Musings of an eccentric mindListening to music,
I am transported back in time.
From nimble stringed instruments
To husky voices.
The energetic percussion
Keeping feet and thumbs tapping.
Eyes closed,
Letting the music transcend.
From the swaying head
To the melting heart.
The music player is older than my memories
The sound as young as ever.
This morning I strung up yet another set of seashells to hang up next to the curtains. Here’s a closer look at just a few of the beauties. Take a wild guess what surface the background is!
Take a closer look at what others around the blogosphere are capturing at the Daily Post’s Weekly Photo Challenge
PS: I love seashells
I have been fortunate to have spent my life in a place where there is plenty of greenery, with exotic birds for neighbours.
When we were small, I remember walking around with my friend, picking up things from the ground. We pressed leaves and flowers and stuck them on the pages of an old notebook, along with little stones, feathers of birds and strange looking seeds. We would try to identify and write down the names of the things we collected and took turns taking care of it. It smelt a little, but we were very proud of it — it was our little treasure chest.
Yes, we were advised not to pick up things from the ground. But we picked them up nonetheless. A hobby that has never faded away. To this day, my cupboard overflows with boxes full of seashells, stones, seeds and feathers.
My friend would eventually give our scrapbook to a science teacher in our school. It upset me for a while, but then she probably knew it was better to let go, than to hold on. I tried to recreate the collection, but I ended up throwing it away — apart from the stench of rotting plants, it was the tiny insects which had turned the feathers to dust that made me discard it.
Since then, I have taken extra care of my feathers, keeping the soft delicate ones in an airy box. The larger ones occupy pride of place atop a bookshelf, alongside photographs of family and friends.
Large brass cylinders holding flowers — they were always unique vases to me. It wasn’t until several years had gone by, that I discovered that they were bombshells.
I was talking to a friend of mine, when our discussion meandered towards the differences between our country and that of corruption-free nations. ‘Those people out there,’ she said, ‘they do not even know the meaning of the word bribe!’ And I recalled at that time that corruption, and every form that it takes, is quite literally a part of the curriculum of our education system.
Why are we taught these things? Nothing good would ever come out of it.
If I hadn’t accidentally found out, the brass casings would have always looked like vases, never like ammunition.
Inspired by this week’s Photo Challenge: Half and Half
A couple of weeks back, I ordered a bag from the online store Chumbak*
The bag was of very good quality, no doubt, but what I liked more were the little bits of detail in the product package — the bright pink tags on the bag; the caption that said ‘Designed with love in India’; and my favourite, the metallic baby elephant!
A symbol of my love for textured paper; a symbol of national pride; and a symbol of the joys of little surprises.
Kudos to the team at the store for putting their heart into the purchase experience!
In other marketing news, here’s something I recently created — a t-shirt of my mother’s kolam!
This is the first of what I hope will become a series of tees – see, there’s a logo too! 😀
I’m still figuring out how to go about all this, and I need your help to make it successful. I’d really appreciate if you would share this with anyone who’d be interested in buying it 🙂
If you’d like to purchase it, it is available here and here.
To see other symbols and their interpretations, be sure to check out the Daily Post’s Weekly Photo Challenge
Waiting to receive my order at a Domino’s Pizza outlet, I noticed this interesting caption on the door leading to the area where young boys and girls were busy fulfilling orders for delivering. Thirty minutes or not, full marks for creative labelling!
Doors to other worlds open up this week at the Daily Post
As I prepare to step outside, I keep my phone camera handy.
Click!
I turn around and tell my mother how I interpret her drawing. In the 30 seconds it takes to get down the staircase, we have had a full conversation of the different ways in which we perceive the world around us.
Amma‘s drawings on the floor are my inspiration – a world of art that flows effortlessly through the stone powder – a new one, every single day.
More about Amma’s kolams here.
And here are interpretations of the kolams in verses, written by my mother.
To see what a-muses bloggers around the world, head over to this week’s Photo Challenge at the Daily Post
Musings of an eccentric mind 