Rafa Says...

Right now I don't think if I am No. 1 or I am No. 5.... I am Rafa, and I go to every tournament to try to play well and to try to be competitive and win as many matches as I can.  For me, important thing is that I feel that I play well, feel that I am competitive to try to win everybody.  And when we finish the season, we will see where I gonna be, no?

-Rafael Nadal

Substitute tennis with life, and it's the best philosophy you can find. Actually attempt to do so, finding exact parallels and all that, and you'll end with up with something that could be out of a crappy self-help book. And most self-help books are crappy, with tall claims, threadbare philosophies, rhetoric, and vague instructions of how to live your life that you wouldn't know how to translate into your day.

This, however... you see, it ain't a morsel thrown to us mortals from someone who has achieved inner peace, or what ever said book is preaching. It is a very real struggle, of a very real person, to try to play well, to give his all to his tennis, to each match, to each game, each point. To find satisfaction, to find life in that struggle. 

To me, Rafa is proof, that it can be done: that you can enjoy what you are doing, that every day deserves your best and that you can give that best every single day, even when it is not your day. That you can keep fighting when you are down, that a struggle need not be tedious, that you can win said struggle, if you persevere. 

That it doesn't matter, what the world labels you. You are yourself (oh, 'I am Rafa' sooo sounds better), and you decide what is truly important to you. You define your own victories and defeats, and you can be happy, as you go about reaching said victories.

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No, it doesn't come easy to me, this living by the day. My mind is clouded by fear of the future, by spectres of the past. But as my Rafa battles the hard-court season, I shall fight my own battle: to live my life, to push aside my demons--fear and guilt and laziness, to do what I love, to enjoy what I do.

'And when I finish this semester, we will see where I gonna be, no?'

'Tis the little things...

This morning, ma crept out of the house for work, and I darted out the door to catch her: "bye, ma!" She turned to look at me, smiling, and I blew her the one-finger kiss that is hers and mine. Well, it was mine, before. For daddy, for jiji, for those I love. But as she looked at me, one hand arrested at the handle of the main gate, I realized that it was ma who knows the trust and adoration that comes with it, ma who understands that it's special. At that moment, it became ours.

She had to leave, of course, and as I stood at the gate, carefully making sure that her smile stayed put, I felt a child-like glee at lifting my ma's spirits.

That lil' goodbye had me smiling the entire morning. A feat unaccomplished by any momentous news, be it acceptance into CS at BITS Pilani, Hyderabad, or any nine point whatever CGPA.

2 July, 2010


Darkness was gathering from behind grey cloud, and I was hurrying home from my walk. There was this bandi in my way, and as I stepped aside, I remembered another beside our school, the old man would sell guavas sprinkled with some mixture of salt and red pepper. A closer look told me it was lemons, not extra-yellow guavas that this old man was selling.
There was no rush of students around him; just a little girl squealing that she wanted one too, and her elder sister, who teasingly advised patience before she skipped away with hers. The old man, clad in that typical white shirt, blue-checked dhoti, and matching pagdi, cigarette in his mouth, smiled indulgently, as he carefully cut a perfectly yellow lemon into four not-yet-separated pieces and added his salt-n-pepper mix. I caught his eye--he chuckled something about kids--then stole a look at the beaming girl.  She returned my smile, willing me to share in her joy, so pure in its innocence, and the happiness swelling in my bosom was almost painful, certainly more that I could bear. I abruptly looked away and directed swift steps homeward.

Happy is the Sunday...

I am not usually a happy person: I belong to that category of people that cannot be happy unless we try very hard at it. Somehow, though, Sundays manage to sneak past that barrier. It is not because I do not have to go to College or where-ever. No, there is a sense of purpose, of meaning in having no obligations to anyone but myself that translates into a quiet, bubbling happiness.

In campus, my Sunday always begins with breakfast. Or a walk, if I wake up early enough; I just put on my ipod, and I’m off at a brisk pace. Breakfast is always leisurely. Sometimes, my friends join me, and it is cheerful conversation over good food. Mostly, though, I’m on my own, to savour hot dosas, hot milk, and a boiled egg, in that order –I always save the best for the last. It is a happy beginning to the day, and after that, whether I find my book, my laptop, or my friends, and even if, nay, when I find boredom in the afternoon, everything is right with my world.

It is, of course, a different story at home. I sleep in, for once. When I do wake up, I find my happiness not in the solitude that makes campus-mornings mine, but in the bosom of my family. I am, as a rule, not one who goes out of the way to seek company. And on a given day, you’ll find us all- dad, ma, jiji, and me- immersed in our own work. But there is a charm on Sundays, when everyone’s at home and with nothing particular to do, and everybody drifts to the hall. It is not a boisterous gathering. Laughter is only in short bursts. Hell, there are times when all of us are silent. No, everything is much more subtle. You see, whether I am quietly reading the newspaper, or animatedly debating something with jiji and ma and dad, there is this sense of belonging, this warmth enveloping me, this je ne sais quoi about the Sunday afternoons and evenings, and a butterfly-happiness settles somewhere in my breast.