Before sunrise

I can finally say this. I am so done with clubbing. I have danced up many a storm, club hopped till breakfast, shared chemistry with quite a few on the floor, created a riot in my girl-brigade phase, fudged hostel late-passes, and sometimes made a fool of myself too.

Now, with two men (the husband and the boy), two cats, and six friends from the real world in tow, I feel almost smug. And slightly dismissive about the way people engage in the city, particularly when the sun goes down.

I guess the reason people succumb to the black hole of social grandeur in night clubs is because it insulates them. Even though the amount of clothing worn these days at such night outs is next to nothing, it still makes them feel more protected than say, meeting for breakfast.

It’s a minefield out there and nothing is as it appears. Singletons are busy scoping the scene and marking potential mates on their datometers. Couples with kids are eager to make an appearance again, almost with a vengeance so as to not appear uncool. DINKS are making the most of whatever they can get while they wait for their mutual funds or reproductive organs to surprise them. The married ones are revelling in the fact that they can still score and making a point of their partners noticing. Those married-but-available are actually acting on it and hoping their partners will not notice — a fact that has become increasingly impossible in an over-tagged, over-commented, over-facebooked world. Insomniacs are hoping that night blends into day, so they can begin tagging and posting pictures the minute they reach their dreary homes.

And no one gives a damn about the music or the deejay, although it is cool to appear knowledgeable about one or both. So while people down their shots and max out their credit cards, the clubs always have the last laugh.

And yet, why do people do this? Why are bars and clubs always full, no matter what the price tag? Simple. Because it’s easy. It involves no work. And once you are on a list, it’s just the comfort of numbers. All you have to do is show up. After all, how many house parties does one get invited to anyway? How many of your night-lifers will actually have you in their home for breakfast?

I know quite a few over-zealous party animals who look like complete fish out of water at home parties. Without the strobe lights and the haze of smoke machines and the ear-shattering decibels, they appear almost naked, speechless, move-less.

So , one of the first rules of dating is do not go clubbing. Or, at the very least, to take it somewhere else from there, given that you have, after all, met the object of your affection in a bar. Things look, sound and feel very different with Long Island Iced teas or vodka-Red Bulls in swishy bars.

As for romances that yet happen, well, you are good as long as you are in your bubble.

Happy happy

Birthdays and babies are like visa-not-required ports. Almost anyone has the right to engage with you to wish you on your birthday or likewise, when you are with child, and there’s no need of clever lines to open the conversation.

So it’s a free for all, including mutual fund managers, personal bankers and insurance agents, Facebook friends, cute boy in the yoga class, PR insects, or anyone in your mailing list. And everyone deserves a thank you.

I somehow grew up on minimal birthday fuss in my childhood (being a May baby meant not being able to flaunt the birthday cake the mother baked, as most of the friends and neighbours were off to cooler climes, wearing polo necks and skiing or rolling in snow, ala Rishi Kapoor and Neetu Singh of yore), but birthdays have been getting more and more populated as I justify my greys. Almost enough to have a ready template for replying to messages/calls/emails.

As for the mother, the husband, the siblings, the BFF, the favourite aunt and cousin, birthday wishes are a given and slighting in any way will be an unpardonable offence, so they stick to what they do best, i.e celebrate you.

But outside of that, almost anyone has a free chance to “like” you on your birthday, or use terms of endearment, everything in the past forgiven. For potential crushes or fans, birthdays are an open window in the era of Facebook. Whether it’s the wall or a message is a choice they have to make, and whether to reply or not is a choice you have to. But how can one ignore a birthday wish? It seems wrong, somehow.

For contentious relationships, birthdays are a way to tell you, “Yes, I am still pissed, so I am not going to wish you on your birthday, see!”

So there were people who were conspicuous by their absence. May be my acerbic tongue might have said something they didn’t want to hear. May be we have outgrown each other and our friendship has reached its expiry date. May be it’s a decadent relationship that has lost its fire and is not worth stoking any more. May be we are just not into each other like we used to be. May be they just don’t have Facebook or birthday calendars or phones with reminders or just a good memory.

And then there are the excuses. “Oh, no, my Facebook page isn’t showing birthdays anymore.” Or, “I forgot to put a reminder on my phone.”

For unresolved romances or relationships that haven’t had closure, it’s a point of re-entry. “Yes, I still have feelings for you. See how I can’t seem to get your birthday out of my system?”

So ex-boyfriends, new flames, admirers and fans (not that I am trying to show off but you know what I mean) can all happily coexist under the birthday radar, say their piece and leave, if only to return after a whole year.

But then, as they say, keep the good energy flowing. It can never hurt, can it?

To many

I thought one of the best things about not being part of an organisation is not having to deal with Lotus Notes on a daily basis. It was as though writing emails was a necessary evil and the most preoccupying thought while writing a mail was who do you mark it to, and in what order. It has always been a tough one for me, so I took the alphabetical way out and pretended it was the norm and nothing untoward happened, so I kept at it.

Sometimes, figuring out who stands where in the order of hierarchy and therefore in your mail is enough to give you ulcers. How do you decide who’s the recipient and who’s the cc when there is a very thin line? Do you have to cc all that cc you? Can anyone butt into a cc chain, even though they haven’t been addressed/spoken to? Does every mail have to be grunted to, even though nothing in it is of any consequence to you? As for the bcc, well, that’s another can of worms. Whoever invented it had a devious little mind and I am sure is having a hearty laugh.

May be all HR departments should conduct an email orientation to new employees explaining the fine nuances of mail protocol, because sooner or later, it will become the bone of contention.

Ironically, I am married into a reply-all family and one of the toughest things about the marriage is keeping people ‘in the loop’. I did it for a while, and even believed in the theory that cyberia is the best thing that happened to the modern family, but after a series of back-patting and wowing at pictures and things, I realised it is not my scene, so I have now left the husband to do the dirty work, which of course he hasn’t done in months.

Having said that, I am still slightly embarrassed about having mailed people to “Become a fan” of this column when a friend set up a Facebook page for me. It seemed vulgar. But as my friends and husband suggested, it’s the age of self promotion, and the whole world is doing it, so what’s wrong with it? I am still ambivalent about it, but the damage is done.

As for forwards, it’s plain lazy. And the closer you are to me, the more I hate a forward from you. That’s about it. There are mails about making the world a better place, but only if you forward it to nine other people, else you will be doomed. Then there are those about life-threatening substances in your blood or deodorant or garbage liners and how, if you don’t do anything about them, you will die in 64 days.

The joke spammers are another lot. I know funny is funny and sharing laughter is such a noble thing and all that. And there are the inspirational messages on how to be happy (while all you are thinking of is how to get rid of this person without hiring a supari killer) and what is life and love and other deep four letter words. But do me a favour. Surprise me. For once.

Sheikh-en and stirred

It's funny how moving away from your immediate habitat puts you in a neutral space almost as you enter your port of take off. I have always been an inveterate traveler and to me, it is the best way to declutter your mind. You are suddenly insulated from all the stuff that gets to you, even though you are the same person and capable of feeling essentially the same things, there is a kind of distillation that happens to your thinking.

Traveling sort of neutralizes you. It’s like sometimes life gets to a point where there is too much acid or too much alkali and then you add the opposite of what it is and render it to pH seven. And strangely, all seems well. People who travel a lot will get this, and will also get the fact that it’s not where you go, or who you go with, but whether you really do.

As mother to a ten-month old, I have been strangely dissuaded from my adventurous spirit by “How will you manage? What about food?”, and other such banal preoccupations, so I figured I will start small. So with baby slung on my shoulder and a suitcase full of adventure, off I went.

So here I am, on a holiday in Dubai and for once, I don’t have any male-bashing to do. The Sheikhs with their clichéd harems actually turned out to be the gentlest men, full of charm and niceties, and having an infant in my arms seemed to have more perks than I had imagined as far as breaking lines and being driven in airport carts went.

The husband is away, and hasn’t done anything to annoy me in the last six days, the parents and siblings are also at bay, thanks to a deactivated roaming facility, so life feels quiet, and sort of contemplative.

As for the cats, their absence is not being felt that much, thanks to a resident feline seductress who goes by the name of Misri and who has a not-so-strange duvet-excavating kink that fluctuates between endearing and exasperating, but she doesn’t really give a damn.

The infant is, to my relief, adaptable, and has been so from the word go, even though he has been breathing a fairly sterile air for the last few days. He of course couldn’t differentiate between the well-manicured porcelain-faced airhostess smiling beatifically at him, and the farsan-eating, bush-shirt wearing passenger next door, who was constantly asking the stewardess for “Cock” and whose shiny watch dial the infant took a shine for. To the child, almost anyone is worthy of a grin, the only prerequisite is that they should grin back.

And before I know it, there ends my jaunt in the mecca of shopping, where, ironically, I have done more food and beach than retail therapy, and where, to my relief, no one gives you the look if you stride up and down the beach in your bikini even though you haven’t exactly been on a size zero regimen for the last few weeks. May be it’s my arm candy.

Oh boy!

It is politically correct and rather fashionable to say that you can’t marry a man and expect to change him. So much so that we have started believing it. But almost every woman I know is subtly and steadfastly working on her man to at least change him enough to be able to live with him. For instance: Change what he eats. How often he sorts his paperwork. What he wears. What he buys. How much he talks. How much he doesn’t talk.

For most men, marriage is the ultimate and possibly, the cheapest rehabilitation program. Let me officially rechristen it to MRP (Man Rehabilitation Program). Coincidentally, MRP in its other avatar is a trivia most men love staring at. For example, the husband examines every bit of packaging, from a tooth brush to a jar of mustard for manufacture and expiry dates. Funnily enough, my father does the same, and so does my brother, and the former even sniffs everything like a dog would.

As if one MRP wasn’t enough, most of us are on multiple ones. I am on four, since I have a father, brother, husband and son.

I know what my friend meant when I told him I was taking a baby sabbatical and he said, “No, you are not. You are making a man.”

Had it been a girl, would he have said, “You are making a lady?” I guess not, because it is assumed that unless something really untoward happens, all girls grow up to be ladies and there’s really no work required. For boys, everything is a work in progress, whether they are seven or seventy.

Most of us have had fathers, brothers or both as projects when we were growing up, and did our best to redeem them. They either ate badly, flung clothes around, smoked too much, played the television too loud, messed up the kitchen, had bad friends or were just being themselves.

Yet, we go and get married. And then wonder, how did the men get by life thus far? And let’s not even get into lousy wardrobes, bad accessories, cholesterol friendly eating habits, electronics overdose or retail junkiness.

And then some of us go and give birth to men. And then actually end up doing more work in not getting him to turn out a certain way.

Curiously, the rehabilitation never ends. And the men aren’t really complaining, although it is considered macho to whine about it in male company. But secretly, they are grateful that someone finally makes them look good.

The husband has one redeeming feature though . The love for order. On a totally superficial level, but there it is. Call it OCD or what you may, but it gives me one less thing to do. Perfect.

Woman, uninterrupted

Something happens when a stunningly attractive woman walks into a group of men and women. The pH of the atmosphere changes. Things go from alkaline to acidic in seconds and the room is not the same again. Women are visibly disconcerted and men are ridden by part-anxiety and part-curiosity.

So she was hot. And chiselled. And funny. And kind. And friendly. And well turned out, despite the bikini-top-under-black-mini, with visibly no intentions of getting into her bikini avatar (good call on her part, considering the gentry floating).

The girls at the brunch wanted to know who she was, her back-story, her status vis-a-vis the guy she was with, so that they could compute how often would they really bump into her and whether they should bother being nice, or just pretend she never happened.

The boys wanted to know if she was really ‘with’ the one she had come with, or did they stand a chance at all, considering he wasn’t exactly a Greek god.

In short, she generated enough ripples to last the afternoon, which was not difficult as the only other ripples were tsunamis in the micro-pool generated by a bunch of somewhat gauche men who had no qualms about jumping into the water in their underwear, boxers or briefs notwithstanding.

It’s a tricky thing, being hot and attractive. While it’s ok to be hotter than the lowest common denominator who could be Ms Thunder-Thighs-still-wearing –her-high-school-clothes or Ms Bad-Make-up-camouflaged-by-uglier-sunglasses, or the I-am-two-sizes-too-small-pink-top, it is technically a crime to:

a) Be a stranger in a party and be the hottest thing around.

b) Be hotter than the girl women are not afraid to call hot, because men don’t find her hot, so they are not in the reckoning anyway.

c) Be hot and nice/clever/funny at the same time.

So then, the men didn’t speak to her—probably thought she is so stunning— what if she rejects us outright? And the women seemed disgruntled as the objects of their affection were somewhat distracted.

It struck me that while people are fairly okay celebrating the average and the mediocre and thumping each other on the back, when it comes to truly superlative beauty or brains, the world prefers to stay quiet, almost aloof. I wondered why. Beauty always comes with the ‘guilty-until-proven-innocent’ baggage, and so it was for the girl in question.

The only one who was truly democratic about it was my ten-month old who approved of her the minute she played his (current) favourite peek-a-boo game and passed his test. She was excited. So was he. They bonded. She stood a chance.

She had him at peek-a-boo.

Thank god for children.

Head over heels

Dear Harsha Bhogle, Virender Sehwag, Jackie Shroff, Akshaye Khanna, Salman Khan and millions of other men who have spent fortunes getting their manes repaired.

Why?

I cannot understand what makes men (and some visibly sensible ones at that) go in for hair transplants (or weaves or whatever they call them these days).

I am sure they feel like a million bucks (especially after spending something that’s close to that), but do their women think they do?

I can understand if they have moved with their new manes to an entirely new habitat where no one knows you and you can start all over again, pretending it was always like this. But what intrigues me is walking into a party where everyone and his dog knows that it is a crop acquired overnight (or however long it takes).

I wonder who their women are, and what they thought of the idea. Did they not feel the slightest trepidation, cupping a manufactured mane in their hands, and fearing that they might damage it? I would be worried silly if I dated such a guy and worry that I might be responsible for diminishing a wee bit of that crop every day even with my gentle ruffling.

Imagine Sehwag going, “Oh, that’s fifty thousand rupees worth hair gone!” every time a girl is sweet on him.

I can still get it if you are devastatingly good-looking, like a Johnny Depp and one fine day woke up to find your locks diminishing, you may have a case for some hair-engineering. But how many men who have had hair tragedies can really call their face their fortune?

A few handy tips for men on the verge (and believe me it’s nature’s way of saying that you may have to reinvent yourself):

· No hair is better than bad hair.

· A comb-over is a sure sign of a loser. Women run away from losers.

· Shaving your pate is one way to ensure you will never have a bad hair day.

· Think of all the money saved buying hair product and going to fancy hairdressers to cut hair that barely exists.

· Think of all the men you know who have gone bald. Now think back and remember them when they had hair. Which one is better?

Over to my men. The husband currently has a decent crop, which I fear is suffering gentle erosion by a certain hat he seems to have developed a fetish for. To the point when aunts have started asking me, “Why does he wear that? Is he balding?” Well, all I can say is that the son can sure learn the letter M from the father’s forehead at this point.

The son, on the other hand seems to have inherited the luscious and curly Iyer mop, so I don’t have to worry about him, at least for now. Unless the Y chromosome takes over as the dominant gene. Or he starts wearing hats too.

But I have an unofficial pre-nup with the husband which states that the day he starts visibly balding, he shaves his crop, because I will have none of the cover-up or hair cultivation business.

Hairrrumph!