going to yet another trip

Srinagar and the Houseboats

i am going to kashmir tomorrow ...with my family...to be very honest
going to a vacation with my family has always meant going alone ...rather should i say it has always felt I'm travelling alone....coz its meant looking at beautiful spots as if they were all mine...as if this was just a dream...which is waiting to be revisited....it all started with the visit to manali wen in 2000

'Me' fabulously in love with a dream...manali is beautiful specially coz we were staying at a cottage on the other side of manali..thr were fewer human beings straying up to me.....the river gushing by, telling its many tales.....the trees reaching up to heavens and if possible they even whisper to gods abt the ongoings on mother earth..even complaints i guess....and of course the stars which seem to have come down to the land ...twinkling mischieviously from the most unlikely places in the ever so

cold night ......cool dark all around...i used to sneak out of the room to wander alone in the night.....feeling the cold touch me

inside...feeling the loneliness creeping over me ...and yet ...feeling complete.....i walked up to chota manali ....a hot water spring which was compassed within a temple and walking back all alone.....looking at the kids playing with a foreigner .....using the latters cricket kit while the mother zoomed around(as fast as she cud in the mountains on a kinetic honda) the lil small inclined park....finding out the lil hidden spots where lovers had etched thr names....and the feeling of being so small in the enormous mountains....i feel at ease in the mountains.....my fears subside....my self conciousness vanishes....i dont think of anyone not liking me....it
hardly matters what deadlines i have tomorrow....i feel like sketching the vast landscapes and then feel it wud probably be a insult to capture eternity on apiece of paper....i love those lil flowers which pop up behind rocks now and then, and suddenly catching more of my attention than a whole mountain can...

but one thing i miss is sam...i keep feeling guilty that im enjoying all these moments alone wen he is not thr to see gods glory in the colours of the mountains.....in the coordination of the lil flower and the humoungous rocks....in the river ..soo violent and the smoothest of rocks....perfect....he told me that he has never been to the mountains....and i loved it wen i went to mussourie with him....we walked down the whole mall road and more..ate at a queer chinese resturant ....made friends with the owner and ended up having free dinner ..played the guitar...walked through the clouds(literally) could just think its soo cold and yet enjoyed it soo much...hug him and sleep in the bus...eat treacle.

i wud have loved to go to kashmir with him...the valley is known to be heaven on earth....my heaven is staying in a sticky city....looking around for a house...trying to survive....wanting food to eat....and i am supposed to be going out with my family...by flight...i wish i could just go off in a general compartment to just see him for once.....healthy, happy and sleeping peacefully....it wud have made my heaven much more perfect than any other heaven on earth...maybe kashmir will be another entry in the diary of "places to visit again, this time with sam"

image : http://lava.nationalgeographic.com/pod/pictures/sm_wallpaper/NGM1999_09p6-7.jpg