Novel

THE GREEN HOUSE AND THE BLUE MOUNTAIN

Chapter-2

Lessons

My early years were surrounded in the home. I played with fire, earth and water. Still water is a problematic element for me. Once it tried to wash out me from life. But I can’t resist the joys of water. I danced in the pouring rain. I went to fishing in the small ponds. Still, an overwhelming well is a wonderful treat to my eyes. After that swallowing episode Father, put a strong coconut wood across the well. In rainy seasons I went to this well and measure the water level with my eyes. Mother takes me to bath in the well side under a group of banana trees. Those mornings sun was pierced through the green banana leaves. I clap my hands and laughed with the colors.

Earth also gave pain to me. Once I was playing with sand and stones, one tiny stone went to my nostril. My cousin Biji took me to the primary health center, 5 km way from our home in his bicycle. I sit in the cross bar and mother take the back seat carrier. Dr.Tharakan took the tiny stone and he patted my cheeks. After that episode I was shunned to touch the stones. Animals were my playmates at that time. Black dog was my sole companion. We sit together and wait for Father at evening. He roared to the cocks who had tried to enter the home. I wept when he died after consuming an ill meat.
I cried three days. We buried him under a rubber tree. I put large stones to remember his tomb. Later years I read, Budha confronted death in the similar way.

These days my name falls like tag into my soul and body. Everybody yelled ‘James do that and don’t do that.’ When I try to climb a tree or try to throw a stone or try to tear a book this yelling irritated me. Once I hit our small lamb with a stick Mother had seen my act and hit me by the same stick. My pleasure turns to be a sudden pain. But I wondered when a visitor came to our home Mother sadistically kill a cock .Its drooling blood dipped through the way and it eyes jutting out from the socks.

At the age of 3 I went to the house of the traveling master. Master lives in the mountain.
One day Mother took me to the mountain road and after a long walk we entered a small thatched home. I remember 4 or 5 pupils sit in the verandah and write something on a dried coconut leaf and they yelled Aa…Aaaa..Ee…Eeee…. Mother enrolled me to the class. Master smiled to me. Mother told me that this master traveled to the rich houses in the village and teaches letters to the students. We are poor so we have to come to this hut regularly. Master put some rice to the mat and I sit in his lap, both of our fingers sketch in the rice…Harisree Ganapathaye Nama.

(Will Continue…)

Novel

THE GREEN HOUSE AND THE BLUE MOUNTAIN

Chapter-1

Birth Pangs

His mother says “It was a rainy day. It started at the evening. His father was away. Kalikochu and the black dog were with me. It was a normal delivery. He was a small bony boy. Kalikochu midwifes me to deliver him. His father came at night. Pain and panic make me in deep slumber; I still remember he cried nightlong. Rain was pouring. Small kerosene lamp flickered in the whistling wind. In sleep I heard Kalikochu‘s hoarse lullabies.”

His father says “I am a painter. Not an artist. I paint walls and fences. That day I was away with my work. It was a huge bungalow in Thiruvalla. It was the final day of our14 day long commission work. Team leader Pappachan gave 200 Rs. to me. We were happy, on the way back we visited a toddy bar, Pappachan paid the bill. It was raining. When I reached our small hut I heard his voice.”

Kalikochu says “They are Christians, but good people. I used to do small domestic duties for them. Kunjumol considered me as her mother. It was a killing pain. There was no one in the home and in the neighborhood. I prayed to all my deities. It ended with 45 minutes. I take the baby. I washed him. He cried”

I was born in a small, poor family. My ancestors were farmers; they came in this mountain side and settled in the valley. When my mother came to this place as a new bride this place was surrounded with thick forest. Jackals and foxes were the daily visitors in the back kitchen. When my mother was conceived with me she fell in the well.
This well was a small one, surrounded with moss and green sprouting.

We had a good stock of cattle and poultry, 3 cows and 4 cubs, 2 goats, 2 dozen hens and chicks, a cat, a dog and a parrot. Mother and cattle roamed through the rustic village and neighborhoods. At night we heard howling of foxes. I cherished that lullabies.

No snuggies and no Johnson & Johnson. Visitors came to visit us. Mother talked and gossiped. Sleep and smile, which was my role. My maternal grand mother came with her home-made medicines to rejuvenate mother. My Christianizing ceremony was conducted in much gaiety. Cousin Elson carried me to the parish. A small congregation surrounded in the altar. Priest showered the holy water into my head. They called me ‘James’.
(Will Continue…)

Old Church

In my Christian childhood I used to visit my country church usually. Its moss eaten walls were damp and green. Doves always perched its roofs. Always its altar emitted the smell of camphor. Old church is situated in a scenic hill side. Its silence always interrupted by whistling winds. Surrounded by blue misty mountains it became vanish from view in winter. Its thorny bush path is surrendered to grass sprouting. Its tall bell tolls on Sundays and call the worshipers for worship. Sin and solace…love and lust…these 4 words nailed me into a cross. Today I found 4 wounds in my body. I heard the heart piercing bell toll of our old church

A Love Poem and a Lollypop

A lollypop and a love poem have same ingredients. Licking a lollypop and loving a love poem is same. One comes with a stick and the other comes with a prick. One quenches the thirst of lips and other quenches the thirst of hearts. One sticks in the lip and other thick in the tongue. Swallow a lollypop and a love poem; the end result will become sweet. The shape of a lollypop and the shape of a love symbol is same, heart. Gifting a lollypop and writing a love poem will attract others. The color of a lollypop and the color of a broken heart are same, red. One helps to cherish your childhood and the other helps to recoup your romance. One helps to hanging out with friends and other helps to hang in a tree. Overeating of lollypop leads to dysentery and the rereading of the other leads to death. Both are momentary happiness. At last, a stick and a kick last.

Lodges

Long 5 years I lived in 12 lodges. Today I am longing for a lodge to sit idle and simply recollect my old agonizing life. For a bachelor a lodge room is his first love. It is his comfort place in a complex world. From this dark room he dreams his new dawn.
Loneliness in a lodge is like locking you in a large room. Loving and lodging is two different things.

When a lover is gone back from his lover’s lap to the lodge is quiet agonizing. I went through this torturing period when I was a lodge dwelling lover. When I was a student of Journalism in Press Club Trivandrum my first lodge was Bhaskara Bhavan. My classmate Thomas was my first roommate. Every lodge room has its own rotten smells. Our room stinks like an old sheet used by generations. Its floors always flourished with foamless cigarette buts. We share a small cub board. Thomas sleeps like sloth in the whole day and I went to my love’s meeting points. Every lodge has its bunch of broken humans and broken animals. We had an interesting character in our lodge, a problematic post master, in salary days this man came with food packets and feed the cats. Fish fry, chilly chicken, parotta …and other eatables, amazing thing is that these crooked cats simply sit in the wall and wait for him in the feast day. This man had no relation to other human beings in the lodge. I had never ever seen he had even smile to a human being. When we had seen this fiesta while our pockets became empty we like to transform to a black cat..mewo…mewo……mewo…..( Will Continue..)

Resurrection from Routine

Resurrection is a word connected to Christianity and Cross. For me resurrection is recouping my life from routine. Today I rise early; normally I rest in bed till 7am.
I brushed my teeth before the first milk tea. Today I walked to the farm to fetch the milk. Today I will quit smoking, the great break for the day. I will found a new route to reach my office. Today I will try to help a human being. I will try to find happiness in every given moment allotted by god. I will try to smile like a small kid. I will start my story writing seriously. I will set my goals. God help me to let resurrect. Let me resurrect in the third day. I can’t stand the smell of this rotten tomb of routine.

My Guiltiest Pleasures

Theft ( Kleptomania)

As a kid I got kicks for shoplifting .In my childhood I stole stickers and candies from our crook old shop keeper. This shop keeper was a land lord in our village; his estates include paddy fields, coconut groves, rubber estates, banana groves…etc. Vast vicinity of these lands subjected to our playground. Exploring and excavating through these jungles we found falling coconuts, arc nuts, ripped bananas and other sellable commodities. My companions always depute me to sell the commodities to the old shop keeper. He always calculated the lowest prices to the products. After collecting the cash with a palpitating heart I feel the deepest guilt and a highest pleasure. But I left this theft pleasure.

Smoking

Smoking is my greatest guiltiest pleasure. Started at the age of 16, still I had continuing this cruel, killing habit. My first smoking experience is worth writing. Once, after picking a 555 cigarette from my Papa’s packet I slip to the shade of the haystack, gazing to the cow shed I smoked. After completing the cigarette I went to my room, an alarming cry alerts me to look at the terrific scene. Haystack got fire.
I was subjected to 25 flogging. Still when I burn the cigarette I can feel the smell of burning haystack.

Peeping

Fetishism
Sorry, you know, I can’t narrate.

( Will Continue…)

Tips

Dating tips, mating tips, cooking tips, fixing tips, dieting tips, traveling tips, driving tips, gardening tips, cleaning tips, jogging tips, yoga tips, planning tips, pregnancy tips, feeding tips, beauty tips, body tips, reading tips, writing tips, exhibition tips, exhibiting tips, memory tips, management tips…we are living in ‘tips’ surrounded world. I think tips are meant for easy doers. Normally it comes in 5 numbers. One of my Aunty had good collections of these tips, wherever she found a Malayalam woman magazine, especially Vanitha or Grihalakshmi she tore the ‘tips’ page and put it in her bag with a nice smile. When the situation needed she vomits her vast tips knowledge. In Malayalam language ‘tips’ is considered as Podikaikal. Normally tips are written in questionnaire form, How to erase an oil mark in your shirt, like stuff. I fed up with these tips thicken magazines.

5 Tips to avoid TIPS

Do not touch a Malayalam Magazine.

Tips are written by editors, not experts.

Experiment with tips is experience with chance.

Truths behind the tips are always false.

5. Stick to a tiny tip? Sit down and think.

My Aunt’s Home or Wuthering Heights

Coiling roads lead the bus to the hill top. Embers of the evening sun pierced through the thick woods. Bus took sharp turn on the curves. Chilling wind circling through the woods .Bus is almost vacant. The bus has to viand two circling coil to reach my station. I had to cross a stream to catch my aunt’s home. Bus has stopped. Its headlights headed to the mountain top after a short while. I stepped in the stream, steeping through the black rocks it ended in the deep fathom. 3 years had passed. Flicker of the light gleaming from the bleak house. Instead of ‘Aruvikkuzhi’ I like to name the home as ‘Wuthering Heights’.

In my childhood my vacation visits were ended in Wuthering heights. Memory of those vacation days and its happiness was the fuel for my quick visit. I cherish that good old days, morning summer walks to the mangrove, bath in the stream, candle lit dinners. Neighborhood is an odd word here. What makes Aruvikkuzhi as Wuthering Heights? Is it its hilly existence…? Or is it its chilly winds howling through the rubber trees? Otherwise is its tumultuous Catherine like human characters? Elson is exact the copy of Catherine, I remember her rustic and at the refined passions, I remember her white frock with the blue flowers, I remember when she sings in the church coir her music reverberated in the altar.
Admirers and lovers try to tackle her.

But Aunt gave her hand to a Heathcliff. That matrimony ended in mutual distaste and divorce. Elson ended her life in the stream.

I pressed the Calling Bell. Traveling through the tunnel like rooms ring tone echoed in the mansion. I heard the rustle of frock, hand unlock the heavy latch of the wood door.
My host, ghost of Elson; welcomes me with a candle light.

Cinema Paradiso or Lakshmi Theatre

In my childhood I have to feed the cow to get permission to watch movies from our nearest country Cinema Theatre. After laboring with the lazy cow over our green pastured mountain tops I went to Lakshmi Theatre to watch the matinee show. Normally I got 2 Rupees from Amma to take the first raw ticket. There were no chairs and benches in the first raw, the spectators should sit in the mat. In those days Lakshmi Theatre was a thatched one, it walls were covered with bamboo mats for sound proof, and there is no fan to beat the heat for the first raw sitters. Still I remember the thrill of my first film. It was a Mohanlal hit, Irupatham Nootandu, the story surrounds with a under world don, Sagar Alias Jackey, emerged from a down trodden life he became the don and finally the hero turns to be a oppressor of evil forces. There is particular background score in the movie
Tu…Tu…Tudotu…Tu..Tu…Tu..Tudotu………………. For the entire movie time the first row sitters should raise their eyes and torso to catch the film. First row sitters was the perfect film buffs, they shrill at every twists and turns of the cinema. Once I had seen, when our movie house played Ahashadootu., an iron-built man sobbed with full heart.
That was the first moment I had realized and wondered that screen can make a man sob.
As a boy I had thought that these actors are acting behind the white screen, one day, after the show I went to the backside of the theatre to check the reality, but I had only found the brick wall. Lakshmi Theatre was a strong presence in our life, at nights its jarring speakers emitted hit Malayalam music, traveled through Rubber tree tops these music reached our home, lullaby to infants. My first encounter with sexuality was happened at Lakshmi Theatre, screen had showed me the enigma of white women flesh, and I shuddered. After this great revelation I revolved round to see more white flesh, screen pacified my thirst.

Home-Coming

Last Saturday I went to home. When I sit in the train a trail of thoughts followed me. I had purchased a Doll Monkey and a Teddy Bear for my brother’s daughter. Rain and train had started at the same time. Rain drops drooling through the window panes like drooling saliva of a baby’s mouth. Yes it is home-coming. A roof and a room are waiting for me. I enjoyed the sheer pleasure of thinking up on it. My co-passengers were in deep slumber. Often a tea boy or a peddler had visited our room. A bookseller exhibited his stuff to the idle sitters. Vasthushatra, Better Sex, Gardening etc. I sipped the over sweated milk tea. Whenever I think on my home I had a deep feeling about it. When I was a kid our home was a thatched one surrounded with splendid trees. Rainy days it showers through our bed rooms. My mother had defended the dipping leaf holes to put another leaf to cover the shower. As a boy I experienced the habit of wetting in midnight with the help of rain drops. Yes it is home coming. I adore my beautiful home which situated in the mountain side. Like a Haiku I love my home

Spring rain-
Under trees
A crystal stream- Basho