Lincoln's letter to his Son's Head Teacher

This again is a piece of rich contect that i was introduced to by a good friend of mine.  We were discussing about my admiration for Rudyard Kipling's Poem " If.." and how every time I read it, I get a different perspective, he said on those similar lines I will send you something and this came to me.  And anything good and admirable has to reach this space, which is so beloved to me and here it goes.  Hope you will enjoy too...

Respected Teacher,


My son will have to learn I know

That all men are not just, all men are not true.But teach him also that for every scoundrel there is a hero;

that for every selfish politician, there is a dedicated leader. Teach him that for every enemy there is a friend.

It will take time, I know; but teach him, if you can, that a dollar earned is far more valuable than five found.

Teach him to learn to lose and also to enjoy winning.

Steer him away from envy, if you can.

Teach him the secret of quite laughter. Let him learn early that the bullies are the easiest to tick.

Teach him, if you can, the wonder of books.. but also give him quiet time to ponder over the eternal mystery of birds in the sky, bees in the sun, and flowers on a green hill –side.

In school teach him it is far more honourable to fail than to cheat.

Teach him to have faith in his own ideas, even if everyone tells him they are wrong.

Teach him to be gentle with gentle people and tough with the tough.

Try to give my son the strength not to follow the crowd when everyone is getting on the bandwagon.

Teach him to listen to all men but teach him also to filter all he hears on a screen of truth and take only the good that comes through.

Teach him, if you can, how to laugh when he is sad. Teach him there is no shame in tears. Teach him to scoff at cynics and to beware of too much sweetness.

Teach him to sell his brawn and brain to the highest bidders; but never to put a price tag on his heart and soul.

Teach him to close his ears to a howling mob… and to stand and fight if he thinks he’s right.

Treat him gently; but do not cuddle him because only the test of fire makes fine steel.

Let him have the courage to be impatient, let him have the patience to be brave.

Teach him always to have sublime faith in himself because then he will always have sublime faith in mankind.

This is a big order; but see what you can do.

He is such a fine little fellow, my son.

My choice !!!

You roam my mind aimlessly
As a Ghost
Is it because you got killed
In the Gallows of my mind?

Logic prevails
Reasoning stands out
Its all too obvious
But the heart is a silly machine

Sometimes its as though it
Has no memory at all
Of the pain or agony
That others cause it

Its surprising to see
Telepathy exists acutely
Love has not vanished
And the longing is still there

Would you ever know
The extent of my passion
Love, and care
Only to feel taken for granted, finally

When tears spoke the language of grief and
I felt the taste of Betrayal
And with every death of hope
I died a little too

Betrayal does it
It Betrays the betrayer.
Love does it too
It takes pleasure in giving more and more

It’s all a joke for you
You say some unrelated stuff
And make me smile
And miss out the pain behind the smile

I am magnanimous enough
To bear the brunt
To Simply say
Its My Choice !!

Signs from above !!!

Sometimes I sound so silly that I wonder whether I have ever grown up really in life.

I don’t know if I can consider the following incident among those silly things that I do and experience in life.

Something has been nagging my mind for sometime now and I was trying to get over the damn thing and it just keeps coming back, how much ever I try pushing it out of my mind. Its like this - try holding a simple glass of water for a minute. It does not bother you much. Try holding it for an hour, and your hands starts aching.. terribly. Continue holding it longer, though the glass of water is not by itself, that heavy, it creates so much of frustration and pain, its impossible to distract yourself from the ‘ pain in the wrong place feeling’ of holding that glass of water. The stuff that is nagging me is as important to me as water :-), but it is actually a very silly thing. I am sure I didn’t make much sense there. But it was meant to be that way !

And this week has been hectic with sessions every single day at work, and on top of it there was a customer presentation and there was some stuff that was incomplete which I needed to finish on priority. With all these in the back of my mind, I began my day starting to go to church and there was this rain, all of a suddent from nowhere. Hubby dear told me, how can you go to church in this rain and all my resolve vanished and I decided against going to church.

Thats when my friend called and offered a drop to office,( his presentation to the customer was immediately after mine) which I was quite happy to accept, as I can reach office earlier, actually much earlier for the customer presentation. So I started on time, waited for my friend, only to get a call from him telling me that he is stuck in traffic and it would be better that I go by the office bus otherwise both of us would miss the time together.

Disappointment !! – On second thoughts it was fine as I was quite early to catch my shuttle. And of all days, the shuttle had to arrive late, today. Have you noticed that I always have second thoughts, is it a characteristic of Gemini? The funnier part I also have third, fourth and believe me nth thoughts on the silliest stuff in the world. Ok – Let me focus !

The reason why I am elaborating all this is to highlight the fact that my tension levels were slowly but steadily increasing. When tension mounts self doubt creeps in. I was wondering the leaders are going to be there in the hall – COO, CPO & CMO and the customers. Will I be able to make the presentation well etc., etc., And then I looked up and asked God, I am worried, looks like I am alone in this whole thing… and really was looking for support.

That’s when I saw a Navy blue Maruti 800 passby my Shuttle and on it in very visible bold letters it was there. I heard him speak to me. And the message was

“ No Matter how far you are from GOD, he is just a prayer away “

I felt so blessed. This is overwhelming – Almighty talking to me so very directly?

No reading between lines, no clues, no guesses, no assumptions. Just plain direct one on one communication. And what more do I need? I felt so safe, so protected, I didn’t feel alone any more.

I felt energized instantly. My fears vanished ‘cos I know my Lord is just a prayer away. I could be in the conference room, discussions with who’s who in this world, in any kind of situation and there He is, ‘ just a prayer away’.

It touched me all the more ‘cos the entire last week during my conversations with the Lord, I kept asking him, ‘Show me a Sign’ and help me decipher it.

Why would the Lord love me so much? This lesser mortal being. This very person who depends so much on worldly passions, ignores the Lord so much, with dependencies on people who are so very hypocritical and yet, when I was stranded he cares enough to respond to me, just like that – so instantly.

With this renewed faith, happiness, Top of the world feeling ( Imagine the almighty talking to me !!!) needless to say, I did well in the presentation and the day was Rocking contrary to what I had anticipated.

And I continue feeling Blessed. And I thank Lord for not allowing me to grow out of these little miracles of every day life.

25 ridiculous reasons why I havent heard from you

1. Someone pushed you from the flight you were travelling and you are still orbiting Stratosphere – stay there !!

2. You are dead and buried and you don’t have a mobile with you.

3. You are out of your mind – which you anyway were he he he

4. STML ( Short Term Memory Loss) has claimed you after you hit the bottom of a swimming pool. Or is it Selective Amnesia?

5. You are jailed under unbailable offence for petty crime and have no access to your handset in your cell :-) the only hope is to expect a call when you get released.

6. You fell into a pothole while walking on the road and no one has pulled you out yet.

7. You were reading and went into a trance and have not recovered till date

8. You are lost and couldn’t make it back home and have left your mobile at home.

9. You have been kidnapped and are held at ransom. Noone is willing to pay the ransom to get you back.

10. An ET has taken you on a visit to its residence in space and they have mistaken you for their relative. They got you to stay there.

11. You have gone insane – isn’t that the same as being out of your mind? But I need 25 weird reasons!

12. Your mobile is stolen and have no way of getting my number back.

13. You have been swallowed by an Anaconda and you are still trying to get out through its mouth which you are not able to.

14. You are stranded in this island near the artic region and the signal strength is bad.

15. While visiting Zoo, you realized you belong there and decided to stay with your kind of beings

16. You are lost in the sea, when you wandered there one morning and haven’t been able to track your way back home. You are somewhere close to Uganda. ( no specific reason for choosing that part of the globe)

17. You haven’t woken up from Shavaasana that you were practicing during Yoga sessions in a long time now.

18. You night walked dreaming of bungee jumping and jumped off a bridge. You are still lying down there with a couple of broken limbs and appendages.

19. You woke up one morning and realized you became deaf, mute and a complete idiot.

20. You asked the waitress at a restaurant for an extra seat for an imaginary friend and got clobbered. Yet to recover from the damages. You didn’t know she was a part time weight lifter.

21. You have gone blind and do not have the inclination to ask for help to get my number. Remember you are already deaf & mute and… in point 19.

22. You were wondering why the Frisbee was getting bigger and it hit you and blew the daylights out of you. You are still wondering !

23. You lost your charger and haven’t been able to charge your phone ( that’s so lame but you see I have a target)

24. You woke up one day opposite gendered and you are embarrassed to call me in your new voice. ( I really like this one !!)

25. The time machine went backwards in your life and you are just an year old and my parents are yet to be married :-)

Hmmm...  I enjoyed doing this !!!

Daily Mass

I went to church this morning – to meet the Lord ( though I can meet him and be with him anywhere, anytime going to the church always energises me) and to receive him in Communion. I really get energized at the thought of participating in the mass and receiving communion. It is a sign of receiving Lord and somehow I feel strengthened more on the days I receive communion. It is as though he is with me physically then, and not just emotionally.

The Sunday Mass is something that I would never miss for my life. I should have a really good reason to miss a Sunday mass. And no reason is good enough to miss a Sunday mass, unless there is something as bad as a communicable disease that you may infect other people with, there is no excuse worth its salt to miss a Sunday Mass. Not just for me, for anyone in the family. To me I draw the entire weeks’ spiritual strength from the communion I receive and I make it a point to avoid taking my mobile along with me. Its dedicated time for the Lord and I wouldn’t want anything to come between me and the Lord.

With a maid who has come in for cooking – yes finally I have a real good cook who comes sharp at 6 am in the morning everyday and cooks for us and she is really efficient that she completes breakfast, lunch and dinner for us in an hour and 15 minutes and leaves the place spic and span, without making much noise about anything and without disturbing us for anything at all. In fact, she doesn’t talk much. Nirmala, that’s her name and she is a blessing to us. Baiamma, our maid who does other chores at home comes by around 6.45 am and does the other work, that leaves me out with absolutely nothing to do. Am I happy? I have reasons to be happy.

Initially when both the maid and the cook started coming in, I lavishly spent my time on reading paper, watching my darling fishes, watering the garden, talking to Joe ( morning conversations are otherwise very limited and if at all there are any, they are heating expressions of verbal exchanges as everyone is hustling and bustling in their efforts to go to offices and school), until one day I felt so guilty of the fact that I am wasting so much of my otherwise busy and useful time. That’s when I happened to speak to Jigie, you know the heart to heart kind of talking, and she was telling about Austin and her going to church every morning and how they have become role models for many families in her Parish.

Jigie is my cousin, and we were brought up together from when we were 8 months old to our pre marriage days. In fact, our birthdays almost fall together June 14th is hers and June 18th is mine and we were almost like twins. We fought so much when we were really small and grew up in friendship when we were adolescents ( partners in every crime, then) until education took Jigie away from Chennai and later marriage.

With a church so close by at a walkable distance and mass on most mornings, I decided to go for Mass whenever I could. And I have made that into a practice. We do not have daily mass, Mondays and Tuesdays the mass is the evening and so on the other days I make it a point to go for mass and meet the Lord in person focus my energies in prayer for all my loved ones ( with whom I am in constant touch and for some with whom I am not in touch too) and most importantly to receive the Lord in communion.

Today when I went for mass, I was reminded of my Yercaud days – there I used to go for mass everyday. Every single day. Rain, storm, landslides, cold weather, no power nothing mattered – I went for mass every single day. Yercaud was my first experience in living away from home and I missed family so much, going to Church used to make up for not having my family closeby. I used to love going for mass, so much so the nuns in the convent thought that I would end up in the novitiate to become a nun. When I went for their Centenary celebrations, Sr. Bernard, the correspondent asked me “ so, Vincy, When are you coming to take the Veil?” I had to tell her “ I intend taking the Veil, but not the one that you are thinking of, Sister Bernard” and we laughed about it.

Joe still makes fun of me saying that I got a good husband (?) ( I forgive him for his ignorance ha ha ), only because of those every day masses that I attended. Anyways, till my Yercaud days, I never had a church so closeby to go for a mass on a daily basis and when I had the opportunity I did not want to waste it.

So, Here comes yet another blessing that I can add onto my list of blessings. Meeting the Lord and receiving him in Communion, every day – every possible day !.

It hurts.. like hell

It hurts to lose. Anything. However insignificant. I am sure everyone would agree on that.

I belong to a peculiar breed, and it used to hurt even if I lost a simple hand kerchief ( back then, at school, I used an handkerchief and not a tissue). Though the hurt itself was short-lived for a couple of days, those couple of days my handkerchief would be always there at the back of mind and I would be blaming myself silly over losing it. Maybe that’s the reason I moved over to tissues, you get so used to throwing it away.

I realized I haven’t changed basically internally, deep down. I realize, am that same little girl to whom it still hurts, when she loses. Friends, opportunities, games – even a silly online game, pens, rings, watches, diamonds, my gold anklet, chain – going by the list that I have lost they are not the insignificant kinds. For example, losing the only diamond I had, hurt so much, that I have vowed to myself that I will not buy diamonds again as a punishment to my own carelessness. The losses have been quite humungous and it has never gone away from my mind for years together.

The wildest part is, inspite of all this, I have never stopped losing. The latest is you. I have lost, haven’t I?

And this time, it hurts and today it hurts like hell. I wish it was a wee bit more easier !!!

Valentine's Day

Its Valentine’s day tomorrow.

Every single magazine, news daily that I came across today had something (?), actually too many glaring articles about Valentines day and loads of gifting ideas, promotions and what not. There were a couple of articles asking what plans for tomorrow to its beloved readers and if they are prepared for the day. Infact, even my Beauty Parlour had some offers for my loved one( albeit an Caveat, which said if the bill amount is more than Rs. 500/-).

Why is Valentine’s day so commercialized ? And by a Valentine everyone seems to be hinting about a lover, a partner or may be a friend ( or is this my ignorant minds understanding??)

I was wondering who my Valentine is and I realized I don’t have just one but many and this thought reminds me about my Sun sign reading this morning in the newspaper. Incidentally, the astro numerologist who wrote this column also told the readers what their partner will be like and how to woo their lover based on their sunsign. Even he hints at partner or lover… so I am not totally wrong in my understanding of what I read all over the place.

Coming back to my sunsign predictions, it starts like this.. It isn’t impossible for Geminis to love more than one person at a time. ( Good, He clarified a major fact there and all I need to do is to blame my Sun sign. Lucky me.) Geminis look for love and tenderness ( ahhh.. that’s a good point too..) and the predictions go on..

So got my point about multiple Valentines that I was hinting at earlier? I decided to go over my list of valentines this year and here I go..

And I start with my Lord. I have the most open conversations with him. Really open and honest. Actually there is no choice about being open and honest. Its lovely to have those conversations. I am sure he is my first Valentine. Always. Infact, I remember, even my first blog was about him. Then I guess I love myself the most in this entire world. Think of it, all of us love ourselves, and why cant I be my own Valentine ? For all the self talk I do, the company I give myself and the space I long for myself, I guess I deserve to be my own Valentine.

Then there is the obvious, my beloved Joe. Been my strength, motivation for long years, been my valentine from the day I knew him, and probably the only one in the true sense of it ( I mean the commercial sense ). And there is Dennu, of course. A very important part of my life and sometimes I think he is atleast now my purpose in life. My parents, truly my loved ones, and I would bet my life on them before marriage and didn’t have “ a commercial sense” Valentine then and they made most of my world and my decisions in life. I am also wondering when exactly in the last 16 years of my marriage, did they drop down to their current positions?  Funny, but true.  Like the varying climatic changes, TRP ratings and stock markets these things change too... 

My siblings, my brother and sister are also my valentines. We love each other, though we all express it differently and I am glad to have an additional bro and sis in their partners and I would consider them my valentines too. And wait how did I miss my two little nephews?

And as I just finished with my family circle, there are a whole host of my cousins, friends, their partners and lovely children whose faces go on as frames in my mind. And that’s a huge list.

So It looks like Anupam V Kapil’s prediction atleast about Gemini’s are so very true, looking at this big list .. “ Its not impossible for Geminis to love more than one person at a time “.  I should be thanking my stars, or is it the Sun, for this prediction. See ya and a great Valentines day for all those reading this. May you be blessed with a big Valentine’s day list and don’t forget to add yourself.

Whats your names' hidden meaning ?

While reading blogs to my heart's content today, till now, little late in the night, I came across this link and was too tempted to check out what my name says about me. 

I should say I was quite skeptical about this link in the beginning and as I read the list that came up after I typed in name, I agree to becoming a true convert.  Lot of things said here are so true, so 'me'... and here goes the list.

 You Are Driven and Tireless

• You are very hyper. You never slow down, even when it's killing you.

• You're the type of person who can be a workaholic during the day... and still have the energy to party all night.

• Your energy is definitely a magnet for those around you. People are addicted to your vibe.

• You tend to be pretty tightly wound. It's easy to get you excited... which can be a good or bad thing.

• You have a lot of enthusiasm, but it fades rather quickly. You don't stick with any one thing for very long.

• You have the drive to accomplish a lot in a short amount of time. Your biggest problem is making sure you finish the projects you start.

• You are very intuitive and wise. You understand the world better than most people.

• You also have a very active imagination. You often get carried away with your thoughts.

• You are prone to a little paranoia and jealousy. You sometimes go overboard in interpreting signals.

• You are very open. You communicate well, and you connect with other people easily.

• You are a naturally creative person. Ideas just flow from your mind.

• A true chameleon, you are many things at different points in your life. You are very adaptable.

• You are a free spirit, and you resent anyone who tries to fence you in.

• You are unpredictable, adventurous, and always a little surprising.

• You may miss out by not settling down, but you're too busy having fun to care.

If you ever have known me, you would vouch for a lot of points said above :-)