Luminous Infinitus

Relived a wonderful moment when I accidentally read one of my old scribblings. There are some places where the moment you go, you feel completely at ease ; you’d stay, transfixed with a longing in your heart to be left there forever! It could be a library, a church, a temple, top of a mountain, a beach, an island, a hut in the middle of a forest, a river bank .. it could even be someone’s house. S’s house, it’s not a house, it is a being. The moment you enter, you feel a warm, smooth embrace. There is certainly something there.. something in the way the house was built, something in the way things were arranged, something in the way lighting was set up, something that kept you suspended in a dream-like state. The flute at the shelf near the bottom of the stairs was lazily placed but you felt as though it blew music into your mind. The winding stairs that led to a small study upstairs beckoned you to go up and when you did, it wasn’t merely going up in space, you felt as though yo...

In my dream I was sleeping. A was shaking my hand. “Achaya..wake up.. wake up.. I can’t find the books.” “What books ? ” “The ones I kept in the box yesterday. The box is empty now.” “Yeah, the books walked away. You ignored them for too long. You know indifference is a punishment more severe than hatred.” (Sorry. I’m sometimes sarcastic when woken up from sleep) “He he ! stupid joke.” (clap, clap ! here is someone who doesn’t take offense.) I went with her to the inner room. She was showing me the empty box. “How could it be. I’m so certain that I took all the books sprawled under the bed and put it into this box. ” I gave a sheepish smile - “I know I know.. ” I took the box in my hand and turned it upside down. Opened it from the other end. All the books were there. “Wow !” “This is a magician’s box.” I wanted to show her the trapdoor and explain it to her. But at that moment my eyes caught ‘Histories’ - Histories by Herodotus. Suddenly, everything dissolved. There was no box. There ...

A recent trip to Mount Shasta became more memorable due to me losing my glasses. When the optician asked me if I wanted the sunlight coating, I said yes. Well ! when someone sounds as though she’s offering the best thing in the world, you’ve got no option but to have it. Moreover insurance covered it (Insurance ! The secret American Ace). Just think of having a pair of glasses that turns black when you walk outside in sunlight and turns plain inside. Great ! I ordered one and the moment I started wearing, I didn’t like them. It looked as though I was wearing sun glasses all day. But suddenly every day was a pleasant day. Be it sunny or cloudy, the day looked the same. Set me thinking.. Why do some people always see goodness ? Because they wear sunglasses in their minds. When they look into the world, they don’t see the scorching intense heat but pleasant evening. Always. Reminds me of a duMaurier short story that I’d read sometime back - ‘The Blue Lenses’. The book which contains this ...

S called. Before he started speaking, I knew what he’d say. Let’s meet up and study something. Yeah ! it’s been over a month since 2nd semester started and we hadn’t even looked into the books list. EC1 was a couple of weeks ahead. It was time. He was in Stanford meeting up with some friend. He wanted to catch up with me in the library after lunch. S - “Library le meet pannalam. Books list eduthuko. We’ll find them there and also plan for studying for this sem. ” Me – “Wokay. I have some work in the bank. Athu mudichittu, I’ll leave to library.” As planned, we met in the library but couldn’t find the books. They’d all been taken. After talking about textbooks for a while, the conversation just slipped into movies and songs. Me - “Have you heard this song ‘Ragasiyamanadu kaadal’ ? A gem of a song. I was listening to top 10 on raaga yesterday and came upon this .. Quite accidentally” S - “Haven’t heard of it. New song ? Which movie ?” “Kodambakkam” “k. Have you listened to ‘New york nag...

He was standing near the sun. There was brightness everywhere, almost blinding him. He could see the rays going away – far away to distant lands, giving light, feeding happiness. But he couldn’t stand there for long. Some strong force was pulling him away. He clenched his teeth, tightened his muscles, held his fists in a tight grip, He tried .. to hold on for longer. It broke. But he wasn’t ready to give away, not yet. He leapt, stretched his hand and grasped a light ray. In a moment he wasn’t himself. As the luminous shaft shot ahead with break neck speed, his vision became blurred, he ceased to think. When he opened his eyes, he was far away. He was still riding on the light ray. But there was no sun, no planets in the vicinity. It was mostly dark. At a distance he could see specks of light from stars, light years away. He could feel that he wasn’t traveling as fast as he was in the beginning. Was the ray weakening ? A dread swept through him. What would happen ? Would the light die ...

Some days you get up slowly .. sit or sometimes sit n sleep on the bed for sometime .. wait for thoughts to gather, slowly come into terms with the world – as though you need time to gradually transition from one world to completely different one – as though you just came out of water and you’re gasping for breath. Yet, Some other days you get up with a jerk – immediately springing into action – as though the very reason that you got up was to do that . It’s as though you’ve been awake all along but had just closed your eyes temporarily.. Today was one of those ‘some other’ days. It was a holiday but I just got up and immediately wanted to check out ‘the destruction of Sennacherib’. I wanted to read the Biblical passage which mentioned this incident. This out-of-ordinary behavior was because just yesterday I started with this book named "Familiar Poems, Annotated" by Asimov. For starters, Isaac Asimov was a master science fiction writer, the most famous in his time and the b...

Amir Aczel’s "Fermat’s Last Theorem" begins with this amazing quote by Andrew Wiles. Yes ! he is the one .. the mathematician who solved the most famous unsolvable problem in the history of Mathematics . Over a span of 3 centuries, thousands of brilliant and hardworking men and women were at it.. and in the quest had discovered so many ground-breaking theories ..even new branches of Maths! I was just dumbfounded the moment I read it - at the sheer truth behind it. Here it goes .. "Perhaps I could best describe my experience of doing mathematics in terms of entering a dark mansion. You go into the first room and it's dark, completely dark. You stumble around, bumping into the furniture. Gradually, you learn where each piece of furniture is. And finally, after six months or so, you find the light switch and turn it on. Suddenly, it's all illuminated and you can see exactly where you were. Then you enter the next room . . . " Exactly !! I think this applies ...