There is a big gap between fact and feelings.

One may appear to have it all. Does that person really?

Putting oneself into another’s shoe is  hard. For most of us,what is that shoe that we wear ourselves is still a blur.

I have read the blog. I have been exposed to the tipping culture. I know what it is to be a good customer. Good tips. Bottom line. I don’t generally complain. I always say please and thank you. I wear good clothes and an even better smile. I am a good human being and not just in a restaurant.

Bottom line I am not the person who gets ignored. I am definitely not the person who takes being ignored very well. Definitely not in a restaurant.

Last weekend when 2 of my girl friends and I decided to hang out in New York we wanted to get a quick dinner, seats at a comedy club and a few drinks at a bar before we hit home. Dinner at West village was a good decision. Settling for the bar at the comedy club which couldn’t seat us, not so much.

We ordered our first round and got chatting. The waiter got my  friends another round. This time really good and very expensive Martinis. I was still working on my first. He comes around to tell us that he has to change shifts and asked us if we would like to close the tab. We tipped him for his service a good 20% but asked him to leave the tab open as we were just getting started. He left thanking us and reassuring us that we will have a new waiter in just a while. This is 11:20 pm

11:45 pm I ask the busboy if he could find us our waiter so that I could order my second drink. He tells me he will look for my waiter.

12:00 am I catch the attention of another waiter who promises to find our waiter.

12:15 am I make a comment to my girl friends that I am feeling ignored. They gasp as they were talking to me too.

12:20 am One of them gets what I was saying and goes to the bar to get me my fuzzy bellini. The person at the bar tells us she will get us our waiter to bring me my drink.

12:30 am I ask another waiter to get us our cheque. She says she will get us our waiter. I twitch. I say, ” If one more person talks about this waiter we haven’t seen in over an hour I will convulse” I am still smiling. I am pissed off. All I want to do is leave.

12:35 am A guy with a cap who I suppose would have been our waiter arrives and asks the wrong questions.

“How are you ladies doing?”.

” Not so good” I answer.

“Why! can I get you a drink on the house”.

“No I would like my cheque please”.

“Hmm, is there a problem”. Don’t stare at me I think. I know that stare. Wont work on me.

“Yes I have been waiting to be served for almost an hour. But now I have lost my appetite. Also the high I had from my previous drink”.

“Can I get you a round of drinks on the house”.

“No” my friends echo. “We would like to leave. Just get us our cheque please or the manager. “

“I’ll get you the manager”.

“Yes. We would like to speak with the manager”.

She is the same person who couldn’t get us into the comedy club. I tell her the saga. With time lines. I can get quite anal when it comes to such details. She says she will get the tab to make up for the lapse in service and apologises. I tell her she needn’t apologise.

I ride the high horse. “If you don’t let me pay, you shall miss the point. I have been politely seeking attention for an hour. Obviously some one doesn’t wish to serve us. We want to leave. We want to pay for what we have had, as this is not to get free drinks”. She tells me she knows we aren’t looking for free drinks but she needs to sort this out and asks for a moment.

After her conversations with our capped man she comes back to tell us that he did get backed up and did ignore our table a tad bit too long. She was sorry for not getting us into the comedy club and for the really bad service at the bar. I insisted on paying. She insisted I didn’t. My friend nudged me into submission.

We got free drinks at a bar in West Village. Next time just get me my fuzzy bellini.

We just didn’t know that. There is a reason men avoid confrontations.

Do you answer that dreaded phone call entertain difficult, heart wrenching, pointless, disturbing, and unnecessary conversation.

Or do you just never answer the phone, making peace knowing they think you are the worst ever.

I am tempted to chose the latter.

The question isn’t if he does or he doesn’t. The real question is why?

Inarguably I come from the generation of young Indian women who have no idea what they really want in life. Personal life that is.Our mothers didn’t want us to go through what they did. Our fathers didn’t want to be the clichéd 60’s dad who didn’t educate their daughters.So here we are a breed of intelligent, smart, confident, sexual beings who can probably get any job available in the market at whims and fancy.But how capable are we of finding the right man, marrying him and then keeping that marriage.

The number of break-ups, divorces and bad marriages in my generation of young people is at an all time high. I am not getting into whose fault it is. I would just like to know how did our mothers make their marriages work. For so long at that.

I consider myself a very adjusting person. Having lived out of home for over 10 years now,in 4 countries, with over 20 room mates, I think I have it all figured. I can live any where, with any one. In my current living situation I have volunteered to cook food every day. For four adults. I also walk the dog two times a day. No complaints. It isn’t the 2/3 hours a day that I have to spend on the chores that bothers me. It is the responsibility associated with the act of providing 2 square meals a day. The days I don’t feel like cooking, there is no hot meal for me to eat. This annoys me, but it isn’t the end of the world. I sometimes wonder would I be as unaffected by lack of sensitivity by the person I end up marrying.

Will I really be able to put up with having to be responsible for any thing else but me? All the time? Is this the strain that most couples are buckling under? There were times when my mother said she needed a holiday. Those times were rare and very few. She has been a working mother. I don’t ever remember her complaining. Did she know when she got into a marriage, how demanding her life would get? How much of herself she would have to let go to keep her marriage and bring up her children.

Is that some thing the girls of my generation aren’t capable of? Or we don’t want to invest as much of our selves to make relationships work? I don’t understand people harping about women’s rights. I think a lot of us are beyond those issues. Where I come from I battle different demons. No matter what I achieve  will I ever be good enough.

Some times not knowing might be a good thing. I am contradicting myself on my own blog.

There is a reason, why people don’t tell you every thing. They have an acute sense of understanding the truth the other can handle. Some times one just can’t handle it all. They know and hence they do not tell. I would like to believe.

Asking for the truth can create off-balance in one’s understanding of the already chaotic sphere of existence.The chaos is one we understand. One we have learnt to create a balance in. What happens when that balance is disturbed? How do we then find our anchor?

Interactions bring about affect. Positive negative small enormous. That is immaterial. How ever trivial, they are real. Most times the purpose of that affect is unfathomable. It exists. We know. Most times that knowledge is sufficient. Some times, one really needs to know.

A long drive, a cafe latte, conversations in a parking lot. Who knows what brings about that clarity. When it does come it is real. Raw. Disturbing. Painful. Creates an off-balance. One good thing is the realisation that we still have some innocence to lose.

With less than a week and the pressure to perform better than my best, I was beginning to buckle. So I panic and reach out for help. Loud and clear. Of all the help I received these words of wisdom have definitely done the trick.

SHUT UP. GO STUDY.

In the company of one, yearning another is a lonely feeling. Understanding that you aren’t the one the other yearns, needs some growing up to do.

It is hard not to ask, why me. It needs some growing up to believe, it is a good thing it was you. Free life experiences, do make the best teachers.

Hurting is easy. Being able to forgive as you realise that you just happened to be at the receiving end for no fault of yours, shows you have grown up in life.

When looking into their eyes, watching the reflection of your pain you know you have grown up.

It isn’t always about you. Exercise caution when dealing with another’s emotions. Know that no matter how minuscule you will have an affect on them. Do not misuse that power. Strive to be a better person. Grow up.

They don’t know how hard it is for you to accept you don’t know what to do. So when you ask for help, you have shown a lot of courage.

Forgive them for not knowing that you feel let down when they don’t come through for you. They don’t know you chose to trust them. They don’t know what went into making that decision.

They also don’t know how much pain, suffering and insecurity you have gone through before accepting defeat. They don’t need to. Definitely not now.

Give more, expect less. Works. But how?

Oh snap out of it. If you thought I will be writting another sappy post, you would be so mistaken. The holiday season is long over and so is my needy mushy nonsensical self. I am back and in full vigour.

So is the virus attacking my upper lip. In any other circumstance I would have my bowels churning to even think about having a cold sore. I have always associated it with dirty thoughts of dirty people doing dirty deeds. And here I have a sore with no claim to that kind of fame. Not fair methinks. But then not much in life is.

So here I have a swollen upper lip, painful and ugly and limiting my food intake, which of course may not be such a horrible thing.

So when I decided not to make resolutions, I said nothing about not becoming a better person this year. This is my first step. Next time I see a person with a cold sore I know, it could just well be platonic.