drove a chevy to the levee ..

And I stood arrow straight
Unencumbered by the weight
Of all these hustlers and their schemes
I stood proud, I stood tall
High above it all
I still believed in my dreams

Twenty years now
Where'd they go?
Twenty years I don't know
Sit and I wonder sometimes
Where they've gone

And sometimes late at night
When I'm bathed in the firelight
The moon comes callin' a ghostly white
And I recall
I Recall

Like a rock.
standin' arrow straight
Like a rock,
chargin' from the gate
Like a rock,
carryin' the weight
Like a rock

Like a rock,
the sun upon my skin
Like a rock,
hard against the wind
Like a rock,
I see myself again
Like a rock

~ Bob Seger, Like a Rock

Der Sohn Spricht

In the years that have passed since
I've thought of you every single day
The pain has numbed
But hope hasn’t yet betrayed
I thought there’d be anger
But that’s never been my forte
I respect the choice to be far away, but
Love her much to stop the search halfway

If you do choose to return, maybe, we’ll have a smoke man to man
Exchange tales that only grown men would understand
Dread the moment when you shall not be missed
Can’t see it in the horizon even if the sun were kissed
In the years that have passed since
I've thought of you every single day
The pain has numbed
But hope just hasn’t betrayed

The Crazy Diamonds ...

Him: Okay, first things first. He is now the Greatest. Now, even greater than that stupid, tongue-drooping-out like a greyhound, drooling-in-spittle like a baby, Pistol Pee (for his name I shall not utter), that you so adored. With 15 slams and a French Open, the only thing that could have helped the Pistol remain the greatest was to have shot "The Greatest" with that rusted Pistol of his before this year's Roland Garros, or even better at Roland Garros. Alas, all Pistol could manage was to come dapperly dressed to Center court and wear dark shades to camouflage his weepy blood-shot eyes.
Her: Can you imagine my dilemma? I badly wanted Fed-ex to win, but if he does, Pistol's record would be broken and then I felt even worse when A-Rod broke down into tears. Do you even realise how difficult it was rooting for Fed-ex, feeling bad for Pistol and then feeling guilty about rooting for Fed-Ex when A-Rod cried. Gosh how could you not empathise and understand the pain.

She was never able to watch a Pistol-Pee match without having her face buried in her palms. Even when the Pistol was 40-0 up and serving for the match at 6-0, 6-0, 5-0. When he was younger he didn’t even try watching the greatest Germans ever to grace a Tennis court, Fraulein-Forehand and Boom-Boom-Bee, play. He loved them too much to want to watch them lose. In 1989, when he saw them on the cover of The Sportstar, posing at the Winners’ ball in SW19 he predicted marriage. He was even willing to play cupid. Nobody ever asked him to. The Fraulein went on to marry another of his favourites, The-Rebel-turned-comeback-kid-turned-elder-statesman. Incidentally, it was the 1999 Winners’ ball at Roland Garros that kicked off their romance, and of course, the Boom-Boom went on to screw a waitress in a broom cupboard at Cafe Nobu, Soho, London.

He didn’t like Pistol-Pee. He found him too drab. Uninteresting. She was the indulging elder sister. She cheered for all the ones he wanted to win. In the end she was the only one cheering as he wasn’t watching. And his "not watching bouts" extended to the Fed-Ex who would eventually become the greatest. The Spaniards’ turn will come too.

This is not about those hallowed gladiators who fight within the confines of the 78 feet X 27 feet battlefield. This is about us. Who could be the crazier of the two?

P.S: Will somebody put an end to his “him-her”/ “he-she” nonsense? He’s been on it for the last 3 posts now

but how ...?

00:54 A.M, Bangalore, 2nd July 2009
Exactly a score and nine years ago to the date, she was born to a militant Tam-bram family in a Chennai hospital. But, of course, it was Madras then. Her parents named her after a famous symmetric raaga in Carnatic music. For all practical purposes, she was called Ammu at home. After toying with various names he had settled on Ammu as well. He was too lazy to think of something that sounded cool, imaginative and Tam-bram. Now, thinking back he knew it wasn’t the laziness. Cool, imaginative and Tam-bram was actually impossible. She had settled down in London. Like most years when he wasn’t around, he called to wish her. Like most of the time when her phone wasn’t around, he hit her voice mail. He decided to send her a text message. Inspired by friends who had brainwashed him on the virtues of predictive texting he decided to try it. He had just started to get the hang of it after an intensive one-on-one session with the guru of predictive texting. In his eyes there was no bigger guru. No better guru. He typed “Ammu” frantically. It came on as something else in English. He wanted to spell the word to add it to the predictive texting list. He hit the send button.
20:24 P.M, London, 1st July 2009 (Daylight Savings Time)
She had just done her groceries at a nearby Tesco’s. She was at home sorting the stuff when she heard a beep on her phone. He was an old friend. As old as the hills. She opened the text message. It was a very short message. In fact, it had just one single word. “Boot”.