound of a vast celestial choir. I found myself kneeling almost involuntarily before him.

-Excuse my attire, he said. We don't often get new arrivals here.

I blushed slightly but managed to hold his gaze. Why am I here? I asked.

-Because your actions ring true, Vaibhav. Because-

No, I get that. I mean why am I here? I am a Hindu. This isn't my idea of-

-Ah, yes. The Pearly Gates are a Western construct, right? Well, Vaibhav, you see... Virtue is rightly perceived as its own reward. The Hindu concept of the hereafter is slightly different from this, but we'll get you transferred as soon as they're done with the paperwork.

But-

-The important thing for you to remember is that the afterlife does not try to distinguish between denominations.

But-

He stepped aside, and the iron gates hardly protested as they swung apart. I had a lot of questions left unanswered but he fixedly let out a big yawn and excused himself.

I stepped forward through the Pearly Gates.

Silence bounded out of the blinding light and welcomed me as an old friend.

The ground beyond the gate was pale, cold and featureless. I briefly wondered why my feet felt benumbed before realizing I was dressed in nothing but a monogrammed bathrobe like St Peter had been. I tried to recall what I'd been wearing before but couldn't.

Is there anybody out there? I called out, but to no avail. Worse, after I walked a few hundred yards and turned around, I found both the gate and my footprints vanished. Looking too closely disoriented me so I gave up.

So what is one supposed to do in heaven? I wondered aloud. The answer came into my head, unbidden.

Meditate, said a slightly dissonant voice. Take stock of thy virtues.

That seems like a good enough plan, I said to nobody in particular. There had better be more people in the Hindu version, I added under my breath.

The ground wasn't as uncomfortable as it looked. I sat cross-legged, arms arranged in the lotus position.

I took a deep breath.

I closed my eyes.

"You're the best," Trishna was saying, "The best thing that ever happened to me."

That's not true, I replied, although I didn't really mean it. I took her hand again as we left the metro station

Now pull the switch.

"Are you sure that is how it is supposed to work?" Girish asked.

Yes, I did this when I was in tenth grade.

"Here goes nothing." Girish pulled the switch. The entire room was lit up by a network of LEDs on a cardboard base, spelling his name in letters that kept changing colour.

See?

"You're the best, bhai," he said as the lights skipped from red to blue

and I'm not going to make any more promises. Because you don't deserve promises. You deserve change. You deserve something better. And I will be better.

Steady round of applause. "Friends, as the incumbent student body president I have to defend my post. But if I were being very honest I wouldn't be able to. And that is because my friend, Vaibhav, is a paragon of virtue. He is the most tireless unselfish level-headed individual I know, and no matter how we disagree on matters of polity, I feel-"

applause rising to a crescendo

drowning him out

"You're the best," Jigyasa was saying. "The nicest person I have ever met. I love you."

I love you too, I replied, although I didn't really mean it. I took her hand again as we left the cinema hall

I stumbled to my feet. The landscape flickered a little. Meditate, the other voice repeated. It kept repeating itself.

I picked a random direction and started walking. Five minutes later I came to the man in the bathrobe making tea on a tiny stove.

-Do you want some tea?

Where are they?

-I might have a few biscuits here somewhere.

Where are they? I had set out to scream but my voice came out in the same even tone.

-What are you talking about?

My memories. The rest of my memories. All I have is good deeds.

-Haven't you led a good life?

Yes! I mean I thought so. But this doesn't make any sense! None of it is coherent!

-I wonder why. He finished making tea. He poured it into two cups. He started rummaging for sugar in the kitchenette.

Where are the rest of my memories? What happened with those girls? After the elections? How did I die?

-The one with Trishna is slightly clichéd. The old man took a sip of his tea. He made a slight face. He went back to rummaging for sugar.

Meditate.

-The one with Jigyasa, on the other hand, had a lot of juicy bits to offer. The old man grinned. It was an ugly grin.

Take stock of thy virtues.

-That has a direct correlation with how you die, you know.

I raised my cup to take a sip but found it empty.

You're not going to tell, are you?

-I don't think so.

You're not really St Peter, are you?

-Far from it, kid. Far from it.

I put my cup down on the ground. The old man, the stove and the kitchenette had all vanished again.

Meditate, repeated the other voice.

I sat down on the ground and closed my eyes.

Pridesbane

In the midst of the valley a forest.

At the heart of the forest a clearing.

He'd been living in the clearing for fifty years, now. Men and women came from the farthest reaches of the province just to hear him speak, or to offer their sorrows for his perusal. He seldom provided them with solutions, but it lessened their burdens to share with him.

"I bet you're a goddamn fraud."

He didn't bother to look up. The young man who'd spoken had been peremptorily loud as he made his way across the clearing, and the air had long been curdled by the dirty looks being cast his way.

"Are you listening to me, you phony freak?"

He finally looked up at the young man. His jaw continued to work up and down on its relentless journey of mastication.

"Look at you wallowing about in the filth." The young man seemed to be warming to his subject. "I bet you love living caked under a layer of dirt, don't you?"

The crowd in the clearing had turned into a giant circle of spectators. He was as aware of their unease as he was of the young man's discomfort. He continued to say nothing.

A couple of hours passed. The young man followed a regular pattern, like clockwork: a couple of laps of the darkening enclosure, a few insults spat at him, and then waiting around for a response that never came.

After the evening gave way to night the young man finally stopped. The clearing was completely empty - most of the spectators had given up in disgust, carving their ways out of the forest and back into their lives.

The young man was in the middle of a sentence when he lost steam. His hands fell limply to his sides, and he stood staring blankly at the older man.

"What ails you?" The ascetic finally asked him. To give him due credit the young man didn't really need to think before answering.

"Jealousy," he said. "It eats me up on the inside. It corrodes me. I see the world going about its business, uncaring of my existence, and I feel jealous."

"The whole world or just some bits in particular?"

The young man looked at him, startled. There was a wry smile beneath the hermit's beard. His jaw never stopped working.

"Your jealousy comes from a sense of being wronged," said the older man. "And that feeling of injustice, in turn, arises from false pride."

"What do you mean, false pride? I'm-"

"All pride is false pride. Why should your existence make a difference to anybody else's? You are meant to live and breathe free of obligation."

"Easy for you to say."

The hermit's smile widened slightly. "Nobody owns anyone else. It is not possible. We'd be fools to try. What we can do instead is destroy this false pride."

"And how can one do that?"

"Here." The hermit opened a knobbly fist. A bunch of spindly leaves unfolded in the moonlight. They seemed to have a purple tinge to them.

"What is this?"

"Pridesbane," said the hermit. "Help yourself."

The young man took a couple of leaves and put them in his mouth. He chewed for a moment or two. He spat them out in disgust.

"Yuck! These are bitter!"

"Yes. That is because they are meant to be."

The young man stared at the older man for a bit.

The knobbly palm never wavered.

The young man helped himself again.

This time he concentrated on the chewing.

"How long do I have to do this?" he asked with his mouth full.

"As long as it takes."

"And when can I stop?"

"When you have conquered your pride," said the hermit. "Or when the leaves stop tasting bitter. Whichever comes first."

The young man looked around for a moment.

The older man pulled a spare rug from under his own and spread it next to himself.

The young man sat down cross-legged.

The forest was silent except for the rhythmic tide of two pairs of teeth working in the darkness.

A Bad Day

So this was going to be a rant but it is not.

It has every right to be, I think. Things have been weird on both personal and creative fronts of late, and the past few days have been a different sort of pain - nothing particularly bad happens, the books are seldom in the red when you take stock at night, but there is a small feeling in the back of your mind that all your cynical notions about specific people and the world in general are being slowly but irrevocably reinforced.

All days but this day.

Had a (slightly) productive morning, an eventful afternoon and a good evening. It is just that the people I enjoy hanging with and the conversations we tend to have veer into melancholic territory, so a good discussion is generally not indicative of the state of mind it leaves one in.

Had been discussing Vonnegut (again) today - how his career graph shows his struggle with the growing sense of despair that he felt with regards to the world around him. He was of the opinion that we are all passable people as long as we concentrate on our intrinsic humanity; but he also believed that we were steadily losing our ability to recognize that fact.

The journey home was supposed to be brief, but it gave enough time to acquaint oneself with another poem in G.M. Muktibodh's repertoire. The poem was bleak, too. So I was in a slightly morose state of mind as I made my way up the looong escalator to the red line, to Welcome, towards home.

The red line was more crowded than the yellow at this point: most of the Jamna-paar workforce headed homewards at the end of a hard day's work. I wedged myself into the doorway, completed the Herculean task of turning around, and began making my way across the width of the compartment, since Welcome (unlike Kashmere Gate) is one of those few stations with an island platform that serves both rails.

In the end the crowd got a little too dense to handle, so I hung about in the middle as the train began its long journey to Shastri Park station.

It was while we crossed the Yamuna that I first noticed him: a short, thin man standing slightly to my right, positioned so that his dirty backpack was digging into my shirt. I shuffled a little to the right to minimize contact, and the resultant paradigm shift gave me an excellent view over his shoulder. The first three things I noticed (in order) were:

1.) The fact that he was missing a couple of nails

2.) The scar that ran down the side of his neck (stopping just before his jugular); and

3.) The fact that I would be forced to look at the screen of his phone unless I was willing to attempt another change in position.

A change in position was impossible, for now; I stayed put. Besides, the dude wasn't even reading any embarrassing texts or anything; all he was doing was going through his phonebook at a sedate pace. It was an interesting exercise; he had a nondescript moustache and no discerning marks to tell me his religion, and there were both an Amit Chacha and an Adil Mamu in his phonebook; was he another one of those lovechilds born out of the bounds of religion? And if yes, did he have an interesting story of his own?

Presently he came to somebody called Ashu. This Ashu seemed pretty interesting himself: he seemed to have numbers across every network! An Ashu was followed by an Ashu Airtel.. an Ashu Airtel (2).. An Ashu Docomo.. An Ashu Dolphin.

The first stirring of unease came with Ashu Hutch (2). I had a vague idea that they checked a person's records before handing him a new phoneline; a guy with seven numbers (eight now, and counting) had to show up as a pretty big blip on some radar somewhere.

By the time he finally reached Ashu Virgin (2) I was starting to get distinctly uncomfortable. My mind skipped over all the jokes about sexual inexperience that had no punchlines. And I listened closely as he pressed the green button and brought the handset next to his year.

"Main metro talag pahunch gaya hoon," he said. "Haan. Haan. Theek hai. Baad mein baat karta hoon."He hung up. His part of the conversation had been innocuous-I'm on the metro, I'll talk to you later-but his choice of words was slightly strange. Why would he say he had reached the metro? The metro was a path, not a destination!

ding

Said the PA system, followed by "Shastri Park.. Station."

The man with the scar reached forward into the crowd, cutting through to the door with an exaggerated sense of urgency, and he was at the head of the mass exodus that would follow within a moment or two.

ding

"Stand clear.. Of the doors."

And suddenly I could breathe, loosen my grip on the handhold, actually turn my head without establishing potentially-embarrassing eye contact with a perfect st-

And there it was.

Lying a couple of feet away, packed in a layer of newspapers and frayed twine, a rectangular crate the size of a large shoebox. Exactly where my friend with the scar had been standing.

I looked up blankly, uncomprehendingly, and the last thing I saw before the doors hummed shut was him, shoving his way through the crowds, trying so hard to get as far away as he could.

What followed were perhaps the longest four minutes of my life. Three people were standing equidistant from the crate - me towards the left, an old man with an apologetic face behind it, and a young guy in a black pullover with oversized headphones to the right. We broke the cardinal rule and established eye-contact, trying to establish if the crate belonged to one of us.

All we saw was our own confusion mirrored back.

There was absolute silence, and in my head I could already hear the rumble of the collapsing overpass, the flare of light and sound so bright and loud it would cause people miles away to flinch, the screams of the twisting girders drowning out the screams of the people onboard.

I probably wouldn't even get to scream.

ding.

"Seelampur.. Station."

I was pretty sure we'd've reached Dilshad Garden by now. I would get off, cross over to the other platform, catch a train back to Welcome, and laugh at my idiocy all the way. If only. If only. If only.

The doors opened.

"Y-ye bag kiska hai?" It was the guy with the oversized headphones. He had probably started off trying to sound nonchalant, but his voice had betrayed him on the first syllable itself.

"Kiska hai, bhai?" The old man this time. I wanted to get in my two cents, too, but I wasn't sure I could manage at this point.

The air was thickening. I was positive of that. It shouldn't have been so difficult to breathe.

"Mera! Mera bag hai." We all turned simultaneously. A middle-aged person rose from a seat behind us, his salt&pepper hair in a tizzy, rubbing sleep from his eyes.

He came forward to stand beside the crate, babbling disjointedly about inconsiderate morons who kick other people's luggage into the netherworld, and we finally relaxed a bit. The old person shook his head resignedly, the young man began humming (a bit too forcefully?) along to his music-an old Kishore number that I didn't mind being slaughtered. Not here. Not now.

I turned to the window and looked out. A pale face stared back at me, his expression completely blank, his complexion ashen.

It took another two minutes before my heart-rate returned to normal.

ding.

"Welcome," said the automated voice, and I laughed like an idiot as I got off the train.

I sat on a bench for a few minutes before making my way home, and turning on the PC, and beginning the entry I am about to end. There,. on the bench, I had a weird thought. I had a lot of weird thoughts, but this one has persisted through the bus ride, the inevitable scolding, and my dinner (which I have forgotten ten minutes after eating).

I know my thoughts and actions aren't completely in sync with the sort of life I lead - I have it easy, mostly, and the sort of melancholia I display (enjoy, suggests a small voice in my head) isn't exactly called for.

I am not going to justify anything I say or do - I have a right to lead my life the way I want, after all, and even five-car pileups are a rubbernecker's paradise - but I still think it is my life, and I have the right to infer the glass is half empty and whoever drank half and left are probably dying of thirst somewhere remote.

What I hate is being forced down certain paths by events beyond my control.

I had a bad day (or a good day that left no impression on me, if you want to be anal about this) and I hate the fact that I am feeling lucky to be alive.

Hungry Hearts

Read a short story by one Franz Kafka a few minutes back (read quite a few, actually, but I'm afraid some of his more urbane nuances tend to get a bit lost in translation). And just when I was about to give up ol' Franny as One-of-Those-Guys-I-Ain't-Gonna-Understand, along comes this one story that literally blows me away.

The story in question was called A Hunger Artist. It was the third or fourth story I flipped to, on account of Indrajit Hazra making a passing reference to it in his column way back when our babe Ramdev was fasting and everyone had an opinion on him, one way or the other. The reference was fleeting and ironical; the story was laden with irony too, only it was as fleeting as a freight train to the back of one's head.

Anyway, lengthy intro paras aside: the story is about a professional hunger artist, a man who ekes out his existence by living in an iron cage and not eating anything for stretches lasting forty days on end (not because of any limits to his endurance-the public simply loses interest after that).

The hunger artist fasts because of some nagging dissatisfaction he has with his life; he wants to fast for longer and longer periods but is hindered by a lack of commercial viability. Eventually, however, the public loses interest; and the hunger artist loses his impresario and his ragtag entourage of suspicious souls. He ends up as a circus sideshow; and finally released by the constant scrutiny and unhealthy interest of his spectators, he manages to fast out to his heart's content (or to the end of his life, although the two are implied to be one and the same).

Finally, as the circus overseer looks to clear out his straw-studded deathbed to make space for a panther, the hunger artist finally reveals the reason why he fasts:

It turns out he never really got the food he wanted.

These turn out to be his last words.

And after an unceremonious burial and a quick once-over, the cage is refilled and life goes on.

There can, of course, be multiple ways of interpreting this tale; however, going with the conclusions I drew, I think the hunger artist represents every creator who ever longed for recognition... Or even a chance to practice his art, or say whatever he wanted to say. We all go through our lives with a nagging sense of unease, a slight crinkle of unfulfilled desire at the corner of our eyes.

The hunger artist wastes away in his anticipation.

We merely die a little every day.

Why do we lead such unsatisfying lives? Why do we fast for longer and longer periods, when it is not food but nourishment that we actually need? There's a million references I could throw at you right now-Taare Zameen Par and some brash lovesong by the INXS and every frigging Rocky movie ever made-but I don't really need to do that, do I?

You already know what I'm talking about.

You've known all along, in fact. This is why we root for the underdog. And it is also the reason behind the populace's disinterest and suspicion when it comes to the hunger artist-because the mirror he holds up to their faces is so woefully accurate. They can all see a little bit of themselves in the artist; and at the same time they are unable to provide him the food he needs above all others.

Since you've read this far, let us try an experiment.

I'll assume I hold your unadulterated, undivided attention.

And you can assume I keep soliloquizing on the magic of Kafka (although I really think I need to go read the rest of that collection - I might miss a lot of the finer points, but ol' Frannypack is equally comfortable swapping his fine chisel for a sledgehammer).

There. We just freed up fifteen minutes (or fourteen, if you're still reading). Take these fourteen minutes, and put 'em where they'll give you the maximum amount of joy... Go listen to those songs you heard when you were young(er) and carefree. Read the first two pages of that paperback you were saving up for a rainy day.

Or if your activity of choice will take more than that to accomplish, write it down somewhere. That way, the next time you're about to blow two hours watching No Entry again on television, you can get off the couch and go painting instead. Or any of the wonderful things that give you peace.

Now. Go.

It might not make much of a difference... But it is a really small slice of your life, ain't it?

And this happens to be the only one you've got.

Now if you'll excuse me, I have to go draw up a bucket list for July 10 to July 16th... We'll talk about it in detail some other time.

On Writing

So this is not going to be a review.

There is a book by the given title (a short guidebook for the aspiring writer by Stephen King: GET IT NOW) but it does not merit a review, if only for the sole reason that I can find no flaws in it. It is short, awesome, hard-hitting, and helpful without being overbearing. Of special note is King's deadpan humour, which gets...

...But I digress.

This short little ditty is about the act of writing itself.

It is currently 3:25AM in the morning. I do not exactly have a healthy sleep pattern, but I generally call it a day at 2 or 3 by the latest (by calling it a day I mean crawling into bed to play Angry Birds or read some short stories on Kindle, but screw it).

Tonight, however, I feel pumped. I feel alive. I feel like the king of all I survey.

And that's simply because of writing.

You see, I started this short story last week. It was meant to be around 5,000 words; two nights worth of effort, three at the most. I worked on it for three days, wrote all the offbeat humour and random violence, and then... Stopped. Somewhere near the 4,000 word mark.

Because I now had to write about normal human interaction; something I do not happen to be very good at. I left the story alone for the next two nights (wrote a poem one day and watched Up the next-awesome flick!) and was going to work on the next one tonight before I thought

I'll be damned if I give up on the one thing I really honestly want to be good at.

Mr King has no illusions of grandeur about the actual act of writing: in his book he speaks of writers using their creativity as an excuse for their other flaws (melancholia and alcoholism amongst them) and also of muses that shit on the writer's head (long story).

One thing he stresses upon, however, is not to give up. He says stories will mostly be fun to write, but that one must not get discouraged at the tough parts, either. Because writing isn't always gonna be a bed of roses.

I stuck by my story (it was mine, after all: who else would stick by it?) and have worked on it for four hours before coming here to pour my incoherent heart out.

At the time of writing, The Last Laugh finally lies in a state of completion: not polished, yet (that shall come later) but in working condition. Readable from start to end. My baby's 6,500 words long (I was never good with estimates) and went for 18 pages of hoots when I read her over again (dunno if everyone else will like it, though).

I might not make it big for a long time to come - heck, for the rest of my life if I'm really unlucky. But right now I honestly think I wouldn't mind. Because as long as fiction, or poetry, or rambling prose (like this one) gives me as much of a kick as it did tonight, it will always be the one drug I'll need to feel truly alive.

Would rant a bit more but I need to mail her off for dad to take a print. Tomorrow I shall edit her a bit, try to keep her soul and trim off a bit of flab, and then maybe I'll post a short excerpt here for your perusal.

Thank you for reading this far. Dunno where a writer would be without his reader(s), but I'm willing to bet it would not be too happy a place.

Peace.