A Six-year Non-ceremony

The day of the ceremonial post is past. Or, so I think. I had once written about the fancy of well rounded numbers like one, three, five and ten. Unlike four and six. Earlier I had called it the classic rounding-off trap.

There isn’t much to celebrate this year. I have written only fifty-six posts this year, which is quite pathetic by my earlier standards. When you consider all the thoughts I thought were blogworthy, it is really pathetic. Like when I magically reached the five-hundredth post on the day I completed five years of this blog, the average was a hundred posts a year. I have obviously not been maintaining standards.

I could blame it on Twitter, but, Mahendra, wrote recently wrote about “Blogging Highlights of 2009, Challenges & Thoughts for 2010”, in which he puts me in a list of folks who are “fairly regular at blogging as well as online social networking in one form or another.” Notwithstanding what I think, I trust his opinion.

Twitter apart, I have been all over the place doing this mega-yatra of everything Web 2.0. I think that took a lot of time away from me this year. If it was launched, I signed up. Towards the end of the year, the carpenter in me said, “Great, you have all the possible tools a carpenter can have. Where’s the wood?”

If the last month is any indicator, I have not been doing well at any of the social places. But then I was away for a while and my mind has been away for a while longer. Blogging remains the only one thing which makes continues to make sense.

2009 has been a very good year for me. I went through significant turmoil on pretty much everything in my life – in a good way. I found time for myself after a very long time and am quite excited and happy about that.

In summary, not much to celebrate here for the sixth year as such, so head out and do your thing for the long weekend. Ours is 4-day long!

You’ll be seeing me.

Being Young; Growing Old

Every birthday brings an end to a year of events. The memory scrapbook becomes thicker. The blank pages seem to lessen. When really young, a birthday is a celebration of growing older; when older, it is the dread of growing older.

Each year, a number begins to subtly suggest expected behaviour; a social norm of how we ought to. Most of us are often trapped in this norm and make conscious changes in all that we do. Dress, talk, smile, laugh, sit, walk, food, drink, and such. More often than not, when we see a stranger and for whatever reason we need to guess the stranger’s age, we will, without obviously knowing it, determine age using factors beyond the sagging skin or the white hair. The make-up as it were. There is more than just taut skin which gives away (or hides) true age.

Age, the wise have said, is what is in your head and what you want it to be. If you want to be 25, you can be 25 all your life if you choose to be. The body may slowly choose to grow old faster than your mind, yet your true age will be only a factor of how old you really want to be.

I have seen people getting older faster than they should; young, lively people full of energy, sapped because they need to grow old. Sober, it is also called (not related to sobriety related to the drink).

Some are friends
Some are old
I feel left behind
A few are younger
I feel old
We are all the same age
We are generations apart
Separated by a few years

What will happen on your next birthday? Will you succumb the question of, “how old are you?”