This is a much awaited apology to both my readers as well as my blogger friends. I have been rather tardy with my blogging primarily due to the end-semester deluge of work. I have logged into the blog at times when unfortunately the system has turned off my ability to reply to comments. Therefore, I must have seemed rather rude to my regular readers. However, I take this opportunity to thank you all for visiting this blog and rejuvenating my spirits with your constant words of encouragement. I hope to revive this somnolent blog with renewed vigor and steer it in a more fruitful manner towards a new state of literary accomplishment. I sincerely hope that my readers will overlook my erstwhile failures and continue to encourage me towards newer pathways.
During the last few weeks a change seems to have come over me. I feel this tremendous need to be silent. It is like a pregnant pause before words of another kind are destined to flow. Having relinquished the company of platforms that promote chatterboxes and are extrovert-oriented, such as the Facebook and Twitter, I increasingly feel the need even to avoid phone calls and messages. Whether it is the social media or commonplace conversations, both are tailor-made for responses and reactions. I seem to have lost both, in the process having developed a strange affinity for saying nothing and reacting to nothing. Words flow otherwise, especially when I am thinking about my next manuscript or characters, but the need to make myself heard is gradually vanishing like sedentary mountain mists. I am like a tree. I have become like a tree. I need nothing except simply the need to be. The need to exist in some quaint corner of this universe. That seems to be all. No questions, no opinions, no judgement, nothing. Simply existence and all the simplicity that comes with the same.
Au revoir, till the next time this mountainous tree wishes to speak a word or two 🙂
I’ve been a regular observer as well as a keen follower of various browsers since the year 1998. I have summarily used Windows 95, 98, XP, 07 and 10. I’ve not yet graduated to Windows 11 since my laptop is rather old and I kind of have an attachment to it. Having been an erstwhile user of browsers such as the MS Internet Explorer, Google Chrome, Safari, Mozilla Firefox, Microsoft Edge and Opera, I’ve come to the conclusion that if you are interested in a browser that is meant for work and primarily focused on work only, then Vivaldi should be the perfect choice for you. I am not saying this simply because I use Vivaldi as a platform for my blog. In fact a thorough research over the years into the productivity quotient of every browser has made me come to this conclusion.
1. The Integrated Mailbox
The integrated mailbox is definitely the best feature of the browser. I have hitherto used email clients like Mozilla Thunderbird and MS Office Outlook, but none of them had had the facility of retaining a copy of the mail in the original server. Not only does Vivaldi retain a copy of the original mail, but also marks it as read in the web-mail inbox. Moreover, it is extremely easy to configure a mailbox in the mail client. I find it extremely satisfying that I can read my emails at leisure without depending on the internet or even during a slow net connection. I personally recommend this email client to all writers or anyone else involved in any other kind of profession.
2. Many Search Engines to Choose From
My personal favorite is DuckDuck Go, though I have used Google, Bing, Yahoo and others in the past. The ability to integrate and use any search engine within the Vivaldi browser is definitely something worth experiencing. Although other browsers allow multiple search engines to function, but somewhere they tend to promote their personally owned search engine to a great extent. This is especially true of Chrome and Edge. Vivaldi does nothing of that sort and allows the user the freedom to choose and operate his or her own choice of search engine.
3. Multi-Tasking
Being a writer is all about multitasking once the manuscript has been written and the process of editing goes on. Deadlines have to be met, and at this point of time a writer requires an assistant more than anything else. Vivaldi acts as a virtual assistant. It has inbuilt sections devoted to translation, managing dates and deadlines, to do lists as well as a personally managed reading list. Recently Vivaldi has introduced a new section called Workspaces which is a brilliant way of separating work and personal life and thus in the process de-cluttering both. I doubt if other browsers have come up with such an innovative feature.
4. Privacy
Last, but not the least, is the concept of privacy that Vivaldi tends to offer. It is by far one of the best browsers when it comes to privacy. Not only the browser, but even the blogging platform as well as its social media platform (Mastodon) offers immense privacy and security features. Being an erstwhile social media addict, I have given up on that platform completely, and thus, I have never really ventured into Mastodon. However, my previous social media experience with regard to Facebook, Twitter and the now defunct Orkut is far from positive. I have always found social media rather intrusive with regard to privacy and other cardinal matters. Leaving the same was a conscious decision that I took in order to devote more time to my craft and less time to things that make us Internet and phone addicts. I am at present in my happy place with this blog and I do not ever intend to relinquish the same.
In a nutshell, I would like to state that from a writer’s point of view Vivaldi is indeed the best browser one can invest in if one is interested in having an integrated mail client and personal assistant at one’s beck and call.
Writing per se is a wonderful thing, as is life for that matter. In both cases, it is the paraphernalia surrounding the same that troubles the intellect. A writer can happily type away words, but when the manuscript is complete, then the tedious job of hunting for an agent or a publisher is what is most bothersome. I’ve been scouting agents and publishers for the last few months to no avail. It is not even the fact that they have rejected my manuscript. They haven’t even had the TIME to go through the same !!! Had my writing been rejected, then at least I would have found comfort in the thought that someone somewhere has read it. But here the situation is much worse. At present I have been giving self publishing quite a serious thought. This has also got me thinking about life and the paraphernalia surrounding the same.
Life, like writing or rather the art of writing is supposed to be simple. But isn’t the paraphernalia surrounding the same that makes it quite tedious for us? Also, for a person living in a populous country like India, who is by nature an introvert, balancing the career of a full time Professor and a struggling writer can be quite cumbersome. My country is beautiful, with a rich cultural legacy and a lovely yet diverse nature, but what irritates me to the core is the immense growth of population and the problems that come with the same like difficulty in commuting, crowded roads and markets, blaring music, and a society that is teeming with extroverts. There is rarely a place in the Indian society for the introvert. Everyone loves company except for a few rare souls who are into writing and other creative arts.
Coming back to writing, I have been avidly searching for self publishing companies these days, as well as keeping an eye open for conventional publishers who may care to as Dickens said once “throw an eye over” my manuscript. Keeping my fingers crossed as well as busy on the keyboard.
I have been rather negligent of this blog, though I have not been negligent of my writing. However, it is never too late to start afresh (as my husband keeps telling me during periods of crisis). Hereafter, I have decided to use this blog as a day to day record of my journey through the writing as well as publication of my various books.
Since I have returned after a very long time, I sincerely hope that I have not lost my online readers/friends with whom I used ro interact on a regular basis.
Writers, poets, dancers, singers, artists, mathematicians, physicists and anyone involved with anything creative and constructive generally tend to live in an alternate universe. We live everyday lives with some amount of difficulty. The daily stresses and strains tend to often act as a negative influence upon our creative abilities. We struggle (in my case with the blank paper) to find our moorings, but often we are thrown headlong into the chaotic waters of life. Sometimes, the thoughts, the words and the sentences come, but unfortunately we are in the wrong place at the wrong time. Maybe at work or in a family gathering or in a social event. And before we can record or jot down those words swimming through the vastness of our complicated brains, they disappear…poof ! As if they were never there in the first place. And we languish within this universe devoid of the gems of our creation.
This is indeed a difficult thing to face on a daily basis. This is what we struggle with on a daily basis. This conflict between the worlds. This existence in parallel worlds or in an alternate universe !
Finally this evening, the rains graced us with their presence after a scorching month of heat and dust. I’ve been a rather lazy writer during the last two months primarily due to the heat becoming quite intolerable for my brain to function in a more sedate manner. However, with the freshness of the evening rains pouring over us like sweet blessings it is indeed high time for me to sharpen my intellect, rouse myself out of my temporary stupor and start writing like I’ve never written before; dotting and decorating pristine pages with my filigreed words. The rains have stopped now, but the cool air blowing across the Indian plains and the tranquil water entering the hard bosom of earth, the weather should be a rather mellowed one for the next couple of days. Generally coldness and cool weather awakens the writer and the poet in me. This is extremely detrimental for one who has been born and lives in a tropical country. Keeping my fingers crossed and hoping that the next few days become both productive as well as mentally invigorating for me. The rains and the Indian rainy season (monsoon) is something that we writers and poets across the subcontinent wait for. Amen to more refreshing weather and further rambunctious deluges.
When I began writing my blog, the primary purpose was of course to jot down the thoughts that were a byproduct of my writings. However, somewhere along the way, the concept of peace, the idea of living a life enmeshed with tranquility sprung up somewhere. The importance of harboring a tranquil mindset both during the process of writing as well as in day to day life became extremely essential. I realized that it is impossible for a writer to give his or her very best unless and until the mind is at rest and the emotions are under control. Living a dual life can be extremely difficult and certain mental tools are needed if we all wish to pursue our life’s ambition of becoming an established writer/poet. This blog will henceforth focus on the understanding of peace and how we can harness the same in our daily lives as well as in our craft in order to lead a more enriching and productive existence.
Back to my blog after a long hiatus. During this time my husband and I took a long deserved holiday to a hill station in Central India. It was our yearly vacation to the mountains and this time together was immensely wonderful, as we could break away from the daily humdrum of life and spend days in optimum relaxation. The hill station we visited was Pachmarhi. This is one of innumerable hill stations that the British established when the ruled over India for over 300 years. These mountainous little towns were called hill stations for a reason. They were summer capitals for the Briish Raj (since the Indian summers were too hot and steamy for the British to tolerate). Thus, they established little towns all across the length and breadth of India. These towns were nestled in the mountains (primarily the Himalayas) and each one was complete with a church, a post office and a police station. During the summer months of March, April, May and June, the entire British population would leave the plains for mountains and during winters they would return back to the plains. Thus, thanks to our erstwhile rulers, we Indians have acquired a plethora of hill stations across the entire Indian subcontinent. Darjeeling, Dalhousie, Nainital, Mussoorie, Almora, Kalimpong, Kurseing, Ooty and Pachmarhi to name a few. Keeping up with the British tradition, ever Indian summer, thousands of Indians leave the plains for short family vacations to the mountains. We did the same too. And it was worth it ! The refreshing mountain air and the break from the heat of the plains energized our mental as well as physical faculties.
Similar to other hill stations, Pachmarhi is replete with churches established by the British dating back to the 1800s, British Commonwealth war graveyards, quaint roads and marketplaces as well as waterfalls, mountain streams, and an old worldly vintage feeling of going back to the Victorian era. The holiday also cleared my mind of doubts regarding my second novel. I have returned with a more focused attitude towards my writing and hope to continue with this peaceful mental state for days to come.
Posting a couple of pictures of Pachmarhi below and a third one of my husband making an instant connection with a playful dog on one of the roads.
February is already upon us. In fact we can safely state that 2023 is already a toddler. Time flies fast and so does the ever spinning world around us. Days fly by and nights wade through invisible moments. I’ve not been able to make much progress on the writing front, though I’ve managed to complete my obligations at work. At least, I can state that on the work front I feel rather light headed and free. Once all this has been settled, it is time to focus back on my original profession…writing. I will keep this post short as I am writing from work. Maybe I will write a longer post at leisure. Writing on this blog is also an important mental exercise that contributes towards my overall well-being of being a writer.
