Girls Will Be Girls

Everybody, obviously, sees the world relative to their explanation of things and it sure is harder to do justice to the understanding of it with such an approach. The amount of time women invest within the making of judgements about mere sights prevailing in their surroundings is one heck of a ride and I tried tasting every bit today offered. I am not stereotyping, it's a first hand experience that the normal, very sane, very upright women took me on.

Now, I won't question why must they sit around making some random, really insignificant people govern their lives for hours. I wouldn't say impersonating one of the ladies from the pack wasn't fun, it probably was but it was more pointless than me trying to have people look past my use of informally uttered medical terms that hold strong stereotypes for explanations, and understand the purpose behind. Blah.

Example: 'Depression' would be one; I am not actually depressed, people. I am just tired of the fact that you don't feel your surroundings can make a good use of you. Stop freaking littering!

I woke up, immediately sitting up on my bed bending over to the bedside, reading the time in my cell phone. I had missed the point and I had missed enough school for them to banish me for life.
"Amma main college ja rahi hun, paisay bhi le rahi hun."
"Point se kyun nahi gaeen?" Amma inquired.
I wasn't going to respond to that. I have grown saner. I took out a shirt from the pile I organized for summer. Ironed it. Pulled out a random dupatta to go with it. A white shalwar too. Abstract contrasting was the outcome. With my 'emergency preparation for school drill' coming as naturally as anything to me, I had an urge, an urge to put on hoops in my ears. And I did. Got off the bus for another and off to my way to Peads ward, instead I went to school. Found Noor in the Girl's Common Room. Found Maria after she gave me the coordinates to seek her out. She saw me and instantly referred to me as the 'Dulhan' for the hoops in my ghoonghat. The day began.

We had some discussions of the most feminine kind. Any way it's a liberty students of medicine often exploit. Ha. Ha. I apologize for too much information. I might be hanged for it too in the majestic court of her highness, Mohtarma Maria Khatoon. Before we could hop to the Peads ward to be enthralled the subject of today came rushing my way, crashing in to my brain and my nerves only shackling under the unfathomable intensity of such a grave issue.

*Dim the lights*
*Cue music*

Wajiha ne mangni kar li.

*Tada!*

Okay, so Wajiha ne mangni karli.
Phir? Main kiya karun?
Wajiha hai kon?

"Nahi bhai, woh chaar semesters se 60s walay kay saath hai, woh aisa kaisay kar sakti hai?"
"Bhai, to tumhain kiya?"
"Nahi, main to court le kar jaungi, 60s walay ka case larhungi."
"Aray to 60s walay ko us mein interest nahi hoga," I reasoned in an unconcerned tone.
"Kaisi batein kar rahi ho, Sana? Tum nahi samajh teen. Aisay thorhi hota. Dosti kissi se, shaadi kissi se, koi baat hai bhala."

The walk to NICH is much fretted upon, but I like to cover the busy Jinnah road, swooshing by people who look dedicated to reach some place of importance. I like looking ahead and pacing when the traffic on my left would show restlessness to break through barriers too. I feel like a winner every time I tear across so many tiny worlds embedded in so many people I meet within that fragment of the day. We got up to the auditorium, received a text from the GGL that we must come to the third floor for the class in the ward. We did. I shook hands with everybody I met.

Minus the studying bit of the day, the ward time revolved around Anum Iftikhar and I, mostly. We escaped the threat of a guy selling memberships for Samzu Water Park. She had been texting me to appear for something valuable she intended to show me. And we could all guess, if it's something valuable called by Iftikhar, it has to be something pertaining to her. It's a Universal truth. It was a poem she had contrived for my grandchild; Epoch II, something I have nothing to do with. [I am laughing]

It was a fine piece of ideas put together and I would have pleased the bearer to some height only had I not known how much Anum wants me to praise her. Honestly, it wasn't as striking as her older works for the magazine. Any who, I was going to take it, sit with her for it for a while; she just likes to make things bigger than they actually are. It's her thing. And who else to facilitate that desire of hers than to advance to the loud speaker I am. I do her the favor of publicising her before the tiny bit of crowd she herself cannot entertain. We are, after all, in a very strange way connected. Bar mates.

Before I could tamper with her ideas, the facts revealed themselves before me that I no longer possess the power to assist anyone as a Magazine Team official. So, I had Hammad listen to her and then Sajidullah came along saying something. A series of really quick events and Anum stood before me questioning as to why I can't take the poem from her. She loves to know things, we all do. Unfortunately, flow of information is my idea of maintaining the integrity of a team. I was never a declared team with her. Ha. Ha.
I don't hate you, beta.

There I sat out side the Pathology lecture hall waiting for Dr. Fauzia to take the class, I was joined by Shahzadi. She told me about her roots in Punjab and how her mother and sister magically recover from their everyday illnesses the moment they go rural. She questioned me about me and I did not want to sound too interesting and I succeeded as she departed to attend the class while I sat all by my lonesome indulged in boredom. Too bored to carry myself into the lecture hall.

After I had stood talking for ten minutes with Anosh, I found in the library, I sat on a table resting my back on a cozy chair opposite to Noor and Sidra. To my surprise the next person to enter my field of vision was '60s wala' the girls had been forming virtual alliances with. Which reminds me I had described the kid to the girls once in an attempt to help them understand who I was talking about on a much more important issue, I am sure, ever since then his name got to be '60s wala'. It was clearly intended to help them recognize him as the most evident thing about him is his drastic renewal of appearance from a very retro-bell bottom-ish to a very modern looking person. Hearing so much about him all morning and how poor little thing is all hurt and God knows what, I asked him if he already had his Peads Ward and if he did he could lend me his histories. He didn't. Then we got into a discussion about how Peads walay aren't really strict this time around and as I waved him off from the conversation I sensed two very stiff almost hypoxic ladies turned slightly toward me with a subtle twist to their backs.

"Um, aap log meri batein sun rahay thay?" I offered them a moment so they could exhale.
"Haan, hum sun rahay thay koi aisi waisi baat to nahi hai," they almost used the same words at the same time.
"Hahaha, wow! Fikar nahi karain, jab hogi to dulha samnay la kar kharha karungi."

The remainder of the lot walked into the library and settled around the two tables. Then we saw him. And how much they liked this unknown handsome stranger. His flawless strut and his sophisticated demeanor. His far-away-ness and the impulse to know him. A chance. A conversation. An idea about what he is really like. His name.

"Ladies, I know him," the smoke formulated into my face in the middle of their reverie.
"Really?"
"The guy in dark blue on the table next to the pillar? I know him."
"Woh beech wala?" One of them confirmed.
"Jee, jee, beech wala, jis ki barhi barhi aankhain hain, bohat acha bacha hai."
"Ruko mai jati hun us table tak, takay for sure ho ja-ay," one of them said.
"O. K." I could not have been any more entertained. I got up behind her, followed her, made sure I knew the guy they were just day dreaming about, dare I say it, as a pack.

"Haan, isi ki baat kar rahi hun main bhi, I know him. He has this way of formulating sentences while staring into your eyes."
You know what I was doing there. Astaghfirullah. I told them why and how I know the kid. Funny, how knowing him wasn't a scandal any more.
"Then you go talk to him and I'll just stand with you," one of them suggested.
"I have to go speak with him on a common interest, any way, you can tag along, quench your desperation for all that i care," I offered.

On our way out of school while we were almost down the stairs, the '60s wala' and Wajiha stood in the hall out side Biochemistry Lab. Now, the girls won't take a step down the stairs. One of them actually lounged on the chairs there. So much time.

"O! That's Wajiha."

Screw the fulfilment of actually being noticed by the man we crush upon as a team, let's eavesdrop on what Wajiha has to say to the '60s wala'.

Who cares?

I went down to have my little conversation with the hunky kiddo and another from the pack accompanied me all through the conversation. After we were finished exchanging thoughts, I and my fellow member from the pack headed outside when the other member who had previously landed to eavesdrop came striding, reprimanding and whining about how unfair the first fellow packer was to her for taking away the opportunity of seeing the guy/kid face to face.

O My God!

Vitality

How can she expect me to tell her how much I need her and how much I will miss her? Have I ever sat her down poured my heart out before her? No. It's just so hard for me to all of a sudden express. Kiya sawal bhi paida hota hai aisi baat sochnay ka kay how much my life is depended upon her? It's there because of her. You can't, however, just all of a sudden formulate sentences and approach. You just can't.

I am writing her a letter per day until the day of her flight, and intend to place them in her luggage without the mention; these are letters of my everyday happenings or my thoughts over some issue she has no interest in that I often [read always] force her to listen. She doesn't actually listen. Well, she hates it when I say this, so she listens, she listens to every word I say. And then she would at times, 'very rarely', walk out on my detailed version of simple occurrences. She would 'very rarely' tell me to be quiet and leave. She would 'very very rarely' even tell me to come to her later. I would babble my stories out any way, resting my head on her legs asking her to caress my hair upon which she would rebuke and question:
"Kabhi hamaray pair dabanay ki taufeeq kiyun nahi hoti tumhain?"
I would then laugh and tell her, "Aap ko hukum karna parhega us kay liye."

I have always been the rational, unyielding, sarcastic, loud, sab se ziyada naseehatain hasil karnay wala attached in a cold but profoundly deep way sort of a child. I have some peculiarities to myself that I offer my relation with her to make it just mine, but those are so diminutive, somethings she might not even recognise to be missing. On the contrary, I spend hours talking to her whether she is responding or not, hours addressing her lying beside her on her bed specially when she makes it clear she needs to rest. She is always in my prayers. I am terrible with long distance relationships. I don't want to lose this. But I can't tell her that because they need her now. I have had her for the time I needed her.

The truth is I can never stop wanting to have her around me. How can I? I have always had her with me ever since my inception. The softeness of the sound of her two gold bangles tinging. The sight of her reciting Quran in the living room. The little steel container from the paan daan of roasted fennel she keeps on her bedside. The accuracy with which she would fix the sheet on her bed before sitting on it and after getting off of it. How she would have pots with crazy-yummy food ready everyday on the stoves before we return from school. The smell of one of her rich perfumes she keeps in her cupboard. The red dust on the dressing table before evening tea. The warm blows of dumm she would bless us with after every namaz.

I have started having my 'goodbye issues' with her. And they are taking their toll. It's like I am making room forecasting the emptiness, pushing things away to let nothingness infuse in my surroundings before hand. I tell her words of how all right I am going to be, unnecessarily, in the most non-redundant way; it is so not my thing. But I am doing that. And I think she is growing concerned.

She is so beautiful, so gentle, so giving, so selfless. And my eyes are watering. I have no words and I have been short on words for quite some time now. I hope she knows I am not just a spoiled kid who enjoys being yelled at by her everyday. I love her and appreciate her more than anyone else. And my tears are running. She runs the course of my everyday life without ever faltering. She makes me feel so protected. I am never going to have this time again, I know, because this seems like the interface to a new begining, a new turn that life is assuming. And I am wiping my tears. With the speed life tends to move these days I don't know where I'll be the next second. And I feel I could have had more to my bonding with her, more from my side. I hope she knows.

Allah meri Maa ko salamat rakhay. Ameen.

She never reads my posts.
Lol.
*blows her nose in the tissue

Delicacy

I am waiting for the electricity to take its leave for the last time before a new spell of similar events takes place in a newer day after the nap that the rapturous beauty of darkness predicts; if I can manage to fall for it that is. I was forcing myself to understand the amount of time my insomnia spares me. Seemingly endless.

Just recently I was going through the collection of ghazliyaat and older songs on the laptop;
Koi faryad tere dil mein dabi ho jaisay,
Jaagtay jaagtay ek umr kati ho jaisay,
Jaan baqi hai mager saans ruki ho jaisay.

The importance of projection of an idea and the perception of it struck me once again as many contrasting ones were discovered earlier. For example the explanation for an insomniac condition from a thoughtful arrangement of words that dances on a melody is found to rest within the tender side of life upon which the east conceptualizes a family system with conviction - the basis of a civilized society. Where as, the phenomenon when defined by Ghulam Ali and his sneer during Forensic lectures in a deliberate immature tone transgressing to the Eiffel Tower of indecency goes beyond the elasticity of social perimeters.

He would call it a 'pinch on the cheek in affection' that he throws at us to tease and perk us up. I like how he fails to actually give us a firm statement, and leaves the lot making a judgement about an idea instead. He then makes insincere attempts to have intended something purposeful with the saucy talk.
But the purpose is lost if we can't find it, Sir.
Nevertheless, I like him.

Banjar hai sab banjar hai...
Teri khoj talaash mein dekh piya,
Hum kitnay kalay koas chalay.

Then there is the reality. How easily it is taken to notice but how intricate are the woven laces of overlapping knots. How cautious you must be to work it right. How deep it is. The actual insomnia. The complexities. The understandings. The shortness of time!

Kaam karo kaam. Bakwas band, kaam ziyada!