Dogs

Dogs are fantastic creatures.They are most expressive among all living species.If you are observant enough,you can decipher every bark,every wag,every howl and every wink.Unlike humans, who often hoodwink with their appearance and expressions,and cats who are skepticism FELINI-fied.Cats are great at only expression that could be produced by a mix of every kind of doubts one could have about others actions .There had been a continuous presence of dog in my household as pet.But the pet dogs belong to a different faction that to their street dwelling brethren.They are educated and sophisticated in their approach and demeanor and often lazy and friendly like my pet who allowed cats to eat from his bowl and did not bark until he is going through a nightmare.He would emit a muffled bark then,and would spring up all alert when we broke out laughing around him.He,perhaps,was the only DREAMER born among his species.And to my surprise,as i discovered a little later in my life,there is a dog equivalent of every kind of humans we come across in life.You look for a bully,its there.A brute barbarian,every street has one.A conniving DOGA-gouge,a prophet,a truant,a spokes-person/DOG,a forgetful semi-lunatic,they are all there.There was a barbarian there dwelling in the only street that connected my house to the corner store.He used to chase everything,living and non-living alike,fearful kids crossing the street and fearless stones pelted at him, by kids from a safe distance.One awful day he chased me.I ran,fell,and he was all over me till I cried in horror and he left with an expression as if saying,"what the heck!I did not even nip you".But revenge was the only way against this humiliation and almost mutilation.I bought rat poison,and fed it to him in some sweets.The notorious kid of my neighborhood was my mercenary agent,who dared to walk the street and throw the sweet at him when he came running for his flesh.He ate it at once and I monitored him for hours to writhe in pain and howl and die eventually, from a safe vantage point,which never happened, until I realized that the shop-keeper has to be killed first.A human should at least be decent enough to sell unadulterated poisons.The incident had got etched in my memory and ran vividly inside my head after I recently encountered a gang of four in mid-night when I was coming back from work.The street was all silent and life-less until that awful fellow raised the first growl and in a split second they were four in numbers.Before my conscious reaction,goosebumps were all over my body and a deep chill all along my spine.I got my senses back to realize only three of them were barking at me.The fourth one was standing with no interest at all in the proceedings.All the expressive elements,which usually are there on a dog's face,were null and void,at his.It took the observant human in me by surprise and I looked at others.The loudest among them was barking with his nose pointing to the sky.He too had no interest in me in particular but he was venting out expletives and allegations on humans as a whole on the behalf of dogs.In between his barking he took confused pauses like a newly appointed spokesperson of a political party who has recently started facing lime light after six decades of his obscure life.Next among them was most contriving creature I have come across in my life.He was emitting a ferocious growl and was appearing restless to jump and tear my limbs apart but when I looked into his eyes,he started wagging his tail.He perhaps was a re-incarnation of a political leader who had always won enough number of seats in his previous life to get a good bargain in coalition.And he perhaps could not hold his inner compulsive temptation to bargain this compromising situation.The third one was perhaps their leader,as others were looking to him every time they paused in between their bark .He was growling at a steady and intense dog-pitch but did not clear his stand that he would let me go or bite my butt as soon as I turn to go on my way.A little later,he perhaps got disappointed,seeing his colleague wag at me and he eventually left after few minutes without looking at his other mates and so did others.I walked the rest of the street turning back intermittently to ensure safety of my posterior.

Today I met a prophet who was meditating in the shade underneath the boot of a car.He was disturbed by two bullies who ran and stopped near him,growling.He lifted his face calmly and looked at them.There was a serenity,contaminated by slight annoyance, on his face saying,"shut the fuck up!".


Piktru says-"Humans try a lot to improve the breeds of dogs.But they never improved theirs beyond the crooked existing one. "

The apology

"Hullo".He replied in a half-conscious slumberous tone.He had returned after a long and boring day at work.He had never liked his job and had always suffered undesired stress and physical exhaustion at the end of the day.It had introduced untimely naps in his daily schedule.Whenever he forgot to switch off his cell ,some unknown sense of urgency had made him to answer the call if it was from an unknown number.
"Hullo?"came the reply.He recognized the voice at once.While he was trying to regain his senses,he heard it again with the exact tone of question mark embedded in it.He replied in his normal and never-changing habit of asking-"How are you?" as it was the first thing he had always liked to know whenever they talked.He had never expected this call to become a reality,at least for rest of his life.His conscious part was hit by an ad-hoc emergency to tackle with, and was running amuck in order to decide what,how,where to start."I am alright",he heard.Though he was in a state of pandemonium,he felt the attached sadness in her voice.There was a hint of smothered inability to hide the guilt in the reply and that made a part of him badly disturbed.There was a long pause from both sides and the first sense of complete consciousness came to his ears,which had gradually turned hot and probably red,beyond his control."so...",unable to find anything else, he uttered in order to break the silence."I am sorry", he heard the words clearly.He could not sense the feeling in the reply as the memories of past had deluged his mind.She had disappeared six month ago without any message.He had tried everything in his reach to find what had happened.His calls went unanswered then her number went invalid and perhaps his mails ended up in a junk pile.It had taken him immense strength to come out of the agony of some unknown guilt.That pain resurfaced unannounced and turned into violent outburst eventually.
"Do you really feel that way.Forget about feeling that way,do you have even a part of spirit left intact in you to feel anything at all."I-AM-SORRY",how easy is it to say.I admire that at least you have some decency left in you to pronounce it.Do you have any idea how I have felt all these days.You left a lacuna in me and it had almost gnawed my soul.I did not deserve the apathy you inflicted on me.But perhaps i was a non-existent, useless mite to you which deserved no consideration.But then why you called me?Are you listening?Do you understand what I am saying?"
"Yes but what is gnaw?",came the reply drenched with innocence and piety of curiosity."What?",he could not believe if it really came as a reply.Before he could contemplate it further he broke out laughing hysterically.He heard a faint broken familiar chuckle on phone.It had always set him upbeat in the past and it was his subconscious yearning to hear it again.It wiped the bruises of suffering off his psyche.He heard a sound of door bell in backdrop of their talk."you will get me killed someday for a joke like this.Somebody is on you door.Go,I ll catch you soon"."I don't hear anybody.You are turning crazy.",He heard it backed with a grin.The door bell rang louder followed by a wild knock on the door.He sprang out of his bed and hit the wall fiercely with his head.Concussion brought him out of the sleep.His roommate was at the door.His cell phone was lying quietly beside the pillow.SWITCHED-OFF!

Piktru says- Idiocy of any form,subconscious or otherwise, finally hits the wall!

The anklet

'I have never experienced anything like this before in my life',I heard my brother saying.He was talking to my uncle and apparently to my mother who was busy making tea.His attempts to include me among audience had failed after his several iterations of 'IT-IS-SO-REAL' and 'IT-IS-SPOOKY' kind of loud statements near my bed.I had no habitof bargaining my good-morning sleep with anything less than a rich tea.Mom had just announced that it was ready.Idea of a cup of hot tea defeated the torpor state of my mind and I was out of bed, when I heard this statement.Different faculties of my brain were still adjusting to the newly awaken state.'It was well past midnight',he had added the next statement to his talk.I was sitting among his listeners now.I had never witnessed him being serious in life.But today he was or at least he was acting serious.'I clearly saw her.It was the female ghost.''You know,' I cut him short'you have a career in management'.Suddenly I was the centre of the stares.NOW-WHERE-DID-THIS-COME-FROM.'Well,you are talking darn crap and you are serious about it',I explained my prediction with a sarcasm sodden smile.'I do see somebody as a Bihar Police constable.Who else can have such visionary deductions.' Before I finished the first sip of tea,he had returned my comment.I experienced, first ever in my life, that words too can cause concussion.My brother had just demonstrated his ability to do so.A constable was a bad exchange against a manager. Under unavoidable circumstances,I can talk crap with conviction but I can never negotiate a bribe in broad day light.I imagined myself potbellied standing outside a police station chewing tobacco.I almost spat the tea out at the thought of tobacco. My brother had finished his story of how he bumped in to the notorious female ghost. It had happened last dark-street-lamp-less night when he was returning from the
play rehearsal in which he was playing an honest police inspector.Perhaps his roleplay was the spark behind his derogatory attack against my sarcasm.My brother was the best reader of my expressions.He apologised for his remark and declared,'I can prove what I said' and walked out.I was relieved by his apology but more perplexed by 'what he'll prove and how?'.He returned nearly an hour later with a victorious smile on his face which faded slowly by seeing amusing grin on our faces.Trying to figure out the reason behind our amusement and regain his confidence,he pulled out something from his pocket.It was an anklet.'Look,this was there at the place where I bumped in to her.'
Laughter burst out.I saw the formation of wrinkles on his forhead,upward twist of eyebrows,broadening and upward shrinking of his nose simultaneously.His expression of obfuscation,if recorded,would have served as a chapter in comical acting.Just after he had left home in search of proof,our domestic help had brought the news that a girl from the neighbourhood had bumped into a walking skeleton last night.She had hurt her knee badly and lost her anklet in the process and was yet to recover from the shock of this ghostly encounter.A local exorcist was invited to treat her.


Piktru says 'Ghosts are not superstitious,they don't believe in humans!'

Love at first sight

I was visibly happy.This was my first trip to a hill station ever.I was in the first year of my under-graduate studies.Four days leave in a row had given me a long awaited chance to explore the places nearby.Even though last football game had put me in same category to my rickety village bus,whose every part except horn, made noise when it moved.Every bone,ligament,muscle and whatnot of my body were in a rude shock. They had a happy life being organs of a sloth.But last evening the sloth had suddenly re-incarnated as David Beckham(minus his looks and soccer skills).Every part of my body was sending a DON'T-DO-IT-AGAIN signal in form of varying degree of pain.But a part of me was parallel-ly happy.A non-stop sequence of picturesque imagination and fantasies about hill stations,which had been accrued by my super sub-conscious brain,were to culminate.We left in afternoon bunking the post lunch session.The place from where we had to catch the bus was terribly hot.We had to travel whole night to reach the place.When I inquired about the fare of the journey,my friend replied that an air conditioned bus would cost 1500 bucks for two way journey.I had 1400 bucks in my pocket,my budget for the trip or the remaining pocket money for the month.He read the expression on my face and added 'however a corporation bus costs as little as 70 bucks each way'.I was as relieved as if I got an unoccupied loo at the purge-threshold of bowel pressure.After an hour of wait,during which my friend explained the geography of the place,the bus arrived.It looked like a distant cousin of my village bus.But the price tag had left it as only available option.

I woke up to an incomprehensible sound.By the time i regained my senses, I realized that it was the sound of bus engine.It was a mechanical cry equivalent to that of an over-loaded donkey. The bus had started its uphill journey.My friend was lying unconscious on the adjacent seat,his head resting over my shoulder and mouth awkwardly open.First kodak moment from a borrowed camera.The view outside surpassed my imagination and every turn at the hair-pin bends resurrected the vestiges of a believer in an atheist.God would have been momentarily happy to get a new recruit in his army of followers who was to quit after few more such bends.Next time I woke up wondering if I am in a freezer.My Jacket which I had put on a few hours back was proving to be of no use.My friend was lying in the same position,the only change being two layers of sweaters and a jacket on his bone dominant physique.'MEAN',the word echoed in my head audible enough to my ears.After two more hours of unyielding attempts to keep myself warm by folding hands,rubbing them, folding legs nearest
possible to my body, we finally reached.Immediately after coming out of bus,I felt a tremendous pressure on my bladder.I contemplated the idea of giving the poor thing a release.A sound from inside warned-'Be careful,the water may freeze before it sees the exit'.Peeing was postponed for a safer environment.I was shivering badly with every part of my body under independent convulsive movements.After nearly five minutes of walk, we reached his house.It was a small beautiful house properly heated inside.I was as relieved as a victim just rescued from a snow avalanche.While providing much awaited relief to my bladder,I rephrased an old quote,'Home is where the warmth is '.After gobbling on breakfast,we retired to the comforts a carefully laid bed.

I got up at 3 in afternoon to know that my friend has just gone out for some work and was to be back after some two hours.I freshened up,rejected aunt's request for lunch as breakfast was heavy enough to keep my system at work till evening and ventured out to the botanical garden.'It's proximity to the house could not challenge my navigational ability',I had reckoned when I arrived here in morning.
There was a nominal admission charge. It was a beautiful place. A vast spread of carefully manicured lawn at entry was followed areas densely covered with variety of trees.There were several flower exhibits with some exotic breeds, incomprehensible botanical name being displayed next to them.I was curiously looking here and there like a villager accidentally dropped in a swanky city mall.My knowledge of flowers was confined to roses and marigolds and jasmine (which every single woman in this part of our country used to wear in their hair locks).Hence surprise was natural.I was mooching around for an hour now observing people and surrounding equally.The cold weather forced me to feel my bladder again and I was on a look out for a secluded place.I walked along a way paved with with stones and lined both sides by pine trees.It took me to another part of the garden,equally beautiful but more serene due to conspicuous absence of people.I noticed a few people sitting on pew here and there,some reading,some just sitting and staring in blank.And there I saw her, sitting alone under a tree and reading some book.Her beauty had left me dumbfound.My brain corrected the existing image of the angel it had by removing the wings as this girl had none.Time had stopped but I kept walking with my eyes fixed on her.I sensed the vexation in her eyes when she returned back my stare.My facial muscles were quick in producing a fake and considerably embarrassed smile.I heard her saying something in return with a plain smile on her face.It took me a few minutes to realize that my, so far malnutrition-ed Venus, had suddenly received a testosterone shot and was flexing its muscles.when I regained my senses,I found myself in an area where I could pee in peace.A part of my subconscious was busy training me on 'How to produce a perfect romantic look with a charming smile?'.This was the only occasion in my life,when my stare had gained me a smile in reply.I was dead set to say her 'hi',with the practiced smile and romance in eyes, on my way back.I did it and this time I remembered every syllable of that word she uttered again.Her smile was already etched in photo folder of my brain.I was smiling and crooning all the way back to my friend's house.He was waiting for me with her mom in the living room.They were a little puzzled to see my unusual cheerful smile.As I ensconced on the couch,it's spring made a sound similar to that of a wind-release in fifth harmonic.The smile on my face was instantly replaced by an embarrassment.I involuntarily had taken the couch's fault on me.A few moments later romance seized back my mood.The word, which the girl had said in reply to my 'hi',echoed in my head.Unable to hold my curiosity,I asked my friend what did that mean.There was a transitory silence before her mom asked,'who taught you this?'.'A girl replied to my 'hi'',I was to admit blushingly.There was a big grin on her face and she left the room saying she would bring some tea for us.
'ASSHOLE',I heard my friend,who was quiet and expressionless so far, saying with a muffled laugh.
'What I did?'
'That's what the word means.'

All the processes running inside my head went to a sudden halt.My brain added back the severed wings to angel's image,when it resumed working.


Piktru wonders 'Had Newton been resting under the apple tree in the garden of Eden,what would have been the laws of attracion?'

Rain dance

Monsoon is believed to bring wonderful time.It inspires romance and gives a few romantics a chance to live fancy bollywood songs in reality.But it gives unscalable frustration to people like me, locked in home due to flooded roads and floating garbage (a common scene in ill evolved indian cities).After three days of undesired recluse due to incessant rain,I went to see my buddy.His bright and cheerful face added confusion to my existing state of frustration.'How damn can this chap be happy in a cursed weather like this',i was ruminating the idea.'Oye,do you like the rain??',I heard him saying.He got half his answer in my twisted eye-brows.'I mean, do you like bathing in rain?'.'I prefer a shower in bathroom as bathing is not a seasonal phenomena to me',I grinned.A few natural expletives fell on my ear-drums before he changed the context.Three days later,I got the answer to this Rain-Bath-Puzzle.The girl next door to my friend's used to dance on terrace oblivious of the presence of a newly monsoon born romantic.Two days hence,my friend got this enlightening fact that the show was intended for a guy living three terraces ahead of the girl's.He woke up to an obnoxious odor of floating garbage and irritating rain that day for the maiden time during that monsoon.A few more expletives,not intended for me,were enough to compensate his one sided wounded heart and unyielding flu he had caught during Bath-cum-Dance sessions.We heard a faint intonation of 'Rain rain go away...' from next room.His little niece was practising the rhyme.The expression on his face was unexplainable in words.An uncontrollable grin appeared on my face and expletives knocked on my ear drums,this time well intended for me.

Piktru says:: Good times are around the corner but the corner is little too far.