Churning

Sometimes it takes just one brief call  to shatter your cool from someone you might recall marginally as a friend, since s/he has long ceased to figure in your life. S/he has merged with the more oblivious part of your memory and to be disturbed so suddenly rankles because the familiarity of the person's tone is indeed irksome. There are commitments you have made, you have moved on ... s/he is not expected to know all that, but you expect the person to familiarize him/herself before being back-thumping close, suddenly and out of the blue.

My cool and composure was shattered this morning when from the obscure oblivion's deep someone I once knew called. 
He had bad luck and marriage; had a fall or two from grace, but he rose again Phoenix-like, every time. In the bargain he had lost once or twice what may be called sanity  which had made him impose himself on people near him, like his wife and so on.  And he had regained his sanity in parts but his anger remained. 
I was not so close to him as, I imagine, his wife might have been, so when he called this morning to announce that he "was coming home" to meet me I found myself unprepared. I declined to see him. Perhaps he was committed mentally, expecting  things to be  just as they were in the past when we bachelors could call on friends as we pleased.  But we are not bachelors anymore. We are middle aged house holders with stricter priorities, more allowing for the needs of our dear ones than our own, let alone of some near total, almost mysteriously vanished, stranger.
I declined and hung up, trying not to feel guilty but he called again. He insisted on coming to visit, making me the more resolute in my refusal to see him. He was angry and hurt, I could sense it in his voice on the phone, but we hung up with him threatening to gate crash and me preparing to call security in case he did.
There I left it and before retiring to siesta at about 2.15, I told Anasuya, our domestic help, that in case a chap shows up at the door at three, she should tell him that I was resting. 
At 4.30 I asked Anasuya whether he had come. He hadn't, she said.  
I sighed, hoping that the matter had ended, that it was a false alarm or a bluff. But it was far from finished. Something of a pang of guilt did stir things up deep within me and my mind began churning. I had to get rid of it, hence this blog.

***

 Much was going on in my mind with the play 'Revolutionaries', with the character of Lenin that I was going to be playing had we gone through the tardy production process to perform, but we have shelved it and so I must write about it to exorcise the ghost:

Since everything has been discussed regarding my need as an actor, since judgements have been passed, I suffice it to say that I wanted to do the play BECAUSE I WANTED to and now I am out of it BECAUSE I WANT to. As for the rest, I do not have the motivation to change things I can not. I have the strength to accept the stubbornly unchanging. I mean, there are so many things about life that I wish were not as they are, but that does not make me cease to live. I accept it, thereby living gratefully the rest that is worth living for. Besides, I do not want to pretend to be so affected by a play that I did not care much about. Goes without saying that theatre, par say, is not the whole of my life. What is one bad play, right?

***

Good news is that we will soon be doing a Shaffer. 'Black comedy' will be scheduled in Jan to perform in April. We have a tentative plan to travel with it to Mumbai and Delhi, Bangalore...I don't know.

*** 

Another good thing is that I am glad I saw Hema, a clairvoyant who told me that it is best to shift to sculpting in stone. This is good news because it sort of made sense. I had bought a bit of red clay to start moulding hollow, to build figures with clay.

Guess I was fighting against 'giving up' painting. I enjoy drawing more than painting and deep deep down I knew this. But the refusal to accept a certain incapacity to enjoy something got me to pull all sorts of veils and wool over my eyes. I was refusing to see the simple fact of going by the aggregate of being happy at the end of an exercise whether I liked it or not. 

Drawing and sculpting are more akin than are painting and drawing. If I do what I enjoy doing then it should not matter whether I paint or sculpt. After all, we live for the joy of living, don't we? 

***

Oh, but before I sign off here is a tip:-

Walk or exercise as much as you can without overdoing it and eat greens. Reduce sodium intake and quit smoking. 

As for alcohol, a peg not everyday, too, keeps the doctor away!