An unsung note

Reading about a random rant on someone's blog....

sometimes you could become so insignificant to someone you wanted so badly that it all becomes unecessarily signififcant....

Spoke to J for about an hour straight through an entire party snuck away in a corner with everyone throwing us curious looks

But I couldn't care...Here was a guy speaking to me about how pathetic it is to know someone loves you, someone you share a compatibility with so good enough that you doubt you will ever find it again. J is going through a testing time because he is in a long distance relationship and he really likes this girl but the time period and distance don't seem feasible. I told J he reminded me of someone I lost recently, lost to miles and lack of conviction. Just hearing him talk about fidelity and attachment was enough to want to encourage him to do whatever suits him for now. And that was hypocritical, because I've been the girl on the other end, had it all offered and had it all taken away because of someone being uncertain or simply not interested in seeing what they initially believed worth pursuing to it's logical end (whatever that might have been)

I heard him out , answered questions about my past, immediate and further back....and also committed myself to being his DP/ cameraperson for a pilot of an wildlife series (it never hurts to fantasize)

And as I stepped out of his car, we shook hands, agreed to do a meal and then these words tumbled out

j: "A lot of bad things happen, but life has too many beautiful things to offer. So try to remind yourself of that"

r: "Let's touch base in 5 years and then see if that's true"

And he said.......... "Knowledge is Good" :)

It's the existential debate. Art for art's sake ? On those lines...visual content for the sole purpose of entertaining the public or empowering them? Educating and enlightening them of realities they would be otherwise unaware of? I am fighting for words here, partially excited with the endorphin rush I am presently experiencing thanks to the developments of this evening and also because days like this one make me want to thank my stars (and my sister! and of course my own decision to pursue a Masters) for bringing me to Newhouse, to Syracuse University and well the US!

The Human Rights Film festival at Newhouse School opened tonight with 'The Response': a 30 minute film based on actual transcripts of trials at Guantanamo Bay. Stellar performances by all especially Asif Mandavi (from The Daily Show ) and wait for it...Peter Reigert! Now for those of you who are wondering why that actor's name is followed by an exclamation mark, Peter Reigert was one of the lead characters in the iconic film 'Animal House' (1978 directed by John Landis). If I was back in India watching this film, I perhaps wouldn't have got the cultural significances, subtle political/literary commentary and the brilliant screenwriting. I did because I watched it in Robert Thompson's 'Critical Perspectives in TV and Film' class this summer and I am so glad I HAD to take it. It opened up a whole new way of critiquing, analysing and viewing visual content like never before.

Coming back to 'The Response' (http://www.theresponsemovie.com/) and what this film aimed at doing in terms of debating the US policy ( post 9/11 suspected terrorists were denied fundamental rights of defending themselves granted to 'military' combatants under the Third Geneva Convention. I am not an expert on the subject although I did get the gist so I highly recommend looking up these on the internet). Here I am - listening to human rights advocates, activists, a Captain from JAG (NOT the TV series silly! I mean THE U.S NAVY JUDGE ADVOCATE GENERAL'S CORPS) the producer of the film - one of only three TV and Film Grad students to attend the screening and panel discussion amidst 200 other law students and I found myself thinking "Did I do the right thing by leaving Journalism and the Broadcast News industry behind? Am I deluding myself with the idea that I can tell the kind of stories that need to be told through mainstream TV and Film by walking down the path a Producer/Director/Screenwriter would take? And if I do, which way do I go? East coast Independent film/ Documentary or West Coast Development/ Feature Film and TV series?

So I wait for the panel discussion to end and I speak to Mallika Dutt to get an idea of what Breakthrough is about and if I can write to her to get a better sense of whether people like me work with Human Right advocate groups to create their visual campaigns etc. And then I contemplate approaching Reigert but I am almost too shy, so I am being egged by a friend about making 'that conversation'. I hesitate for a few moments, feel very stupid for not making the most of every opportunity I am being presented with and I act on my impulse at this very epiphany. I turn around and walk straight up to him, introduce myself and ask him for 2 minutes of his time.

That 2 minutes turned to a 25 and Mr Reigert and I spoke about Downtown NYC theatre artists vis-a-vis Hollywood actors, his experience with both New York and LA, why it would make sense to go one over another and I got a whole lot of advice I had not anticipated I would ever have heard from an actor here at Newhouse :D I am so glad I did. Thank you Mr Peter Reigert. And he was so happy to hear that atleast Jessica and I had got his joke when he started his commentary in the discussion with the one now almost iconic corny line from the opening scene of Animal House: 'Knowledge is Good'. As I shook his hand to say goodbye, I couldn't help but reiterate it.

So what did I take away from this evening, from the panel members' debate, from the movie and from my rendezvous with Peter Reigert. Well I can only do justice to that question by quoting him for somethings he said today. As an actor he would have played any one of the roles in The Response with "as much integrity" as he played his (the only Captain on the tribunal convinced that the suspect was to be absolved of all charges) Peter also said that as aspiring artists "in the end you do your job and you do it well" .

I hope to use my craft and skills in mainstream TV/Film so as to fund and create visual content on themes that need to reach a larger audience. And I intend to keep that promise regardless of what lies ahead. Sometimes it really is about "doing your work, paying your bills and then fueling your passion for the things you believe in" but most of all as Peter said, I continue to remind myself of this:

"Am I who I say I am

Or am I what I do?"

It's absolutely splendid to be back in school!

***Pachelbel Canon***

Almost three weeks ago, I was sitting under a dimly lit dome, its ceilings adorned with stain glass frescoes tinged red and black. It was my first day at Central Park West that day....and as they played Pachelbel Canon, I found myself rooted to my spot. I couldn't breathe and I wasn't aware of the 40 odd people gathered around those student musicians.......

The music rose to a crescendo and I was suddenly conscious of how much I belonged to a moment which I could not have, a moment in an alternate universe where you stood by me here at CPW on a cold Saturday evening... an evening we could have had no matter how tough the distance would have proved....perhaps if you hadn't given up and said good bye. And as goosebumps made their way onto my skin, a tear and then more rolled down my cheek. You were miles away so I took out my phone to just have you share that moment with me. It didn't matter that you didn't see this work ...it didn't matter

But I made that call half-way through and put my cell phone away......not knowing if you would understand or even try to.....

At times like these...

At times like these, the need to call you is the most,

Not for assurances or re-assurances

Of questions from my end to you

Asking why we couldn't be

Just to share yet another eventful day or the most

To hear your silly joke or curious question in the end

To know you get it and if you don't

You'd stop me and ask and nod and smile

At times like these the need to call you is the most,

When I have no one but myself to speak to

To muse at what I have seen and understand how it will change me

Just having you hear the same makes it more significant

For your companionship and wise words

Not for sweet nothings, they were not you

For your silent chuckles and heart warming smile

That made me want to dissolve the virtual space between us

And sit beside you ....miles away

At times like these the need to call you is the most,

And yet I hold myself back not knowing whether you feel the same anymore

Shabbat & Full Moon

This weekend was quite unique. I had the opportunity of being a part of two very different cultural and gastronomic events. Friday evening was spent at J's place. She and her landlady (also her roommate) invited me over for a 'shabbat' meal. In Judaism, shabbat is the seventh day of the Jewish week and is a day of rest wherein the family congregates together eating three special meals. Also, it is a time when the Jewish community contemplate the spiritual aspect of lie often atoning for mistakes made over the year. J is one of the most wonderful and extremely intelligent women I have met and I doubt I will meet more like her. Sometimes you meet women who are so effervescent, charismatic, funny, caring and the easiest to get along with and you almost wonder why you can't just have a guy version of her :P I know two women I would very much like to meet. More on that later. Anyways, going back to the shabbat meal, we had squash soup, cauliflower gratin, a salad with roman lettuce, tomatoes, blue cheese and balsamic vinegar (I'm hooked on to this thing) and khallah, the traditional bread which J baked herself. Knowing J, she always sets herself apart in some way so she baked the bread in a way that the inside was semi gooey...really nice :). There were 6 of us and we sat around the table, lit up with the candles (which are supposed to burn all night) rounded up with rosemary liek laurels resting around those candlestands. J and her roomie then took the candles to her forehead and what they sang next, rather the way they sang their prayers gave me goosebumps:

"Baruch ata adonai

Eloheinu melech ha'olam

Hamotzi lechem min ha'aretz"

That was just one part of the bread blessing....I think :)

Here's what it means and it's beautiful in its simplicity:

"Blessed are you O lord our God

King of the Universe

For giving us bread from the earth"

And we held the bread together and broke it after saying one more prayer (garrrh I should have taken a camera) and we blessed our wine and drunk it :)

So much conversation ensued I don't even remember the details. We spoke about our eccentricities as children and our parents and how much we love them. I asked about the NRA because H has a pistol at home and that just made me feel a bit queasy. It was interesting to listen to H's explanation about essentially "having the ability to protect oneself from one;s government if turned tyrannical. What would we socialists do?!!!!" hmmmmm

C spoke about different things, how he wants to have kids someday (that's the first American guy in my peer group I've heard wanting to settle down) and then trailed off for a bit ending on an ex girlfriend in Brooklyn and why it didn't work although she was great.......'the distance' he said and left me to pour some more wine and sink into mellowness. C was a journalist for the US millitary for 5 years before having to resign because of epileptic fits. He is the funniest I've met on campus so far and extremely talented. Hoping to cast him as John for the short film that my team directs this semester. Dropping me off he said "Well we all have the same concerns Ronnie regardless of which country we are in...we'll talk about this over more wine?" I smiled and agreed trying to hide my sadness about what he earlier said about distances by looking out of the window. Finally getting out, C called out to me just as i was walking away. He had his classic Woody Allen-ish horn-rimmed mega spectacles half-way down on his nose (which his colleagues apparently dubbed as the birth-control glass because it would never get him laid) and said 'hay hay' in the very goofy naughty way. These are my friends and I am grateful for always finding the most unique lot of them wherever I go.

Today, I was couped up in my room all day long, having 'Ramen' noodles for dinner and tring my very best to finish my auto-ethnography assignment in between fooling around my blogpost's weird kitschy purple new template. I had decided not to attend an Indian get together down the street "There will be a DJ!" read the facebook invite. And just generally shaking off clammy mellowness I tried focussing on my screen. Qi-bi called me out to the dining space and the table was laid out with a grill and fancy food. turns out today is the chinese Moon Festival, and it's marked by the family gathering together to eat a good meal. So I sat there with 5 Chinese students (Qi and Janey are from NYC) trying to understand the relevance of this festival, what the meat was marinated in, making jokes about how hopeless I was with chopsticks and nibbling away at the fantastic beef, tofu, chicken and prawns. Turns out American kids learn about Hindu gods in their curriculum. Janey was telling me more about Shiva than I knew! 2 hours later and a lot of meat and prawns down, Qi brought out 'ice wine' and we were all quizzed. I also had chinese 'moon cakes' and they were splendid. These are made from thick lotus seed paste that's surrounded by a relatively thinner layer and the centre of the cake is salted yolk from duck eggs.

Food for thought followed. Janey asked me and Qi whether we would date men who were shorter than us or younger. I said I could settle for someone slightly younger and Tink her friend did his best to convince me that "you should never date a guy who is younger to you because he will be emotionally stunted" ....hmmmm. The guys said they would not mind dating women who were taller to them :D That's a refreshing one. Wonder what they would have to say about older women ;)

Syracuse is getting colder after getting intermittently warm and damp. And I can feel the weather affecting my chain of thoughts. I feel it when I wake up in my bed and see the grey sky outside, I feel it when I go to my cold bed alone everynight, I feel it when I walk to school letting the draft make me shiver taking off my cap so I get used to this and I feel it when it rains and I can hear the cars 'ssssssshhhh' through the wet roads beneath my window. Coming to the US has definitely been more than what I expected from my campus life....even if the last month has been an unexpected low....there are just 8 months left to my academic life and I can only hope I'll do justice to all those 32 weeks..........only 32 weeks

TRIADS OF AN IN BETWEENER

It's been close to three weeks now...or so I would like to think. I am trying to pile on fictitious days since the last conversation. So much for cliches. They say time heals everything. I wonder if time can take care of yet another,yet again.... And while some say 'it's no big deal. Just give yourself 6 months. After all it was just 3 months". 6, 3.....how do weeks, months or years count as less significant for what you've felt for someone you shared your weekends with, the lows of your life back in a city that barely let you be, down pitchers of beer at your favourite pub, listen to the soft gurgling of the waves at PDP while the moon came up and shone down upon you two...mumbling on a port wine high.....or your best New Year first day..not the eve...the first day

I smile at people as much as I can. I always have and it's my defense mechanism to remind myself there are things to be happy about. Mom always has something very profound to say when she suspects something is amiss, even all these miles apart. "Happiness is a state of mind". But these days, I am barely concerned with being happy. I just want to be hopeful, believe that yet another 'let's end it and move on' is not something I will hear again. I seem to have adapted to a robotic like survival mechanism. Hear it all out, calmly ask reasons, ignore the brain which is screaming out all the things you really want to say before it's too late, before the other person begins the process of forgetting you, in bits and pieces, until you are a specter of an idea.

You on the other end, you are looking out at everything new and delightful, wishing to share all of it with someone half way across the globe and you take your steps further, a little by little, wondering why it could not be closer to what it could have been.....

Peremptory

Someone I know just came up with a nickname for me 'Ranjana Peremptory Mitra'

I realised of all the adjectives someone could come up with to describe one unique facet of my personality....this is it!

Immediacy, impulse...im......emmmmm...

It's difficult to tame your brain into rationale decision making when your heart insists you do the contrary.

Right now I could fly back to......and turn up at.....