“Why are you not writing?”
“Don’t you know it already? I don’t have time…”
“Is it the best excuse that you can think of? I know it’s not true!”
“How can you say that it’s not true…I spend half my fucking day in the office.”
“Doing what? Faking that you are working?”
“Hey, cut it! I do work…”
“Yeah, in that secluded corner away from prying eyes as if they would copy what innovative out-of-box solutions you are implementing.”
“No, it’s my desk there…and besides I cannot write there.”
“But you can study newspapers and novels there…”
“They don’t, they just don’t require me to think, do they?”
“As if you are putting it all in already…”
“Hey, there’s a lot of din there too!”
“Are you probing in your mind, simulating a scene of office trying to carve off an excuse?”
“No!”
“Yes, you are. That’s what you’ve always been, a …”
“Hey…”
“Ok, ok, but what about the other half of the day?”
“I am too tired!”
“Lolz…don’t fucking kid me; you are tired after reading newspapers and novels?”
“You are saying as if I don’t go the site at all…”
“Well, maybe you do, maybe I chose to sleep then, you don’t need me then, do you?”
“I don’t need you now either…”
“Pity, you cannot get rid of me, nobody can…I am you! “
“That’s the problem, and still you don’t understand me.”
“But why should I? You are clipping me, you are tightening screws on yourself…don’t
you see?”
“No, I am not. “
“Yes, you are…what do you do when you get home too ‘tired’ to write? Surf internet endlessly, read those worthless Page 3 news and those crap movies? And punctuate it with porn?”
“Hey…”
“Look, I am not afraid of baring it all…that’s what you really do!”
“I do not watch porn…”
“Yeah, and I am Mother Teresa!”
“Fuck off…”
“What’s been with the dreams? Have you forgotten Rabindranath, Rudyard Kipling?
Orhan Pamuk? What about Upamanyu Chatterjee, he is a civil servant too! At least you’ll end up being Chetan Bhagat…”
“I don’t want to be Chetan Bhagat, the rest…they are too high!”
“So is that your latest excuse, that the aims are too soaring to be achieved, hoopla too far?”
“That’s not an excuse; that is the reality.”
“And since when has reality started stymieing your path?”
“Look, let’s be practical…”
“Yeah, practicality, a sensible man’s excuse! So the romance has worn off, aye?”
“Yes.”
“And was it the only reason that you were writing for?”
“Was it not?”
“What about being the harbinger of change? The revolutionary?”
“There’s nothing to revolt against?”
“Ahh…I see, is that so? What about the Khap fiasco? The Indo-Pakistan talk’s failure?”
“I cannot find inspiration in them, they are not affecting me…”
“Gawd, can’t believe you are the same person who wrote about an alien civilization last month…You promised to write once a week, at least.”
“But if there’s nothing happening over the week worth writing on, then what can I do?”
“What about that last weekend’s trip to Mahaballipuram?”
“There’s nothing to write about a small town full of temples carved out of stones, besides there’s still much archaeological uncertainty about them.”
“And what about the weekend escapades to Chennai’s shopping centers/malls/bird-watching sanctuaries?”
“Oh come on…”
“How can you leave it to me to find something to inspire you?”
“Isn’t that what you are supposed to do?”
“Yeah…that’s exactly what I am supposed to do! What about college, has your heart
dried up?”
“No, but it is beginning to…Chennai’s heat has evaporated all of Dwarahat’s snow! Besides, no one would like to read me sulk about college any more…”
“So are you afraid of you reader’s reactions?”
“Well…”
“Oh, what a coward! How can you think like that? What happened to the philosophy of life?”
“Nothing, but then…”
“Oh yeah, your practicality, come on, one more lecture on it…”
“Oh spare me…”
“If only you would spare me! How about lost love?”
“There’s no lost love…”
“Are you sure?”
“Yes, I damn am!”
“But then why do you always force me towards…”
“Look, you drag yourself towards a closed chapter; you cannot blame me for it.”
“You know, you cannot lie to me.”
“I am not lying.”
“Tendulkar, once said that if one wants to be great that he/she better not lie to himself/herself.”
“I am not lying, I am only…and why are you dragging Sachin in this! Don’t try to get me sentimental…”
“Your sentiments, haven’t you killed them all already? Buried them in the coffin of past?”
“You don’t need similes to convey the idea…”
“I can and I will because I am a writer! But you, you are just a pathetic excuse for
a writer…is that what you have been impressing upon people? You are just a cunctator! “
