Illusions, Dispelled.

 I was born in 1993, at the cusp of a generational divide. Born into a newly-liberalized India, I lived a life starkly different from what absolutely anyone older than me lived. I lived *with* electronic access to my country’s culture. The family regaled us with stories of life without what seemed like necessities in my life. Every 90s kid will identify.

But it was the regular immersion in literature that was the reason for my self-definition. To this day, I understand my life in the context of Jane Eyre and Raskolnikov, versus Brad Pitt and ‘the Rachel’. In an age of false perspective, where Shah Rukh Khan can appear taller than Deepika Padukone, and where marches are held to stand still, literature helped me gain knowledge in a way that television, or even the internet, never has. 

Books have taken me to places I didn’t necessarily want to go, forced me to confront my prejudices, assumptions, and at the bare bottom, forced me to confront my ‘self’ at an intrinsic level. Words make me vulnerable in a way actions never seem to. For those precious moments, when I’m alone in bed with a book, I don’t feel alone. That fleeting moment, where the author actually connects with the reader, makes me realize that the ability to articulate is a beautiful one. 

I can't believe half of December has vanished. Bombay continues to be a furnace, the morning breeze nothing but an ambush, the evening chill nothing but a glimpse of an actual winter.

Guess what? We got our very first client. (YAY!) I didn't ever imagine my life turning out the way it has.

2011 has been a breathtaking beauty of a year. Personally. Professionally. Every which ______-ally, there is.

I've been excruciatingly happy. I've been breathlessly sad. I've been indelibly excited. I've been morbidly afraid. I've undoubtedly lived.