New Beginings and the boredom of social media

I have a Google+ invite in my inbox. I haven't signed up yet but someday I might. For a communication professional and a media enthusiast, not being on the Google+ thing spells doom. Not that it affects my earnings, but when I will meet with my fellow communicators at the next happy hour, I will have nothing to contribute about the pros and cons of Google over FB. I won't be able to offer insights into what space is Google filling in exactly, in the social media jungle. No intelligent forecasts about if it will change the social media diet of corporations. I will just have to hold on to my beer glass and listen to the conversation, all the while feeling insecure that I may just be losing my edge.
And as I write this, I am still extremely reluctant to even start exploring what's Google up to next. I suspect that it's not them it's me. Maybe I am just good at beginnings.Maybe I am the type that seeks thrill and passion of the first date but the thought of being together for a while means boredom for me. I started on FB with a ready circle of friends all too willing and happy to share pictures, anecdotes and wisecracks about our daily goings-on. Now I have 200+ friends on FB many of whom I haven't seen in two decades. Time and time again, I have stopped myself from writing updates just because now most of the updates will mean nothing to majority of my "friends". And let's admit there are some updates that don't go up because I don't want it to be seen by people who I now barely know. And so, my relationship with FB is on a downward slope.
 "That's exactly why you need to sign on to Google +" my social savvy friend instructed me. "You know, it has circles and it so much better for privacy controls. You ought to try it" he said. And it is a an incentive no doubt, but a weak one. Because to be honest, I am getting exhausted keeping up with sharing and 'friending' and looking at pictures of strangers. I am in the mode of 'just let me be and keep your happy life to yourself'. I long for a simple life where if you wanted to share something, you just emailed your friends list. Friends who aren't just  names on your list or tagged  faces in photos but the ones whose names can be associated with their sense of humor, their quirks and talents and the ones I can count on to not "comment" on but share my joy and sorrow. 
Thanks FB for finding so many friends for me. Don't get me wrong, each and every one of then has had some significance in my life at some point in time. And if not for you, I probably never would have relived so many lost memories. But my life as a mom and a professional is already filled with so many miniscule to-do's that I prefer not to add some extra thinking to the mix.


As for Google+, I won't sign up yet because I don't want it to be my rebound social network. I will be on board when I am ready for a new beginning.

Hair Affair

This is something I have been struggling with for almost 5 years now. I want my hair back. My 5 year old controls the texture, the oilines, the length,-basically everything about my hair and I want to take back that control.
It all started when she was born. With her tiny hands, she somehow sought out my hair and held it tight in her fist. It was the ultimate natural pacifier. She could be bawling and soon as she had her hands on my hair, she would calm down. It was magic. It was also extremely cute and adorable at first. "Oh how cute! She keeps holding your hair as soon as you pick her up". I admit I am guilty of marginally encouraging the habit. When I would be awake almost for an hour at midnight, trying to get her to sleep and she showed no signs of lying down, I would hand her a few strands and viola! Within a few minutes she was next to me dreaming her baby dreams and sleeping -well, like a baby.
This was then. But now I am just miserable. I can't stand it when I have just shampooed and styled and she runs to me with her hands which have been making little play-doh balls all day and hugs and gently pulls out a few strands from my pony tail so she can hold on to it. But to be fair its not something she does on purpose. She can't help it. She is hardwired for that. After being very forceful and consistent in explaining to her that she had to stop that, I have to say the habit is a bit under control but not completely gone. I am now sufficiently at ease with this that I can think about this a bit lightheartedly. Here are a few of my ideas about what I can do to better protect my hair. Feel free to suggest some more.

1. Wear a helmet when she is around.
2. Go bald
3. Give her a hairy doll as a relplacement hair specimen.
4. Wear a headscarf
5. Tell her that if she pulls my hair, I am going to pull hers.
6. Hand her over to her dad and tell her that dad has better hair.

Eve Ensler's "I am an emotional creature"

Afer a long break, here is a post just for sharing Eve Ensler's poem that I recently heard on TED.com. I loved it, hope you will like it too!

I AM AN EMOTIONAL CREATURE
I love being a girl.
I can feel what you're feeling as you're feeling it inside the feeling before.
I am an emotional creature.

Things do not come to me as intellectual theories or hard-shaped ideas.
They pulse through my organs and legs and burn up my ears.
I know when your girlfriend's really pissed off even though she appears to give you what you want.
I know when a storm is coming.
I can feel the invisible stirrings in the air.
I can tell you he won't call back.
It's a vibe I share.
I am an emotional creature.

I love that I do not take things lightly.
Everything is intense to me.
The way I walk in the street.
The way my mother wakes me up.
The way I hear bad news.
The way it's unbearable when I lose.
I am an emotional creature.

I am connected to everything and everyone.
I was born like that.
Don't you dare say all negative that it's a teenage thing or it's only only because I'm a girl.
These feelings make me better.
They make me ready. They make me present. They make me strong.
I am an emotional creature.

There is a particular way of knowing.
It's like the older women somehow forgot.
I rejoice that it's still in my body.
I know when the coconut's about to fall.
I know that we've pushed the earth too far.
I know my father isn't coming back.
That no one's prepared for the fire.
I know that lipstick means more than show.
I know that boys feel super-insecure and so-called terrorists are made, not born.
I know that one kiss can takeaway all my decision-making ability and sometimes, you know, it should.
This is not extreme.
It's a girl thing.
What we would all be if the big door inside us flew open.
Don't tell me not to cry.
To calm it down
Not to be so extreme
To be reasonable.
I am an emotional creature.

It's how the earth got made.
How the wind continues to pollinate.
You don't tell the Atlantic ocean to behave.
I am an emotional creature.

Why would you want to shut me down or turn me off?
I am your remaining memory.
I am connecting you to your source.
Nothing's been diluted.
Nothing's leaked out.
I can take you back.
I love that I can feel the inside of the feelings in you, even if it stops my life even if it hurts too much or takes me off track even if it breaks my heart.
It makes me responsible.

I am an emotional I am an emotional, devotional, unconditional, creature.
And I love, hear me, love love love being a girl.

Eve Ensler, a playwright and activist, is the founder of V-Day, a global movement to end violence against women and girls.

On dressing business casual

My co-worker Mark and I had a discussion on work attire. My workplace is a casual attire workplace. Some people kinda take it to the extreme and walk in with flip-flops and shorts over the usual jeans and t-shirt which is generally the most accepted version of business casual. Without really thinking about it, I tend to wear formal clothes. Slacks, scarves and sometimes even jackets. When Mark noted that aloud today, I uncovered my thought process.

Oregon weather is not exactly what you would call-cheerful. It is mostly glum with dark clouds hanging over you. It makes it harder for people to be excited about the day in the morning. Add to that the routine drudgery of the grey office environment and all you see for a 8 hour workday is an endless river of time with gloom written on each drop with big letters. If I don't dress smart in this environment, I am only adding to the melancholy of my surroundings. The only thing that prevents me from being a slob that rolls into the office at 8 and out of it at 5, is the simple act of deciding "so what should I wear today"? If I don't dress smart, I don't feel smart. Not to mention, for all the liberties that a modern workplace allows us with its tolerance for casual, being the best dressed person in a room will be extremely helpful in your opinions being heard seriously, especially if that room is full of highly opinionated folks who are much senior to you.

As a side note, a quick story about my friend who, like me, wears formal clothes to her new contracting job- After spending almost 6 years interacting mostly with people in diapers a.k.a her kids, she recently got a great opportunity at Nike. On the first day of work, her manager informed her that she should feel free to wear jeans and sneakers (Nike sneakers of course) as they are a casual workplace. Although my friend nodded at the comment, she later told me that she has gone on a full-on wardrobe makeover and will now dress in nothing but branded designer businesswear and high heels. She has spent most of the last few years in her sweatpants and bunny slippers and she is not interested in taking advantage of the 'casual dress' privileges. To each their own!!

Will the real (normal) woman (on TV) please stand up?

As Non-resident Indian parents of a US born 3 year old, we are very conscientious of passing along our culture and language to our daughter. This involves talking to her in Marathi at home, having regular phone conversations in Marathi with her grandparents, celebrating Diwali, Ganpati, Rakhi and other festivities and having a generous wardrobe of Indian clothes for her to wear. Lately we stumbled upon an Internet TV site that lets us watch Marathi soaps on our TV. Although we are not much of TV lovers, we loved having Marathi sounds on TV in the evening. Our daughter surprisingly loved some dance programming on the channel and now we regularly switch to our Lingua Francua on TV in the evenings.

I once read a book where the author compared soap operas to bubble bath. You soak in them. You get absorbed in them. Watching them provides a few moments of stress-free activity for your brain. I, on the other hand cannot help analyzing the characters, their dialogues and even their wardrobes. I look for representations particular to the society the stories are set in. There was a time in my life when I followed Desperate Housewives; Occasionally relished the convoluted storylines of beautiful people in General hospital, Bold and Beautiful and other American soaps. I sometimes still do. And here is my analysis for the portrayal of women in these shows.

At the onset, let me say that India and US being two extremes when it comes to culture, it is no surprise that attitudes of women and their place in the society differs greatly. And media being the perfect barometer, it accurately brings out these differences- only in a ‘larger than life’ size. I watch American soaps full of gorgeous women with perfect facial features, porcelain skin and western- style, figure-hugging, cleavage-showing outfits. They may be portrayed as moms, girlfriends, vamps, businesswomen, all with an unabashed display of their womanly desires, mostly sexual, confident yet inexplicably insecure; articulate yet silly. The interaction of all these gorgeous men and women inevitably results in a myriad network of folks who are all romantically involved in often times incestuous relationships. Of course the side storylines of kidnapped babies, ginormous money making deals and blackmails all exist, but the pervasive theme is the sexual tension between characters. And women are mostly just shown to be either needy, insecure beings always worried about finding love or as villainous, scheming pathogens always plotting to suck the joy out of other womens’ life. One would think there are no American women-professionals and mothers- working hard to bring peace and harmony to their homes. There are so many women who craft, sew, cook, shop and have baby showers or are successful doctors, lawyers, engineers struggling to balance family and work. There are smart girls in the US who have goals for education and at the same time have tons of fun going out with friends and hanging out at dance clubs. Not to mention, they also want loving boyfriends or husbands but that’s not the only thing they want! Where are these women?

On the other end of the spectrum, there are the Indian television women- gorgeous, sari clad, covered with jewels and with all the symbols of matrimony or lack thereof. Here the pervasive theme is not sexuality but victimization- of women by men and mostly by women. Untouched by modernity, Indian TV women are rarely professionals. They are mostly housewives or girls-next door. They are torn in an eternal struggle of pleasing everybody in the family and taking care of them. Mostly sacrificial lambs ready to lay their lives for their husband and children, they are scheming and vicious mothers-in-law, sisters-in-law and mistresses who are only planning on poisoning somebody. In real life, for all their love of traditions, Indian women are smart women who have made tremendous strides over the last few decades. They are in every field working side by side with men, dating, going out and having fun with girlfriends and boyfriends. I for one, think that they have done a great job balancing the age old traditions with new world possibilities. They dress in jeans and skirts. They color their hair, wear high heels and have fixed ideas about their life-partners and still are very rooted - very Indian. Individuality and independent thinking which is completely absent in Indian TV women is plentiful in the real-life women. Why don’t I see these women on TV?

Media may well be a heightened reality but I think women are not being done justice here. I want to see normal, real women with desires and insecurities and struggles that I go through everyday. The advertisements have caught on, but why not the shows?

Will the real woman please stand up?
(PS: For those who care to read what I write, this post comes after a long period of hibernation. Just goes to prove that I am a normal (!) woman who does not find time even to do her most favorite thing in the world-write).

The new Mary

Little one is a little over the top in her attitude. She is at an age (3) where she has no doubt that the world revolves around her and momma and dadda exist to take care of her. She also doesn't doubt that she has all the words right when she sings her nursery rhymes.

We have a CD of nursery rhymes in our car stereo. It never comes out. It only keeps playing over and over again when we are in the car. Even if the car has just hubby and I in it, we forget that we can actually change the CD and listen to our own songs. One of her favorite songs from the CD is 'Mary had a little lamb'. Lately she has been singing it aloud. Only with a twist. She sings it as-"Mary had a little man, little man, little man....."

I am not going to correct her. It is my daily dose of humor in the morning.

I am trying to be a professional here...

Work, kid and school. These are only a few of the million things that have kept me away from my blog for a long time. Today, I have a rare afternoon all to myself; and after reading all the gossip about oscars and slumdog millionaire and the octuplet mom, I decided that maybe writing something will be a more useful way to spend my time.

Work has been running its own smooth course for past few weeks. That's the way we like it at a financial institution these days-no excitement. Although, the most routine day sometimes brings its own little surprises that shake things up and provide a human touch to a very guideline-driven day.

Members at our credit union often set passwords on their accounts for additional security. I am always fascinated by the choice of passwords people make. They do get me thinking about the reasoning, or the special relationship people might have with the words they pick. Why does somebody pick 'turtle' and somebody else, 'mac attack'? But this one was a winner. A senior citizen who looked unusually happy for his age, came up to me. I looked up his account and burst into uncontrollable, but suppressed laughter when I read his password-"Two old farts". I asked him and he said it aloud- without hesitation, a mischievous smile on his wrinkled face. At this point, I was trying to think of excuses to go back in the break room and laugh a big laugh to let it all out!!
Of course I didn't; but I could not help smiling. "That's my wife's idea"- the gentleman said, smiling again. "I am sure she will say it's yours" I replied. The gentleman laughed a good-natured laugh and we both said our good byes.