Wouldn’t it be cool if our life worked the way it does in cartoons?

I enjoyed watching cartoons as a kid. Now I have a 3 year old and I am watching lots of them and reruns of every episode more than a thousand times each. But surprisingly I enjoy them even today. Now when I watch them I cannot help but realize that physics works differently in cartoons.

Characters can walk on air, as long as they are not reminded of the situation. If they fall, they make their body impression in the ground or if it is water they go into the depths and float back with a smile on their face. Even if they are injured it is okay because they recover in a second. The characters pass through otherwise impenetrable barriers and hot peppers really do make smoke come out of their ears. Wouldn't it be cool if our world worked that way too?

I am a big fan of Pixar. It takes a lot of creative thinking and fresh perspective to come up with such great stories. I wish I remembered my dreams on the cartoon characters, I could have proudly read my son the stories authored by me. Watching so many cartoons these days I think I can come up with a few of my own!

I started wondering how it would be if the laws of Newton and Einstein changed to those of Hanna and Barbara (Producers of the Tom and Jerry show). Just imagine the laws of gravity working in coherence with emotions and intuition and negated by fear. One can run and almost fly without their feet touching to the ground when in a hurry, flight does not depend on mass of the body, can perforate solid walls at will. I would happily become a James Bond successor and work in some special rescue missions with super natural (or should I say cartoon) powers without getting hurt.

Life would be more exaggerated and funny so that the fantasy while still illogical makes sense. People would not look dull but idiotic. The innumerable and utterly complex emotions like happiness, sadness, anger, surprise, and disgust can be clearly expressed with different faces. Life would be less painful or mostly painless; you would get solutions to the problems in a blink, resolve differences with people around you in a moment. I could use all the emoticons shown in cartoons in my real life to express what I feel in different situations with out having to say a word!

The view from my kitchen window

My kitchen window has a beautiful view. For a while now I have looked outside several times but hardly paid attention to the beauty of the scene lying ahead. My three year old started school this September. I struggle every morning preparing breakfast, packing lunch, getting him ready, and sending him to school all in 45 minutes time. I don’t have enough time to relish my morning coffee.

One morning, the last week of September I guess, I woke up thinking that it is another morning with the same routine. I wanted some fresh air and opened up the window. It was 8.00am. One look out of my window changed everything. The golden hue of the Sun peeking over the tree in my front yard on the wall next to the window was so beautiful. It was a calm and pleasant morning. A lush green lawn with the serenity of a landscape, the freshness in the air and the cold breeze awakened my spirits.

I lived in this house for almost two years now. But it felt like a new revelation to me. I made it a point to open the window first thing I entered the kitchen everyday. I never liked cooking and cleaning dishes. But now I don’t mind so much as I have some thing great to look at while doing so. The scene changes everyday with the changing seasons. Some times it is bright and sunny; some times it is foggy or cloudy.

Some changes are very gradual and yet other things happen in just a few days. With the approach of fall, I started looking every morning for the changing colors of leaves. The slow rustle of the fallen leaves with a cold breeze is marvelous. The morning’s delight, birds perching, squirrels going up and down the tree, it is a sheer joy to see.

As I see the leaves fall it felt so nice, a few yellow leaves here and there on the green lawn. But with in a couple of days the lawn gets filled with leaves, it looks so crowded. I thought that my mood swings the same way! Some time the days are just so pleasant and happy. But things around me, the happenings in my life, start bothering me and my mind becomes crowded like my lawn. But then my gardener came and cleaned up the rubble. Now I have a clean lawn again.

The lesson learnt is no matter how bad our minds get clogged with lots of things there will be some thing or some one like my gardener who will help clean it up and make it all nice and beautiful again. All said and done life is beautiful. We need to stop and look at it to enjoy its beauty!

Can I handle the seasons of my life?

I was watching a movie and the title of this blog is from the lyrics of a song from that movie. Tears dropped from my eyes as I heard the song. Especially this line was very touching. Well, normally I would have appreciated the lyrics but since I am going through some ups and downs it felt miserable.

This was a few months ago. The moment I finished the movie I opened a word doc and gave it the title. Had I written this blog at that point of time it would have been a real tear jerker! Some thing came up and I did not get a chance to write it. I started thinking, will I be able to write it to the same extent after the moment has passed. I don’t think so.

Why is it that when we are happy we do not recall how bad our past was? And when we are sad all the past memories become fresh. It seems like I have been sad for long enough to remember the last best thing that happened in my life. And now I don’t even know if I am sad or happy. I guess the worst part of the day is when I am all by myself.

I tried doing some new things to keep myself busy but at least for a few minutes I try to think what I am doing with my life and it all comes back. Actually my life is not that bad. I had worst moments before and to my surprise I handled them well. But when ever some thing new comes up, it feel so hard, everything comes to a stand still, and questions my ability to handle the situation.

Can I handle the seasons of my life? I am good at handling the good ones like accomplishments (obviously). I am slowly mastering the bad ones but every other hit seems like a bigger one. I know there is much more to face in life and this is just the beginning. Some thing which has not happened yet should not hurt you but the thought that my today’s decisions are going to shape up my future is scary.

Rebirth

Do you believe in rebirth? I do. I am a Hindu. I was raised with all the epic stories which state rebirth a lot. I was told to be kind to people and do good things in this life as it gets carried to my next life. So practically I have the power to make my next life a better one. It felt nice to have that kind of control and I followed it.

I have seen the rebirth in trees. It hit me looking at the autumn season known as fall in North America where trees shed their leaves. The leaves of the trees change their color to a reddish hue prior to falling. It is also the season during which days get shorter and cooler, the nights get longer. I see a resemblance to human life here.

I used to feel really bad for the plants to lose all its leaves and look grey and dry. I never liked the empty trees. It is depressing to watch them. But the fall of 2006 changed my perception.

I observed that during summer the trees reach maturity and perfection. They look lush green and are full of great tasting fruits and flowers. So it is like one life cycle for the trees that can be compared to the human life. I see the on set of fall as the maturing season representing the old age followed by death(fall).

The interesting fact to be observed is that the tree does not lose its identity. It certainly loses what ever it owned in its previous life but if it is taken good care of, nurtured properly it has a better life in the next season. So, the fact that your today’s deeds gets carried over to a better tomorrow is true. Now I have a stronger reason to be good and do well!

Life gives answers in three ways

Life gives answers in three ways:

When you ask life for some thing
1. It says yes and gives you what you want
2. It says no and gives you something better
3. It says wait and gives you the best

My belief is that if you do not ask for anything, do not have any expectations, be sincere in your efforts you will get the best. It happened with me all my life. I never planned for anything. I took one step at a time, put in my sincere efforts got the best results.

I did not have a wish list for anything. Things just happened for me. May be I am very lucky. But I don’t believe that people are just lucky and they get what they want without the hard work. I think of it more as I got what I deserved. I guess it is like that with everyone.

I have seen my parents live like this. Dad and mom never had any expectations from life, from us, from what they did. And they led a happy, peaceful life. You will not face many disappointments in this way of life.

I believe in God. But I confess I pray most of the time when I need something, like when I go for an interview. But I never ask for success in my attempt. I do ask for the strength to do my best. After the interview or any exam I ask god to give me what I deserve the most. I will accept it happily; with out any regret what so ever. I am not a super human not to get disappointed when I fail in my attempts. But I do recover quickly keeping in mind that “Everything happens for the best.”

The secret is I don't know what is best for me, and I leave it for my fate, destiny or God to decide it for me. One catch for this is that you need to make the best of what is given to you. I failed at certain things in my life but I had better things that followed. So now when I fail at some thing I feel that it will do something good for me in the long run. Now I am less worried about my future!

What I learnt from a chameleon?

When I was a kid about 9 years old, I saw a chameleon for the first time on a tree in front of our house. I hate lizards but this one was different. My mom told me that it has an unusual ability to change the color of the skin. I was surprised and kept staring at it for quite sometime.

It changed its colors to brown when it was on the bark of the tree, to green when it was on the leaves and to red when it jumped to the brick wall next to the tree. Mom told me that it is trying to protect itself by not being visible. I accepted her version then.

Later, as I grew older, I felt that the chameleon is very wise in adapting to the surroundings. It may be true that it is defending itself, but I see it as it is trying to mingle with the surroundings. The way it perceives its environment is incredible. It is a great quality to have as you can really enjoy where ever you are if you can adapt to the surroundings well.

I observed that people always try to search for some one who are like them - similar ideas or ideologies. They get to be friendly with a similar group. I guess I learnt from the chameleon to match my wavelength with the people I interact with to make them comfortable in my presence.

You never know the true color of the chameleon. May be it feels insecure to stand out in a new place? But it can get along with anyone with its unusual yet great capacity.