Well, depends on how you look at it, right? I am the eternal optimist(even in my moments of pessimism), but I'm unable to think of myself as 25 years young. I'm feeling ancient. It's been a quarter of a century since I landed on earth. For the first time in my life, I tried to postpone away my birthday. I felt no mirth and joy of being another year older. What a contrast to the time I was counting down hours and minutes to my 18th birthday.

Feeling ancient is not surprising, considering my situation. For starters, I am 2 years older than all my classmates. I feel like a wizened old cow in a stable full of young stallions. If you're going to tell me it's all in my mind, spare me the words. I've seen it in the attitude of people around me. People are just waiting for a reason to refer to my age again and again. To put it in perspective - My poor phone back in India used to splinter into a hundred pieces each time it fell down from it's perch between my ear and helmet, or from my pocket onto the road beneath a kerosene-fume-spewing autorickshaw or accidentally dropped into the lift shaft in office; each time it used to switch back on faithfully once I'd put it back on and I used to seize the opportunity to say "Nokia, man. Very sturdy". Likewise, each time I blurt out a wrong answer in class or a stupid idea, I can hear rude whispers behind me to the effect of "Oldie ya.. 1984 model" or "Old syllabus dude.. What did you expect the oldie to say??" :( I mean, :(. And I was just 24 when all this happened. And now I'm a year older.

Try as I did to postpone the inevitable, but finally did arrive my 25th birthday. Not once, but twice(one was my date of birth, and the other was according to my Hindu star). Disembodied voices on the phone boomed out congratulations and wishes on my silver-jubilee birthday. Friends on orkut and FaceBook pounded me with wishes on my birthday. Birthday emails from friends, ex-friends and ex-best-friends, ex-colleagues, etc. sure made my email inbox a cheery place. Ganeshaspeaks.com, tarotastrology.com and cyberastro.com were not to be left too far behind in wishing me and offering me their products and services for a hefty discount(only because it was my birthday, mind you!!). One of the sites gave me two gifts(We're sorry, but you have Mangal Dosha in your horoscope and Congratulations, you do not have Shani Dosha in your horoscope!! Bah. What is there to be sorry about telling me I have Mangal Dosha? I am told that Aishwarya Rai and Abhishek Bachchan too have Mangal Dosha. Don't you see, morons, that Mangal Dosha afflicts only the rich and the famous?)

Thankfully, folks at home did not rub it in too deep. My star-birthday(yeah, I'm a star!!) was celebrated with a sumptuous feast prepared by mom, delicious and creamy pink payasam by sis and crunchy bajjis by dad. A yummy choca-mocha-crunch cake kicked off my birth anniversary, followed by a sumptous feast, topped off with delicious dabeli paav from sis. Wow. In between, however, my birthday was celebrated in spectacular fashion over the interceding weekend(with rich Italian food on the first day, a boat cruise and cycle-tour the next day, punctuated with a grand pizza and topped off by stir-fresh Mongolian spead. Ooooh. Awesome. The only negative aspect was senior family members pronouncing me of marriageable age(What a load of you know what!!). That raises the next sore point.

I used to think that only girls endured impetuses towards marriage(forgive the gender profiling, but this is what I had heard and seen happening). Oh how sorely mistaken I was. A couple of weeks back, there was suddenly a spate of people asking me when I was planning to get married, when I was planning to settle down, etc. Well all those questions, encouragements and motivations just gained momentum in the light of my 25th birthday. Many people who had studied with me(sat on the same bench, read from the same book, ate from the same tiffin carrier, got runny noses from each other, got belted by the same teachers, that sort of thing) suddenly had a feeling that they were young and barely 18 while I had somehow, mysteriously overtaken them and gotten to be an old and senile 25. Just because their 25th birthday happens next month. Well, bad luck folks, I have absolutely no intention of succumbing to any such settling down in my foreseeable future(never, if I have my way). I'm too fond of a life where I get to be myself, where I'm responsible for no other, where I'm responsible to no other.

I had seriously considered giving myself a special gift for my birthday(being the gadget freak that I am), but somehow I lost the drive to actually go and indulge myself. I have sunken into this feeling where I am content at just looking at the devices online. Hope I will get over this abnormality pretty soon. Well, on that note, I have stepped into the 26th year of my illustrious existence on this planet. May I have many more birthdays, complete with cakes and feasts and bajjis and dabeli pavs, may I have all of these and much more friends to remind me of my birthday every year and may this blog last to see more of my birthdays. Amen.

There were a couple of posts brewing about my new shiny black iPod touch, violin, etc. but they will have to remain in the pipeline just yet. For, friendship day is here. Friendship day was never in the grand scheme of things. By never, I mean never. Therefore, justified that I did not even keep track of the comings and goings of Friendship day. But the triennial inundation of my gmail inbox has just taken place via orkut and facebook(not that I'm complaining. Far from it!!), and this time around, I'm compelled to write a post on it. In spite of my favourite hobby(procrastination), this post has to be started, completed and posted today itself, or else it has to wait for another year, I guess. So iPod and violin, we'll get to you e-v-e-n-t-u-a-l-l-y. Fret not.

Friendship day was a rage during school days. We planned for it weeks ahead. Filched money for cards and friendship bands(Kids nowadays are so lucky. Electronic cards and electronic friendship bands). I don't know about you, but I managed to make more enemies than friends each year on friendship day. Most of the reasons for this phenomenon were beyond my control. Once it was because I had totally forgotten the day(I'm very very bad with remembering occasions) and sauntered into school the day after, oblivious to the long glares flashing at me from all sides. Yes, I had forgotten to make the customary midnight calls(I hate the guy(or gal) who made up this stupid tradition of wishing people at midnight. When you could be snug and sleeping.). God knows how many friends-lists and best-friends-lists my name got struck of that time. I had to identify all offended parties(You know. Whoever scowled when they saw me) and pacify them. The effort took me most of the year until the next friendship day was here to catch me unawares.

The other reason was totally beyond my control. I did remember friendship day in advance and even got some friendship bands with money filched from Mom's secret stash. The nut who ran the fancy store was unable to give me friendship bands all in the same color, so I got bands in two different colors. Yeah you guessed it. People thought they were color-coded and I earned myself some fresh enemies. Phew. So much for all my efforts. Thankfully, soon after, all the guys grew up out of that phase(of celebrating Friendship Day, Left-handers' Day, Right-handers' day, etc). Of course, not many of the girls grew out of that phase. Tempers still fray over missed friendship day greetings, missed womens' day greetings, etc. Some smart guy came up with an idea to circumvent the irritated-female problem. Every "day" celebration was converted into a week-long celebration. You know, friendship week, womens' week, fools' week. Phew. Gave us some breathing time.

Personally, this concept of having a separate day to celebrate every single concept of life has never appealed to me. I find the whole idea so frivolous. The way I see it, I don't need a whole day to come by, just to appreciate the people in my life. I don't need a day to remind me of how drab the world would have been without left handers. I don't need a day to remind me of teachers who treated me as their favourite punching bag and smashed my knuckles to pulp. I don't need a day to remind me how valuable a role my cell-phone or laptop plays in my life. I think of, appreciate and thank God for all that every single day of my life.

But still, I know you're all yearning to hear it, so here goes !! (drums rolling)HAPPY FRIENDSHIP DAY!!

PS: Commenters earn an extra friendship band. Offer valid for a week only!!(Last-ditch attempt to get more silent readers to comment, tee hee :D)

Me..

Aspiring computer scientist. Aspiring writer. Aspiring Nat Geo traveler. Aspiring musician. Aspiring pilot. Aspiring chef. Yes, I'm constantly growing up.

Hits..

Friends of this blog

Copyright 2009 - The Yarn Factory

Blogspot Theme designed by: Ray Creations, Ray Hosting.