This was meant to be my first post on this blog – back in June 2006. Somehow I thought it was too personal. And I was not sure whether I wanted the blog to be funny, or informative …or diary-like… or just plain therapeutic. My earlier posts were full of vitriol targeted at certain group and individuals alike. I tried to minimize the diary type entries since. But yesterday morning, something happened. Actually it happened the night before.
I check a few blogs (of friends, their girlfriends, their friends etc etc) every night.
This entry by Apoorva was interesting. Maybe she also felt the way I did and that’s what prompted the disclaimer. I liked the honesty… although I believe that there’s more to that story than mentioned.
The next morning, while I was getting ready for work I had
THE RIVER playing on the stereo. It’s an album that used to be a morning staple a few years ago… and it continues to be one of my favourite albums till date. All went perfectly well till
Independence Day began… and a wave of memories swept over me. The next 18 hours was spent in that same wave.
I came to Bombay in Oct 1999 from Coonoor, my hometown. Fed up with life in a small, sleepy and overbearing town… I wanted out. I grew up sharing a fantastic relationship with my parents… my father especially. As I got older and developed a rationale of my own, things got less peaceful. On the good days, we were like buddy-friends. On the bad days, he was surely suppressing feelings of punching me… and I punching the wall. See, the problem was that we were too much of the same kind. Our arguments were bizarre and unnecessary. Insults, sweeping general statements… all these were traded in good measures. After graduating, I decided to take a year off, stay home (misstep) and prepare for an MBA (entrance exam). At 21 and a few months, I was urging to break out… I discovered new music… was in love… and also saw the family going though some financial woes. My sitting home, eating like a pig, pumping my way into an old T shirt and watering the garden every evening was not adding to anything.
It is during those months that I realized how much I wanted to get out of that town. I would work out every day with rusted dumbells in my room, the music blaring into the misty Coonoor evenings through my open windows, just trying to lose steam. And the fights would not stop. Under one roof – my dad and I were like Tommy Lee and Kid Rock. Trump and Rosie.
Finally I made up my mind. A buddy put me on to someone who promised me an interview with his boss … if I made that trip to Bombay. And so I did. I borrowed money from my brother, packed a few clothes and a couple of CDs and was on my way. I remember feeling really sad. Sad that maybe I was not leaving home for the right reason or in the right frame of mind. But I was relieved to be free. To be independent.
In Bombay, I moved into a friend’s run-down pad by the fisherfolk’s village. The stench was horrible. It was not great at all… but it felt good. His energy, his friends… their passion for work and their struggle was so endearing. I borrowed his clothes, shoes and tie for my interview – and landed the job. An 8000 Rupee salary in 1999 was no good. Especially if 1500 bucks went in taxes and 500 bucks went for the Kargil Relief fund. 2500 bucks went for rent – and 3500 bucks didn’t last long. Long walks to wherever I wanted to go, jeans and shoes from distant factory outlets and export rejects, … one meal a day, samaosa paav for dinner… a year just went by like that. But I felt good. I had 4 shirts I wore to work – John (white), Paul (pink), Ringo (light blue) and George (beige). I wore my college-day T shirts on Friday. Washed them all on Saturday and wore them all over again. But sometimes George beat Paul and John to Monday. I moved out of Razy’s place after a month to stay as a PG with a catholic family at the Santa Cruz Railway Colony. They gave me a deewan to sleep on – I had a PG-mate too. Vikram, the budding film-maker slept in the balcony. He used to tell me it as a sight to watch me sleep on that deewan – with my legs dangling (knee downwards)!! Actually, it was a sight to watch him sleep in the balcony. In drapes made of blue tarp. I was asked to leave that place after 6 months for coming in drunk one night and silently falling by the door. I was glad to leave actually. This bastard used to insist that I do my laundry on Saturday mornings at 6:00am so that I could use the running water instead of the stored water in the tank. 6am on a Saturday. Imagine. He had a dog called Dinku that had a particular fondness for my shoes. And his 3 year old son was the reincarnation of Lucifer himself. Often I used to think – is this why I fucking left Coonoor?
Anyway, back to the point - there was nothing we (my father and I) did or said that could change what happened – but the distance helped us develop our friendship again.
I was borrowing heavily from Avinash every month-end… if was funny actually. Every 25th, I’d borrow 500 bucks and pay him on 1st when I got my pay. One day, he surprised me… when I opened my office drawer to find
BRUCE SPRINGSTEEN & THE E STREET BAND (LIVE 1975-1985). I paid him for this in installments over 5 months. I borrowed (yes. I shamelessly borrowed everything) a CD player from our division secretary to listen to the 3 CD album over weekends. This may sound stupid to today’s kids (‘music loving kids’) who just have access to stuff at their fingertips thanks to the internet. Anyway, there was a certain romance in longing for an album displayed in stores. Saving up to buy the music was a way of life for me. Food and grooming became secondary.
That weekend, I discovered the real Bruce Springsteen. On disc 2… there was a track called
Independence Day. Expecting it to be a jingoistic fist-thumping American war-cry, I let it play. It was anything but that. Bruce had a shaky relationship with his old man… and this song was about that… and whatever I wrote earlier.
It was my life in that song and the pain in his voice was mine. After months of holding on… I let go.
The E Street Band in the late 70's: L to R - Mighty Max Weinberg, The Big Man - Clarence Clemons, The Boss, Professor Roy Bittan, Miami Steven Van Zandt, Garry W Tallent and Phantom Dan. Only Clarence, Bruce, Garry and Dan were around when the E Street Band was first formed.
The band as we have grown to love, in 2007 - Danny, Max, Nils, Roy, Big Man, Bruce, Patti, Little Steven, Garry
