I feel hypocritical. I send mails to other people asking them when they’re going to reply, all while myself being late with the Fillets. I don’t have an excuse, either. Sonali v0.2 has been up and running for two days now.
Anyway, on with the Fillet.
There’s been a long weekend. Of course, while Delhiites are blessed with a <i>really</i> long weekend- Friday to Tuesday, I’m making do with Friday to Monday. Don’t I sound lazy when I say that?
Well, anyway. I came home on Thursday by bus, reaching home around 8 pm, just in time for dinner. After dinner, I did something I hadn’t done for three months- had coffee at Barista. That is possibly one of the primary causes for my sleeplessness that night.
I slept at about half past eleven, after reading Dune for about half an hour. Four hours later, I was forced awake when a squadron of homicidal mosquitoes carried out shock-and-awe tactics on my person. This, coupled with disturbing dreams of Fremen and Muad’dib up to that point did nothing to improve my mood.
I decided to respond to the incessant attacks with chemical warfare, and padded out of my room in search of All Out. All Out lived up to it’s name when I found that we were all out of it. However, I did find Odomos, and applied it liberally to all my exposed skin.
Fortified by my aura of Odomos, I exacted my revenge. The bed was soon littered with mosquito corpses. But, as usual, life behaved like a movie, and I found that vengeance, especially against mosquitos, just leaves you feeling empty. It was four in the morning and I couldn’t get back to sleep.
So I continued to read Dune- not a very wise thing to do, but what the heck. Soon, I grew oppressed by Dune, and went off to check my mail. Sadly, there were no new messages.
At about five, I went back to my room, turned out the light, and lay down again. And in about half an hour, just when I was almost ready to start sleeping again, birds outside my window broke into song.
I gave up. If birds were waking up, it would be inappropriate to go back to sleep. Instead, I went out for a walk.
Safdarjung Enclave at half past five in the morning is not exactly beautiful, but it’s much better than at half past five in the evening. A cool breeze plays upon your face. The sky, which is almost purple to start with, changes to a light greyish-bluish tint- a good approximation is the www.aadisht.net background colour- in a period of less than fifteen minutes. Watching this happen is very wonderful.
I walked all the way to Hauz Khas District Park- the one with the Queen’s bathing tank. The first creature I saw out there was a stray dog.
At half past five in the morning, even the mangiest of strays possesses an air of dignity. This one wasn’t a Hound of the Baskervilles, but it was no slouch either. It’s tail was up, and so were it’s ears. It stared at me with an almost regal air. Such are the wonders that dawn works.
After this, I walked through the park, and smelt the dew evaporating off the grass. And then I climbed up to the roof of the tomb and listened to all the different birds. And I wished that I had carried a Walkman with me, so I could listen to Beautiful Day.
That, in essence, is what this particular Fillet is about. There’s war in Iraq, people lose their loved ones on what amounts to a daily basis, most people are bastitches, but what the heck, dawn makes up for almost all of that.
At about six, I walked back home to prevent my parents from panicking when they woke up and found that they were locked in and I was missing. My general feeling of benevolent lovingkindness towards the world also inspired me to make myself breakfast- scrambled eggs with mustard and cheese, and a Virgin Mary.
About ten minutes after breakfast I discovered that my entire family, due to one reason or the other, had also been awake since at least four in the morning. How richly bizarre.
I had another breakfast shortly after that- cereal and strawberry flavoured dahi.
And then my brother invited me to come to the gym with him, thus capping off a highly interesting early morning. But more about the gym later.