tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-35825012012-01-25T06:04:13.631-06:00Le ChaimMathangihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00544238015342512904noreply@blogger.comBlogger7291100tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3582501.post-32515546489375636462011-12-03T23:19:00.008-06:002011-12-05T14:06:03.829-06:00Memento MoriDev Anand died last week. He was 88. I feel a distinct sense of loss. For a figure I had almost forgotten and for a life I had tucked away. Dev Anand was no ordinary 88 year old. He was what the film magazines called the "evergreen hero"; one who had been acting since 1946 and hadn't delivered a hit or any movie of notice in the last two decades. This is the man credited with having "Mathangihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00544238015342512904noreply@blogger.com5tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3582501.post-48736671098579223802011-11-16T15:10:00.001-06:002011-11-16T15:15:33.932-06:00A Little ToothYour baby grows a tooth, then two,and four, and five, then she wants some meatdirectly from the bone. It's allover: she'll learn some words, she'll fallin love with cretins, dolts, a sweettalker on his way to jail. And you,your wife, get old, flyblown, and ruenothing. You did, you loved, your feetare sore. It's dusk. Your daughter's tall.-- Thomas LuxMathangihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00544238015342512904noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3582501.post-35984274522158012912011-11-13T16:26:00.002-06:002011-11-13T16:42:38.546-06:00Part Three: LoveLIIILet me not mar that perfect dream By an auroral stain, But so adjust my daily night That it will come again.-- Emily Dickinson (1830–86). Complete Poems. 1924.How to Build Cathedrals. Cildo Meireles, 1987Mathangihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00544238015342512904noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3582501.post-85491604328761136152011-11-07T21:55:00.002-06:002011-11-07T21:58:11.488-06:00A Story in 500 WordsNietzsche said that women make the highs higher and the lows more frequent. For who I wonder. I am a woman and I feel the highs higher and the lows more frequent. Am I becoming more woman? Is this what they call gendering?I have known for a while now that this might just be the end of life as I know it. The world is at war. Thinking does not lead to change. Television no Mathangihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00544238015342512904noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3582501.post-82758844421400721842011-10-16T22:48:00.004-05:002011-10-17T00:04:34.891-05:00We asked for workers, but human beings came instead. Agency is a tricky word. It is, in shorthand, the ability to be an agent. Of change, of value, of worth, even of identity. Choice writ large, intentionality writ small. Agency is a tricky minefield. If one understates it, one takes away the ability of people to represent themselves. For example, think of an oft-used fragment such as "The Mathangihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00544238015342512904noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3582501.post-58395941301395815622011-10-14T19:19:00.001-05:002011-10-14T19:26:13.342-05:00Friday FrivolityThe Philosopher's Drinking Song Immanuel Kant was a real pissant who was very rarely stable. Heidegger, Heidegger was a boozy beggar who could think you under the table. David Hume could out consume Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel, And Wittgenstein was a beery swine who was just as sloshed as Schlegel. There's nothing Nietzsche couldn't teach ya 'bout the raisin' Mathangihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00544238015342512904noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3582501.post-38980100410202269622011-09-28T13:46:00.006-05:002011-10-14T19:11:36.143-05:00Encounters with the Nation-StateYesterday, I had a parking ticket withdrawn. A conscientious policeman, having noticed that my registration plate was wrongfully displayed (the sign had fallen off to be precise), had stuck on a ticket for $55 on my windshield, thereby rendering me rather footstompy at the end of a taxing work day. In atypical bravado, I decided to contest the ticket, especially Mathangihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00544238015342512904noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3582501.post-14192944428287614672011-09-08T09:14:00.007-05:002011-09-25T22:29:51.335-05:00'Tis the end of summer daysFall is almost here. Well, actually, given that I have to wear two layers of clothing in the house, it is here. And I have so much to say that I'm suffering the problem of excess. This space will not contain everything, will it? So let's resort to our favorite way of making sense of the world. Lists. (a) Speaking of lists, here is a really cool list-making tool called Mathangihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00544238015342512904noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3582501.post-59286489545996379602011-08-04T17:17:00.007-05:002011-08-08T09:32:58.904-05:00Soup for the Soul
It is such bliss to have feet planted firmly in one place. Especially after scraping them all over endlessly precarious landscapes. My feet are wiser for the wear and I sleepier for the relatives who all insisted on waking me up at ungodly hours of the morning, which is why I am not even really sure if I'm back. But at least, I am temporarily in the place I currently call homeMathangihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00544238015342512904noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3582501.post-81563425208518600902011-07-28T01:37:00.002-05:002011-07-28T01:42:02.897-05:00Two PoemsI haven't found any words for a while now. I have let my world become fluid, loosened its borders, and let others in. I am now as a result most confused. Too many people, too many other worlds, too little meaning. But I will soon regain my world, tighten its words, and give it form. Once again. And it will have beauty, and power, and it will compel you. Until then, I give you other wordsMathangihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00544238015342512904noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3582501.post-59307336821722589492011-07-04T01:59:00.003-05:002011-07-04T02:48:42.943-05:00The Summer of DiscontentDream Caused by the Flight of a Bee around a Pomegranate a Second Before Awakening(1944), Salvador Dali. Thyssen-Bornemisza Museum, Madrid. ©Salvador Dalí, Gala-Salvador Dalí Foundation/Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York.Is this universal? Everywhere around me I see structures crumbling, people buckling, and things being not-so-even. I must admit that some of this is Mathangihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00544238015342512904noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3582501.post-79637703313023361922011-06-12T12:05:00.011-05:002011-06-14T02:10:47.438-05:00Five BooksAnd yes, that is precisely what this is about. Five books.Begin your week withThe Elegance of the Hedgehog; Muriel Barbery“Apparently, now and again adults take the time to sit down and contemplate what a disaster their life is. They complain without understanding and, like flies constantly banging against the same old windowpane, they buzz around, suffer, waste away, get depressed thenMathangihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00544238015342512904noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3582501.post-64141278414622299062011-06-10T02:00:00.007-05:002011-06-10T11:32:55.659-05:00On Art in a Disenchanted WorldOur survival as dare I say, members of a sensate class, depends on not just food, shelter, occupation, but on the idea of a full life. And into every full life, some art must fall. I am not going to escape the charge of elitism I know, but to my limited knowledge, art is not the prerogative only of the privileged classes, but of all communities, even if often Mathangihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00544238015342512904noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3582501.post-91932657583507321712011-05-30T02:44:00.002-05:002011-05-30T02:53:28.880-05:00BodyI feel fear. Not in an abstract fashion. But right in the middle of my chest. In a tight knot the size of a ping-pong ball. It is stuck in a mass of flesh and bone and struggles to escape, getting caught as it were in a whirligig of deepening complexity and stubborn ire. I feel tiredness. Where the bottom of my feet meet my ankles. It pulls at my blood and all of it flows downward to Mathangihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00544238015342512904noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3582501.post-39085924972696367082011-05-16T06:30:00.010-05:002011-05-16T22:14:52.620-05:00All about ManasiIt is the end of an era. Badal Sarkar has passed away. And mourn I must. Not because this is the end qua end, but because surely this is worth calling the end of something. If I were to be melancholic, I might claim that the vision of a certain kind of life-world is becoming sparse. But I am not. So then what kind of end are we contemplating? Badal Sarkar or Sircar, for those of Mathangihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00544238015342512904noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3582501.post-77057882203353486482011-05-07T14:39:00.006-05:002011-05-10T15:09:32.666-05:00Happiness is a stuffed brinjalAnd if you must be curmudgeonly and orthodox, fine, I know it is a sin to translate. Bharli Vangi it is. Although "Happiness is a bharli vangi" doesn't quite have the same ring now does it?So did you want an update from the last few weeks? I'll give it to you anyway. Three words. Austin, Tequila, Tacos. I miss the city, but in a good way. It is nostalgia of a Mathangihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00544238015342512904noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3582501.post-54451213692548496492011-04-28T09:57:00.007-05:002011-04-28T10:14:16.218-05:00Down & Delirious in Mexico City: The Aztec Metropolis in the Twenty-First Century---{Book Review and Guest Post by Susy Chavez]There is a legend that runs through artist circles in Mexico about the surrealist French photographer Henri Cartier-Bresson’s first visit to that country. They say Cartier-Bresson was so moved and overwhelmed with visual stimulation that he declared all one had to do to Mathangihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00544238015342512904noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3582501.post-87571188006226487862011-04-24T19:40:00.005-05:002011-04-24T20:05:06.280-05:00Panzanella and signs of middle-classnessEven as I talk about identity being fluid, and personhood as pastiche, there is still a value to certain core forms of identification. In my case, middle-classness. Or to be more specific, socialist Indian eighties-style middle-classness. While a really poor eater through my childhood and teens, I nevertheless absorbed that one core lesson that all my peersMathangihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00544238015342512904noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3582501.post-70330888235638498512011-04-23T12:59:00.010-05:002011-04-23T14:06:05.704-05:00Prodigal ReturnsOr not? Dear ole faithfuls, at the risk of boring you with the inordinately long tale of my absence, let me sum it up thus:(a) Travel(b) Conferences(c) Work crises(d) Travel(e) Work that I had to get to because I lazed around on the beach...And it is this last that should catch your attention because wait, isn't she in Wisconsin? Wasn't it winter? Where is the beach? Has she lost Mathangihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00544238015342512904noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3582501.post-1675812948478955162011-03-17T17:44:00.003-05:002011-03-17T18:58:34.686-05:00AbsencesI'm away folks. It's officially vacation time. Be back soon. Watch for more in the coming weeks. Vacations, that is....Mathangihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00544238015342512904noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3582501.post-53933132536122810872011-03-01T01:01:00.004-06:002011-03-01T13:08:07.181-06:00And in today's news...And if you're wondering what this is about, go here.Judith Davidoff writes:"When did Al Jazeera start caring about Madison, Wisconsin? That would be since last week, when the Qatar-based news agency contacted WisconsinEye for permission to use video of the tens of thousands of public workers and their allies who were swarming the Capitol to protest Gov. Scott Walker’s plan Mathangihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00544238015342512904noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3582501.post-34448518892002625702011-02-20T21:29:00.009-06:002011-02-21T18:10:15.143-06:00ArtificeTonight I am indolent. In half stupor. I see things clearly. I don't know it all. And I don't know you at all. But if I never know anything ever again, if I never know anyone ever again, it will still be enough. Tonight, I am the romance of the soul. Tonight, I am enough. Tomorrow, I will be awake. And ambitious. And dissatisfied. And yet, tonight I am enough. Even if profoundly Mathangihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00544238015342512904noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3582501.post-56691130763490190902011-02-19T18:43:00.003-06:002011-02-19T18:52:24.138-06:00KeywordsTo clap. To infuse noise and possibility and movement into life as is known. An act of ritual, of acceleration, of energy in lieu of movement, of the performance of speed in the hope that life will acquiesce.Wassily Kandinsky. Fugue. 1914. Oil on canvas. 129.5 x 129.5 cm. Private collection.Mathangihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00544238015342512904noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3582501.post-35480443324406464652011-02-17T22:07:00.002-06:002011-02-17T22:09:22.102-06:00Time OutUnusually busy week. One public lecture. Two big decisions. Three politically charged days. Now officially exhausted. One more day to go. Bear with me. Be back Sunday.Mathangihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00544238015342512904noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3582501.post-47004117245157257112011-02-15T19:13:00.005-06:002011-02-15T19:42:27.660-06:00The Female BodyTrawling my various online article feeds today, I found this gem:"South Dakota Moves To Legalize Killing Abortion Providers"Kate Sheppard writes, "A law under consideration in South Dakota would expand the definition of "justifiable homicide" to include killings that are intended to prevent harm to a fetus—a move that could make it legal to kill doctors who perform abortions...If Mathangihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00544238015342512904noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3582501.post-17776726208499306492011-02-14T16:19:00.005-06:002011-02-14T16:28:01.808-06:00Random responses...(and realities?)---[Guest post by Arshiya Bose]I'm writing from a small village in Konkan (Western India), where I'm doing PhD fieldwork. I have just started a survey/interview process in 8 villages and am quickly realizing that this PhD is not going to be as pretty as I had originally hoped! Yet the process of unravelling this mystery is exciting and I often feel like a Mathangihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00544238015342512904noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3582501.post-91799490590947351242011-02-13T20:55:00.008-06:002011-02-13T23:50:08.990-06:00Why would I go to Utah?The other day, a friend and I were making a list of must-see places in the US. Apparently, Utah is one of them. Of course, given that I'm rather committed to near-urbanity having lived in two almost-cities in the US and forever aspiring to a city proper, no bells rang. Utah? Really? The only reference I could remember to Utah was in one of the four Sherlock Holmes "long" Mathangihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00544238015342512904noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3582501.post-68701644657895679562011-02-11T23:41:00.004-06:002011-02-13T23:50:22.389-06:00Waiting and watching...what can I tell myself except that even though this isn't me, perhaps it is.Mathangihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00544238015342512904noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3582501.post-85814957709562042122011-02-10T21:39:00.003-06:002011-02-10T21:45:38.408-06:00On the Art/ifice of LoveA picture may well be worth a thousand words, but I'd honestly just have the thousand words instead. I am not sure, for example, if any picture could do what this poem does.(P.S Since we don't do Valentine's consider this my pre-Valentine offering)To His Coy Mistress Had we but world enough, and time,This coyness, Lady, were no crime.We would sit down and think which Mathangihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00544238015342512904noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3582501.post-11121212740079861192011-02-10T00:12:00.001-06:002011-02-10T00:14:42.438-06:00Business SchoolAnd that people, is your television fix recommendation for the year. Go watch "The Wire".Mathangihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00544238015342512904noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3582501.post-77344844302063844262011-02-08T23:45:00.002-06:002011-02-09T00:02:44.109-06:00Different StrokesI was considering a polemic on the nation-state and its component parts, and the myth we term unity even as we ignore its inconsistencies and violence. Rivetting eh? But I read this first thing in the morning and I think it says more, and rather, something else. Do go read Vivek Menezes' piece, "Bringing it All Back Home (To Shillong)" on 3quarksdaily.An excerpt:The story of Mathangihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00544238015342512904noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3582501.post-79645568795035278752011-02-07T21:01:00.005-06:002011-02-07T21:17:42.005-06:00The GAP in the vision-- [Guest post by Madhu]As someone prone to museum fatigue and precarious finances, I am only too thrilled to browse the colossal corridors of the Met or the Uffizi online. But I find the Google Art Project intriguing for other reasons. Having trawled museum websites for some time now, I am more interested in Google’s role in this ambitious project of digital curatorship/Mathangihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00544238015342512904noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3582501.post-52387101463189845752011-02-06T22:33:00.003-06:002011-02-06T22:44:47.306-06:00Quick fix SundaySundays are for sleeping in. And eating cold pizza. I don't know many people who love eating leftovers straight from the refrigerator. I do. Especially pizza.So last week, when my roommate C's brother was visiting, we threw together a quick pizza from readymade dough we picked up from the local bakery. Really smart way to make home-made pizza we realized.We rolled the dough on Mathangihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00544238015342512904noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3582501.post-57718425480928177872011-02-05T22:14:00.002-06:002011-02-05T23:02:16.479-06:00SpaceIt is a bit of an overused American stereotype, isn't it? The "give me space" line? As if each person needs this amount of physical distance between her/him and the next physical body and the next immaterial mind? As if closeness breeds incapacity? This is what I used to think. And yet, these days, I think I have more of an appreciation for physical space, for vastness, as far as the eye canMathangihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00544238015342512904noreply@blogger.com5tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3582501.post-20905371138911667792011-02-04T21:57:00.002-06:002011-02-04T22:07:26.391-06:00Note for the dayThis is the question that the night quiets and the dream fights; what will morning bring?Mathangihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00544238015342512904noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3582501.post-67223264667464785972011-02-04T12:00:00.005-06:002011-02-04T17:12:46.797-06:00PasticheAnd it falls through the cracks :)....crazy day yesterday so am a day late and many pennies short. But let's try and do the best we can, shall we? So here's post number yesterday.Yesterday, I did a long lecture on modernity and modernism. However, we did not really touch upon the implications of newness, the wonder of imagination, and the joy/ hopelessness of experimentation. And it's Mathangihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00544238015342512904noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3582501.post-49212093362579780572011-02-02T23:10:00.002-06:002011-02-02T23:13:57.588-06:00SnowYes, the fluffy kinds. Also the immensely beautiful kinds. Also the frightfully delightfully playful kinds. It snowed last night. Blizzard-ed rather. And we had a day off today. I had to shovel for three hours. Except for that, it was all quite magical. And so, in honour of "snow day", I give you...Like Snow She, then, like snow in a dark night, Fell secretly. And the world waked With Mathangihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00544238015342512904noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3582501.post-17631379326657095642011-02-01T23:18:00.004-06:002011-02-01T23:43:13.948-06:00Egypt in QuotesAn effigy of President Hosni Mubarak hung from a traffic light in Tahrir Square in Cairo on Tuesday. Hossam el-Hamalaw in The Washington Post"The revolution for me is about radical redistribution of wealth and a government that will represent the will of the Egyptian people when it comes to civil liberties in addition to a pro-resistance stand vis a vis the U.S. hegemony on the Mathangihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00544238015342512904noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3582501.post-90965999918185864902011-01-31T21:54:00.006-06:002011-02-01T13:25:24.664-06:00I should have been in my seventies now ! -- [Guest post by Yashoda Joshi] Sometimes I wish I were born in the 1930s. Why such a stupid wish, one might ask. Given that there were no cell phones, no computers, no Internet, no television and not even enough cinema halls, coffee shops, or bars around. Well perhaps those might well be some of the reasons for an anachronistic wish Mathangihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00544238015342512904noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3582501.post-53974644455465728652011-01-30T22:53:00.006-06:002011-01-31T22:16:55.726-06:00Nightmare TherapyThis morning I jolted myself out of three nightmares. Not one-one, not two-two, but three-three. While I won't go into the details of all, the last was particularly enlightening since it involved a talk I am going to deliver this Wednesday and in my dream, it was a spectacular failure. The audience kept asking strange questions, and I was making my slides during the talk. Yes, Mathangihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00544238015342512904noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3582501.post-20222293050989230892011-01-29T22:33:00.004-06:002011-01-29T23:21:16.647-06:00Time and Space -- Two StoriesDebris is an object. The past is a country. And while we now live through categories such as nations and states, all around us lie the living artifacts of the past. Basilica Cistern/ Yerebatan Sarayi: Istanbul - 5th century ADPhotograph of the Basilica Cistern/ Yerebatan Sarayi: Istanbul - 2006 ADMonte Albán, Oaxaca, Mexico - 500 BCPhotograph of Monte Albán, Oaxaca, Mathangihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00544238015342512904noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3582501.post-22035833015822586302011-01-28T22:47:00.003-06:002011-01-29T10:53:28.509-06:00This perhaps is my conceit then, that if it weren't for the mechanics of life distracting the soul, I would be free to be a genius. Instead, I am merely corrupt. And indigent. And restless. And bored. Now I have bills to pay. And places to go. And a body to feed. Once every seven days, come a few unguarded moments; sans hunger, pain, body, or breath, I am magnificent. And then life comes crowdingMathangihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00544238015342512904noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3582501.post-44867433949085252012011-01-27T23:00:00.000-06:002011-01-27T23:04:14.433-06:00Seeing and FluxGerhard RichterGerman, born 1932Woman Descending the Staircase (Frau die Treppe herabgehend), 1965Oil on canvas198 x 128 cm (79 x 51 in.)Art Institute of ChicagoRoy J. and Frances R. Friedman Endowment; gift of Lannan Foundation, 1997.176© Gerhard RichterMathangihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00544238015342512904noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3582501.post-55840417331944692212011-01-26T15:49:00.004-06:002011-01-26T22:27:46.109-06:00The Things the Movies DoI watched this film yesterday. Tilda Swinton is magnificent. And uncanny. It's been a while since I have been so taken in by beautiful images and benign dissatisfaction. You know? The kind that lurks in all of us, in our daily lives? That we stem with ritual, and form, and pretty clothes, and a social life? Of course, the life of the Recchis, the Italian family around Mathangihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00544238015342512904noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3582501.post-22861950316799772482011-01-25T11:24:00.008-06:002011-01-25T12:57:28.067-06:00Where We LiveThe factors, and in most cases, the constraints that determine where we live are varied and diverse. Yesterday, Tejumola Olaniyan spoke at the Institute for Research in the Humanities at The University of WIsconsin, Madison, about imagining a cultural biography of the African postcolonial nation-state through "the cultural forms that help people cope with a bewildering modernity". Mathangihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00544238015342512904noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3582501.post-72915696823849789372011-01-24T08:54:00.003-06:002011-01-24T09:25:29.242-06:00On someone else’s what? -- [Guest post by Ganju] I am a nudist. Or rather, I believe in nudity. Not mine per se. Other people’s. Well maybe just women’s. And let’s make that young, hot women’s. Writing on someone else’s blog is a little like going to a nudist camp in someone else’s part of the world. A little outside your comfort zone. Making yourself a little vulnerable. But Mathangihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00544238015342512904noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3582501.post-49599194359341961712011-01-23T09:07:00.007-06:002011-01-23T09:34:31.589-06:00Sunday Soup: Avocado(Some of you who have been kind and frequent visitors will remember that I began a series of posts titled the "Cavalier Cook" in the last week of 2009 as a response to star food-blogger Nupur's invitation to a cooking marathon. Suffice to say, I've been huffing and puffing ever since. So taking account of (a) busy lives (hah!), and (b) laziness (that's more like it), this is Mathangihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00544238015342512904noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3582501.post-77503001070853699682011-01-21T08:17:00.009-06:002011-02-01T22:29:25.871-06:0021.1.2011: And so it begins...Here we go then. This blog has now officially been revamped. Stop shaking your head, you'll see. More details coming up here, but here's what one might call the net-net. I will post everyday. Each day's post will conform to a different loosely titled theme. Many more will write along with me, and I will post their bios as they write. Why this change? Well firstly, Mathangihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00544238015342512904noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3582501.post-59223781178370351412011-01-01T10:28:00.003-06:002011-01-01T11:56:20.021-06:00Wake up1.1.11In the words of the rabbit, I'm late!!! It's almost the end of the first day of 2011 and I'm late! I've been awake all of last night and cannot muster up either the energy or the focus required to string wisdom of any magnitude together, so I give you instead my resolutions for the year. Big(a) A little tenderness. Towards small things. Flowers, food, animals, beetles.(b) Loads of Mathangihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00544238015342512904noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3582501.post-87079948966198773692010-12-30T11:21:00.001-06:002010-12-30T11:39:28.444-06:00A Post for the Old YearGoing to Sleep Now that the day wearies me, My yearning desire, will receive more kindly, like a tired child, the starry night Hence, leave off your deeds mind, forget all thoughts; All of my forces yearn only to sink into sleep. And my soul, unguarded, would soar on widespread wings, to live in a night's magical sphere More profoundly, more variously.-- Hermann HesseMathangihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00544238015342512904noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3582501.post-81064608431135212112010-12-24T10:52:00.001-06:002010-12-24T11:03:31.400-06:00Long Distance LoveThat I don’t know how you take your coffee or you, how I take my tea (cream, no sugar, strong) should not be reason enough to question love. Or should it?That I don’t know how your stubble feels in the morning or you, how I curl up at night should not be cause to end this enterprise. Or can it?How does love begin? In ritual? In habit? In forms unknown? In lives remembered? In Mathangihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00544238015342512904noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3582501.post-57627429307252521652010-11-01T20:40:00.003-05:002010-12-05T00:27:18.164-06:00Red Earth and Pouring RainIt is evening and it is quiet. I have found myself, strangely, earnestly, eagerly awaiting rain. Perhaps just sound. Perhaps a whiff of water seeping into soil. Perhaps even a word of faraway skies and precipitous clouds. The promise of rain. I first read this poem in Vikram Chandra's book of fantastical kings, faraway lands, and typing monkeys. I won't spoil it by Mathangihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00544238015342512904noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3582501.post-38651258656176988682010-10-28T10:23:00.002-05:002010-10-28T10:24:19.763-05:00Weather ReportConstable, JohnRainstorm off the Coast at Brightonc. 1824-28Oil on paper laid on canvas8 3/4 x 12 1/4 in (22.2 x 31 cm)Royal Academy of Arts, LondonMathangihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00544238015342512904noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3582501.post-88228748690814482922010-10-23T18:24:00.003-05:002010-10-23T18:40:17.608-05:00The Dog and IThis conversation has become stilted, and boring, and repetitive. And I really am not sure what I can do about it. Well actually I do know, but am not doing it. The answer, my absent friends, my silent readers, my peeping tom-mers is, merely, simply, to write. And I will. I promise. More often, more plentifully, less morosely, more effusively. I live in Madison now and it's beautifulMathangihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00544238015342512904noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3582501.post-55107912463857857522010-09-10T21:34:00.014-05:002011-01-12T22:42:22.332-06:00Time to WriteIt's time to be back, don't you think? Enough of a break already! I am now 1200 miles north of where I used to be and much colder than I ever used to be. Literally, not metaphorically. People here are true to caricature, incredibly warm. In a good way. The curmudgeonly part of me sometimes longs for NYC, or other rude places, but only in an ignorant, aspirational sort of way. At the Mathangihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00544238015342512904noreply@blogger.com10tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3582501.post-91762516684161819542010-08-08T09:08:00.004-05:002011-01-12T22:42:22.333-06:00On the Loss of FamiliarityM called and is bringing tacos. As I sit waiting for breakfast and coffee, the fog is slowly clearing. This morning is one of few that will never quite be reproduced in familiar form. These summer weeks that I have lived year after year, hoping for some form of change, sometimes wistfully, at other vociferously, are apparently going to change. My home will be different, Mathangihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00544238015342512904noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3582501.post-65961496735030821852010-08-05T22:14:00.004-05:002011-01-12T22:42:22.334-06:00Abstractions for a moody nightI have many things to say. But I'd rather make up stuff instead. Or pretend to be wise. Or write in choppy sentences. So here are many random things, just for you. Make of them what you will. Perhaps with a few drops of moonshine.- A moment interpreted does not a teleology make- I wish I could swim calmly without splashing around so much- There are surprises around Mathangihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00544238015342512904noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3582501.post-48740262082298227632010-07-20T09:55:00.003-05:002011-01-12T22:42:22.334-06:00The Winds of ChangeI haven't been here in a while. But that's because I have been everywhere else. Five cities and two countries. And a couple of stops in-between. Not to mention many worlds. It's been really quite a fantastic, phantasmic month. And I have written a dissertation. In the middle of all the seriousness, I also found laughter, grinning teeth, endless merriment and mindless joy. I Mathangihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00544238015342512904noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3582501.post-32518693926333752212010-06-23T00:39:00.001-05:002011-01-12T22:32:55.703-06:00Song for the Rainsomewhere i have never travelled somewhere i have never travelled, gladly beyond any experience, your eyes have their silence: in your most frail gesture are things which enclose me, or which i cannot touch because they are too near your slightest look easily will unclose me though i have closed myself as fingers, you open always petal by petal myself as Spring opens (touching Mathangihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00544238015342512904noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3582501.post-46160648104073896122010-06-05T23:15:00.004-05:002011-01-12T22:42:22.335-06:00Dances on TrainsThere is a trick I use to lighten work. You might want to try it. I play a song. One-two, one-two. In my head I begin to dance. In perfect rhythm, in perfect beat. Then I begin to mouth the words. Silently. The song and I become one; the song is I and I am song. And as I dance in my head, sometimes I leave my desk, stand tippy-toed and slowly begin to move. First the feet; up andMathangihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00544238015342512904noreply@blogger.com6tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3582501.post-59365719368499317132010-05-28T00:22:00.004-05:002011-01-12T22:33:23.924-06:00StuckOnce in a while, I find myself in a place that seems alien, like it has nothing to do with what I know of myself. At such times, things will not be defined and all truth is negotiable. At such points, I have a physical feeling like my head is going to explode. Into smithereens (what a nice word). And at such times, I wonder what it is that I cannot make sense of. Because truth be told, this Mathangihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00544238015342512904noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3582501.post-19769903706752452010-05-24T21:45:00.002-05:002011-01-12T22:31:47.796-06:00So many storiesI am drawing a family tree. From my uncle I am extracting names from long ago pre-colonial times, when the states were not linguistically separated and India perhaps only a selective idea. I am learning about grandmothers and great-grandmothers, about virile men and stubborn women, about fiery events and legends equal parts fate and magic.Here is one of them.A woman fought with herMathangihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00544238015342512904noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3582501.post-42922664765780246462010-05-17T00:22:00.002-05:002011-01-12T22:31:47.797-06:00Hazaaron Khwaishen AisiAnd I wish time were malleable. Like the squeaky soles on my red shoes. And pliable desires. I wish time were in stock. Like spare batteries and countless flashlights. And unending hopes for life and sunshine. I wish space were boundless. Like spring flowers on hilly countrysides. And an expansive sense of the world.It's been an interesting few weeks. Soon I will move. But Mathangihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00544238015342512904noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3582501.post-6175055696818385212010-05-03T19:39:00.002-05:002011-01-12T22:32:55.704-06:00An ode to SpringIt is beautiful here today and I sat out in the sun and watched the birds and the flowers. You cannot be here right now, so here's a missive just for you. For Spring. For happiness. For I miss you. The Word Down near the bottom of the crossed-out list of things you have to do today, between "green thread" and "broccoli" you find that you have penciled "sunlight." Resting on the Mathangihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00544238015342512904noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3582501.post-54749293933711358322010-04-27T18:35:00.003-05:002011-01-12T22:31:47.797-06:00For your wide-eyed wonderment, I give you:(a) A kaleidoscope(b) Soap bubbles(c) Trees(d) An iguana(e) Jasmine flowers(f) Red(g)Tulle(h) Shiny faces on train journeys(i) Late afternoon sunlightand...(j) A cameraNow please make me a story?Mathangihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00544238015342512904noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3582501.post-53484367780706042552010-04-21T13:53:00.003-05:002011-01-12T22:31:47.798-06:00Imagination and its DisuseI am on the verge of resolving a quandary of intellect. For ages now, my dissertation has been making minor breakthroughs. I have pieced together bits and nuggest and chunks and jujubes to make what some might say a minor contribution. But, as people across the border from have been saying for a while, ya basta. I mean really, enough already. This is not supposed to be Mathangihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00544238015342512904noreply@blogger.com5tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3582501.post-5268292901966857092010-04-05T16:56:00.002-05:002011-01-12T22:31:47.799-06:00A Song in my HeadFor some reason, I've been thinking about this:Watch from 1:06I never realized that Jeremy Brett plays Freddy Eynsford-Hill in My Fair Lady. "Tell her that I'll wait," he says. Waiting as both metaphor and ontology behoves comment. In other words, what does waiting stand for and what does waiting in itself do/ mean if it were to be a metaphor for all of life? One waits in order Mathangihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00544238015342512904noreply@blogger.com5tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3582501.post-51643574866566930242010-03-29T22:10:00.003-05:002011-01-12T22:31:47.800-06:00I am yet to do what my last post promised, but it will have to wait. Am currently working on a chapter on language, so have lost all enthusiasm as I wade through endless literature and data. But today, we should talk about being sensate. I was on a mindless blog trawl looking at posts over the last few years and I realize the ones that evoke the most immediacy are ones that talk about sensations.Mathangihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00544238015342512904noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3582501.post-56970834236586297332010-03-08T20:44:00.002-06:002011-01-12T22:31:47.800-06:00Words, Words, WordsFor those few of you who may have followed this blog for a while, one and only one thing might have stayed common across the seven years or so that we have spent together. Words. Duh. It's true, I admit it. I love words. Before this blog. During. And hopefully after. Words make me go weak in the knees. One syllable and you will pass muster; two may get you a nod; three might Mathangihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00544238015342512904noreply@blogger.com5tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3582501.post-30095972765360504362010-03-02T19:37:00.001-06:002010-03-02T19:39:11.515-06:00Here are some words; why don't you make me a sentence?Sentient. Pocorn. Terrible. Scarlet. Umbrella. Tower. Bookshelf. Street. Reproduction. Repercussion.Mathangihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00544238015342512904noreply@blogger.com8tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3582501.post-363422288797785232010-02-18T18:18:00.001-06:002010-02-18T18:19:42.793-06:00Argh, ugh, damn, damn, damn, damnBlistering barnacles, thundering typhoons and murdering mimosas. Damn damn damn.Ugh, argh, double argh.(Yes, this has become one of those ranty, boring, diary-like, teenage chronicles.)Okay sorry, now we are done.Mathangihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00544238015342512904noreply@blogger.com8tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3582501.post-71277123024582061932010-02-16T00:17:00.003-06:002010-02-16T00:19:51.905-06:00WritingI am writing notes to Peter. And stop asking me if I am writing the dissertation. If you still want to know, yes I am. I can multi-task like that.Mathangihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00544238015342512904noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3582501.post-89201423220413962402010-02-09T23:30:00.002-06:002010-02-10T00:16:35.464-06:00Staring at PhotographsSometimes I am mad at my digital camera. For capturing a life so full. And emptying it. My parents have an old red suitcase. It has stainless steel snap locks and is red. And it spills over with pictures. From three decades ago. And every alternate year since. One random sepia tinged picture where my mother looks thin as a reed and innocent as morning light. One tattered Mathangihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00544238015342512904noreply@blogger.com10tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3582501.post-65643757020279342432010-02-08T01:46:00.003-06:002011-01-12T22:32:55.705-06:00 -- The Storm, Edvard Munch (Norwegian, 1863-1944)Try To Praise The Mutilated WorldTry to praise the mutilated world. Remember June's long days, and wild strawberries, drops of wine, the dew. The nettles that methodically overgrow the abandoned homesteads of exiles. You must praise the mutilated world. You watched the stylish yachts and ships; one of them Mathangihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00544238015342512904noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3582501.post-66460956360254000532010-02-02T21:42:00.003-06:002010-02-03T00:19:33.913-06:00Rigor Mortis -- A story in many partsPart V(Go here for Parts I, II, III and IV)Sandhya came home shell-shocked. Not that there wasn't an easy explanation. She knew that children sensed things faster than adults. That Maya must have sensed Ranjeeta's mood. That she must have caught her staring into the distance frequently. Or seen her eyes glaze. She must have wondered about Ranjeeta's vacant Mathangihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00544238015342512904noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3582501.post-71255162845899197142010-01-28T23:38:00.003-06:002010-01-28T23:53:59.213-06:00After a long time, reading is invoking in me, what is my only form of primeval joy. Beauty, joy, wide-eyed glee. I am galloping through some wonderful articles. It is too late at night and morning will come shortly so I cannot say everything about them that I want to. However, this much I will share. I am glad. I have increasingly begun to fear that I will bore myself to death; but now I know Mathangihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00544238015342512904noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3582501.post-90524841487399862932010-01-26T14:41:00.003-06:002010-01-26T15:15:40.773-06:00In my rapidly aging mind, I have turned immobile. I have internalized the rules and have begun to take them seriously. The journey so far should tell me that the rules are all wrong. That there are a few good things one can do and that is really about it. So in an effort to sanity, let me write mine down. And forget the rest. (a) Be good to people -- give as much as you can(b) Speak softly and Mathangihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00544238015342512904noreply@blogger.com7tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3582501.post-49529785429921577832010-01-25T12:20:00.005-06:002010-01-25T14:34:40.799-06:00In the manner of an acceptance speechI give you...."Ahem, well, actually, you know, I don't know, I love my fourth standard English teacher and...thank you?"I mean, what do I do? I always thought awards and speeches were a little plebeian..until I received one, of course. I am a little short of words today, but I must thank miapan who was kind enough to make my week by giving me this.Thank you Mathangihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00544238015342512904noreply@blogger.com5tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3582501.post-61938201017817973482010-01-21T00:27:00.000-06:002010-01-21T00:28:30.241-06:00A little secret from long agoI played with a pug today and wished that life were simpler. To give it due credit, it never claimed to be.Mathangihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00544238015342512904noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3582501.post-63548267001000904552010-01-20T19:02:00.003-06:002010-01-20T20:02:24.965-06:00Did he really say that?In David Brooks' article on Haiti, which is objectionable on so many levels that I would have to abandon my dissertation to construct a thorough refutation, there is one I will talk about here. Brooks writes: "As Lawrence E. Harrison explained in his book “The Central Liberal Truth,” Haiti, like most of the world’s poorest nations, suffers from a complex web of Mathangihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00544238015342512904noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3582501.post-78042004043901854882010-01-16T20:42:00.002-06:002010-01-16T20:54:45.631-06:00Rigor Mortis -- A story in many partsPart IV(Go here for Parts I, II and III)And in many ways, Maya over the years, exhibited such signs of environmental osmosis. She was a sensate child. At the age of six, she came back home, stony-faced and grief stricken. Sandhya could get nothing out of her. She refused to eat and went to bed on a glass of milk. This continued for the week. Every day, Sandhy Mathangihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00544238015342512904noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3582501.post-4931201184271783542010-01-11T15:18:00.002-06:002010-01-11T15:23:34.613-06:00We are back to our non-cooking self. As in we do cook. But to eat. Not to use our digital camera.How is the new year treating the rest of you guys?Mine has me off to a tail-on-fire start at work. But instead of concentrating on the impossibly large loads of writing I have been condemned to produce, I am guest blogging. Do go check out my post on Notes to a Young Man About Town, a daily advice Mathangihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00544238015342512904noreply@blogger.com7tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3582501.post-82443167096742926592010-01-02T15:21:00.006-06:002011-01-12T22:29:38.107-06:00The Cavalier Cook - Numero Uno!It's a brand new year. And a lovely day to boot. I am sitting on my couch, staring at a few crates of beer bottles and a dozen empty bottles of wine. Some cake, some madeleines and a year's supply of olives. There are flowers too. How beautifully we have sashayed into 2010. This is the last post for now from the cavalier cook. It's been such a busy week and so Mathangihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00544238015342512904noreply@blogger.com9tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3582501.post-2690486896864281292009-12-31T15:39:00.012-06:002011-01-12T22:29:38.107-06:00The Cavalier Cook - Numero Dos2009 is ending. Officially. And so is this marathon. I will post one last recipe tomorrow however. Provided it turns out the way I think it should! To put it midly, I am taking what in polite company may be called, a risk. Let me not prolong this year waxing eloquent a few thousand words more; I am now going to get straight to the point. One word. Chocolate. Enough Mathangihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00544238015342512904noreply@blogger.com10tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3582501.post-39645585318284093372009-12-30T21:25:00.008-06:002011-01-12T22:29:38.108-06:00The Cavalier Cook - Numero TresThe marathon is officially done with tomorrow. But the cavalier cook will only be on day Numero Dos, because the new year is officially Numero Uno! Tomorrow, we will start the run up to 2010, but tonight, much like the rabbit or wait, much like Alice, we are LATE! More on the day later, but let's get to today's fare, shall we?Paneer Chilli Stir Fry Wrap and a littleMathangihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00544238015342512904noreply@blogger.com6tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3582501.post-36207253818184338292009-12-29T17:44:00.008-06:002011-01-12T22:29:38.109-06:00The Cavalier Cook - Numero CuatroThis morning, I could barely be coaxed to emerge from my warm blanket. And when I did, I was ravenous. Given that breakfast is the one meal I hardly ever miss, I set forth grabbing things from my refrigerator to put together what turned out to be filling, tasty and pretty. I give you:The Breakfast of Titans or An omelette and a smoothieI converted to eggs rather Mathangihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00544238015342512904noreply@blogger.com7tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3582501.post-83996415074128495892009-12-28T14:56:00.008-06:002011-01-12T22:32:23.811-06:00The Cavalier Cook - Numero CincoIn honour of having completed a chapter, I temporarily hung up my boots and set out clothes shopping. A morning and some later, I'm poorer by a few dozen dollars and richer by 1 lipstick, 1 t-shirt, 2 lotions and the same pair of shoes that I set out to exchange (don't ask). In the meantime, the busy bloggers have been making hay; for an update go here. This Mathangihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00544238015342512904noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3582501.post-77714785529292459432009-12-27T19:57:00.007-06:002011-01-12T22:30:08.146-06:00The Cavalier Cook: Numero SeisOne chapter down, many more to go! My fellow cooks are rocking the marathon trail. Nupur, our diligent host has summaries here and here. I, on the contrary have been lazy today and the only tastes I have in my mouth right now are that of endless cups of coffee, downed as I gaped at my computer screen. Now I see the world in letters. That’s right; one “c-a-r” that I Mathangihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00544238015342512904noreply@blogger.com7tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3582501.post-30808324495175565512009-12-26T15:07:00.011-06:002011-01-12T22:29:38.109-06:00The Cavalier Cook - Numero SieteAnother day, and we are inching ladle by ladle to the finish line. I have vowed to finish a chapter by Sunday night so in steeling myself for an invariable all-nighter, I decided to stock my tummy with good old pulao and dal. So my fellow comfort food veggie afficianados, I give you...Carrot Spinach Pulao/Pilaf and Dal MakhaniThe pulao is a dish inspired by my Mathangihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00544238015342512904noreply@blogger.com9tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3582501.post-57294145223066217852009-12-25T13:33:00.007-06:002011-01-12T22:32:23.812-06:00The Cavalier Cook - Numero OchoFire the guns! We are off. In the words of my friend Y, who is, in Madras lingo, quite a Peter, or perhaps even a Pierre ;), Joyeux Noel!It's a chilly yet beautifully sunny day in Austin. The semester has ended which means that on most mornings, I work from home. An essential part of morning activities involves cooking lunch. Today, I was in the mood for pasta. My Mathangihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00544238015342512904noreply@blogger.com8tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3582501.post-90972153390069165542009-12-24T14:46:00.006-06:002011-01-12T22:32:23.813-06:00The Cavalier Cook - Numero NueveAnd now for something completely different! In a gesture completely uncharacteristic of my blogging habits thus far, I have foolhardily signed away my reputation and sensibility to Nupur's year-end cooking marathon. I have been following her blog for a few years now and have much to be grateful for; both to her considerably culinary talents and to those of the Mathangihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00544238015342512904noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3582501.post-50247393092870367492009-12-17T14:04:00.005-06:002011-01-12T22:31:47.801-06:00The Art of the Object: A mini essay on fetishism, loss and longingI lose lip balms. Beeswax and rose essence and mint and vanilla. Cocoa butter, sunscreen, raspberry and lime. Those tiny objects of bright colours and wide-eyed shine, those little tubes and tubs of winter cheer and summer solace; I lose them. One by one they nest in the corners of my purse, my backpack, my tote and my clutch. Mathangihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00544238015342512904noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3582501.post-62289806659851715092009-12-12T22:01:00.004-06:002011-01-12T22:42:22.336-06:00Some day, many days from now, this day will have been forgotten. Its doubts, its faint pleas, its lily-livered will to survive, will have been defeated by other pleasures, other desires, other conquests. Such is the nature of memory. But I want to remember. I want to remember that on this day, I carefully reasoned and pleaded the case of this life against all other possible futures. Even in the Mathangihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00544238015342512904noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3582501.post-19674913366778707212009-12-07T20:37:00.002-06:002011-01-12T22:42:22.337-06:00ReadingIt's our age. We think we know that the miracle is a lie and we always look for a hidden or suppressed explanation. We would rather have greed and lust as motive than love. We are reassured by slyly mocking references to our squalor, our smells and our expulsions, than our trembling modesty, or to our quivering desire for affection. We are not even allowed souls any more, and our secret Mathangihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00544238015342512904noreply@blogger.com5tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3582501.post-22056819466653226712009-11-23T15:10:00.004-06:002011-01-12T22:32:23.815-06:00On this bright Austin afternoon, I have endless deadlines and overwhelming work. The right thing to do would to be to get to them. But frankly, I would rather not. Instead, I give you my two critical engagements of the week. Such a beautiful movie. Cinematographically and in terms of narrative, one of the gentlest films I have seen in recent times. This despite the harsh, barren Armenian Mathangihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00544238015342512904noreply@blogger.com6tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3582501.post-85226933653539319352009-11-13T12:55:00.001-06:002011-01-12T22:42:22.337-06:00An Ode to MelancholiaHow do I kill this strange thought?It took root some time ago and will not die. But it does not live either. The thing it thinks about has long been dead. All that it left behind was this thought, its ghost, a specter. Now the thought is the thing. Or so it thinks. And it remakes the thing everyday.Until the thing as it was is now the thing that the thought thinks.Mathangihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00544238015342512904noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3582501.post-42013937365921839862009-11-06T16:37:00.003-06:002011-01-12T22:31:47.802-06:00A BreakthroughIt happens. It does. Sometimes you stare long enough at something and something else begins to emerge. And no, it is not holistic, or contextual, or big picture, or any of those cliched, banal, horridly unimaginative senses of the world. Not figure and ground. Not front and back. Not yin and yang. (Lord save us from antonyms)So what exactly is this sense of the world? At the risk ofMathangihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00544238015342512904noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3582501.post-82459752669884465762009-11-02T21:13:00.003-06:002011-01-12T22:42:22.338-06:00Go on, ask meAnd just because I have had a song floating in my head all morning, this is what I would say....How are you?Haal Chaal Theek Thaak Hai, Sab Kuchh Theek Thaak Hai, Kaam Nahin Hai Varna Yahaan Aap Ki Dua se Sab Theek Thaak HaWhat have you been doing today?Main Zindagi Ka Saath Nibhata Chala GayaHar Fikr Ko Dhuen Mein Udata Chala GayaAny applications come through?Kiska Rasta Dekhe Mathangihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00544238015342512904noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3582501.post-53018605966350094602009-11-01T00:09:00.011-05:002011-01-12T22:42:22.339-06:00I am writing now. In this time. In this space. In this body. I wish I could tell you how much that means to me. To inhabit this moment in all its modes. I am supine on a blue couch, the light is behind me; yellow light. My glass of wine rests on a red coffee table and the light falls softly on a sienna rug. Tango music in the background. The weather is lightly chilly. I am reading. And I will Mathangihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00544238015342512904noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3582501.post-47038609693400344432009-10-26T14:15:00.009-05:002011-01-12T22:42:22.339-06:00My life has no clarity which is why I have no stories to tell. The frames are now all slightly awry and we are thick into the messy process of imposing structure, albeit temporary, albeit arbitrary. Which is why I have no stories to tell. Instead, I will throw at you random bits of information and song, in no specific order of meaning or intent. A. How to dress like an intellectual-- Whimsy, Mathangihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00544238015342512904noreply@blogger.com4