Musings on Monday Mornings

Lahore: the city that never sleep. My city of saints, my city of sinners. I am back. For that annual homecoming rite that is a two-week passage of both chaos and excitement, of exaggerated expectations and serendipitous surprises, familiar exhaustion of too much, and too little family. Of paradoxes and mixed emotions. I am home. Every trip the potholes seem deeper, the traffic wilder, the energy crisis more critical...the corruption unconquerable. And yet, no where in the world do the crows crow like they do here. Or the trees on the canal, play with the winter sunlight. No where do oranges and mandarins grow the same earthy smell like a second skin... and no where are the electricity cuts with candles as romantic as here. Throw in a thunderstorm and this place is my version of heaven. If I was an eloquent Pakistani expatriate, I would write a poem worthy of this place; of my convoluted devotion, adoration and obsession juxtaposed with hatred, despair and apathy for here. But I am just...

It says on Hassan and Nadine's blog that though there may be no one reading their random ramblings (I am being polite; "rantings" came to mind first, unfairly), they continue writing, largely, to chronicle their child's early years. While I have been doing the same for Daniyal (for the record, before they even had their kid), albeit irregularly, I am somehow more faithful to this space than the others. Does that mean that I love myself, am more interested in myself or am "father of the child"? Ok that didn't sound cool and understandable at all. Let me retry. Am I writing only for the slowed evolution of my immature-ish mind? Is this only so that I can turn back to an entry on September 2006 and thank the stars that I become more confident/ articulate/ emancipated etc. OR, is this just a huge waste of cyberspace? On an absolute change of subject: I had two friends over for dinner. Other than the fact that I reconnected with the human species (Daniyal an...

I've said it before. I'll say it again. It's tough being a modern woman. Female liberation and emancipation can no longer be used as the panacea to advance personal development and fulfillment. It's a lonely existence, where practicality wins you no favours and even lesser warmth at night (luckily I have a pocket size version who fits comfortable between my elbow and knee!) ... but still, few favours and no warmth. Case in point. Have been ferrying people around the last couple of days. Agreed, of my own decision, initiating from a desire to stay at home...but all the same; lots of ferrying. I got me a license. Driving, that is. And having got it, am mandated to drive. Liberation biting me in the butt. Suddenly I see wisdom in myopia! :) Case in point II: Shahid missed his flight home from Riyadh. Now ordinarily I wouldn't have been so fussy (putting aside the whole loneliness argument for a bit), but at this point in the game, I could have done with another pair of...

Life is interesting. Your entire universe starts revolving around the whims of an infant. One who cannot communicate like from dislike and where you are left second guessing every single move. I sometimes wonder if he knows love. Love that understands and comprehends choice and sacrifice. When I look down at his sleeping face I understand the compromises I am making in being there, the choices disregarded...but his love is simpler, purer. Its a love of necessity, of absolute faith. I suppose the only other manifestation of that kind of love in our lives is in the love for the Omnipotent. A love, simultaneously, of necessity and implicit trust. And yet, I seem to use the word 'love' far too liberally. Man's relationship with Allah is more of helplessness. You have no choice because at a certain point in despair you have no other option than to leave everything to the encompassing ocean of hope. And since we can't bear the thought of no one holding on to the thread and di...

Its one of those days; a slow sun rising, halted in its climb. A steady breeze promising more and expectation not met. It did rain a trickle at night though. As of morning, nothing. The Princess in me is slowly dying. Its a torturous murder. Slow poisoning by reality. As a rule I have refused to sleep in a crumbled bed. It has surprised many bed fellows. First Zareen and as of the last eight years, Shahid. Waking from the bed, the sheets must be ordered before returning. Hair must be made. Make-up removed. One must maintain a semblance of Princely-ness on retiring for the night. But as of late my bones are so wary, my body so racked that I fall into bed in the most graceless, unprincess-like manner. Before, where the little wrinkle disturbed though the night, now one could leave a hedgehog in bed with me and the nettles wouldn't pinch. This is a tragedy since there little in life that entertains and warms more than illusions. And when the illusion breaks, reality is a hard cushion...

We came back from Lahore after the winter break close to a month ago. And since coming back have been trying desperately to dodge one health bug after another. First week in Daniyal came down with a stomach bug... one we brought with us from Lahore. That was the first weekend gone. Thereafter Shahid caught Iblees's own cough, and so the second weekend was sacrificed. With Shahid coughing and sneezing his guts out, I was the next obvious port of call, so the third weekend was spent with me topping 102C on the temperature scale and finally, come full circle Daniyal, has caught the bug. Have spent a miserable month barely making it outside the house once a week. Top it with a weak pocket with little buying power and even the idea of retail therapy no longer cheers. Has my pocket shrunk or has the world become more expensive. Its sad to note that incentive to shop is inversely proportional to money in the pocket. I have never wanted to shop in the last six years, when i myself was earn...

I had written a random mail to the HR department at Gulf News in a moment of absolute uselessness. I was pretty sure that no one would call back; between the recession and me being a full-time mom, I figured corporates didn't see me as someone worth investing into. And though I realise this is severely premature, I just got a call from HR at GN. She wants someone to freelance for a month to help out with one of their publications. As things go this is brilliant. I was looking for a small stimulus to keep my brain working and a little money to line my pocket. However, I am breaking into a cold sweat here. Daniyal is sleeping in the background and I feel like a deserter leaving the ranks. Shahid is right. He's not the clingy one, I am. I'm palpitating. Pace yourself Ambreen. I'll figure something out. I'll take him in with me. Somehow. I'll manage. I'm a professional dammit!

Out of the night that covers me, Black as the Pit from pole to pole, I thank whatever gods may be For my unconquerable soul. In the fell clutch of circumstance I have not winced nor cried aloud. Under the bludgeonings of chance My head is bloody, but unbowed. Beyond this place of wrath and tears Looms but the Horror of the shade, And yet the menace of the years Finds, and shall find, me unafraid. It matters not how strait the gate, How charged with punishments the scroll. I am the master of my fate: I am the captain of my soul. William Ernest Henley