somkritya

The sloth chronicle-What is your SQ

Soma Mukherjee — Thu, 23 Feb 2012 15:59:25 +0000

“Weave some silly fun put it in the world and make it smile as often as you can.”

I am starting this new series..it is going to be about every thing you have ever wanted to know about sloths,for those who just cannot have enough of this brainy species.

I will keep updating about them once in a month or may be once in two or three months, can’t commit( sloths don’t)

Let me kick-start this series with little more about me ( Got a sloth award)

I had several chores to attend to,write a lot of notes,make beds,run to the grocery store nearby

buy vegetables and things my house needs,do this and that and burn some fat.

I smiled at all of them and said no thanks will see ya later.

Made myself a great breakfast and enjoyed it with some good music. watched some re runs,and was about to get up when a cute lil meow decided to drop in for a word. She was a diva but then so am I! So we both gave each other a care two hoots about you diva look for few seconds before I blinked…damn I lost

she smiled and said she will come back( of course in her language which was …well…meow)

Time to go and make amends with house work but not before some deep breaths absorbing warmth ,gave sun a lazy smile

ah the chores I thought,now I am ready, lets jive

and the day was over in no time………..ya right

Me being me, stopped to look myself in mirror..you cannot do work unless you have that diva look..even when doing laundry..its like I am always shooting for some commercial…you never know guys!!!!

what if you die go up there and they have made some CD of your life and its being watched by an expert panel before judging..I mean the kind of goof ups we all do all the time that too not looking great…whoa…am not taking any Chance. I don’t want to look like my pic in driving licence or passport anymore .. a drug addict +thief caught in act….in short a kind of person who looks like mug shot of every criminal Interpol is searching for.

Anyways so after giving my self that OMG I am so hot look in the mirror was just about to attack the laundry when my neighbour rescued me by interfering and updating me on my neighbour hood events

yup that is more important so half an hour and 200 gossips later I thought laundry here I come (Oh how lucky were the early guys wearing leaves ..wear and dump) and then decided against it again….

Today I just wanted to be a sloth and I asked my self what would a sloth do..and pat came the reply..blog..of course I should blog about this hugely important phase of my life

what do you guys do when you encounter such day do you sit and let yourself be a sloth

You : hey boss I ain’t coming for work today , its sloth day

your boss: you lucky you go enjoy

Or do you kill that urge and go to work.

you: sir today was a sloth day but I came to work

your boss:what! are you mad?go home!!!

So there is no story or poem…I am a sloth enjoying my sloth day today

oh by the way if you want to celebrate a sloth day there is a ritual

Sit on the most comfortable couch,legs up on table nearby and chant

Now the great sloth quiz. Check you SQ( sloth quotient)

Q1 How often do you give in to your sloth urges

a)once or twice a month

b)once or twice every week

c) few hours every day

Q2 You have an important meeting

a) you go to the office and attend meeting half heartedly

b) you go to office but come back after making some excuse

c) you sleep it off

Q3 You look at the laundry basket which is threatening to explode

a) you decide to do it later that day

b) you decide to do it next day

c) you laugh and show your middle finger to the basket

Q4 You have a party to attend

a)you smell all the party wear in the laundry basket and decide to buy one

b) you smell all the clothes in the laundry basket and wash the one you want to wear that night

c) you smell all the clothes and pick up the one which smells the least and wear it with loads of perfume

RESULT-

Mostly a- darling oh poor darling

Mostly b- Aww you are so sweet, almost there

Mostly c- Yay( applause and drum roll) clear winner hugs bro/sis

I hope you all have immensely enjoyed this post

have a great day all of you while I sit and do nothing till its bed time

Filed under: Insane Zone Tagged: fun, humour, Postaweek2012, Sloth, writing

Zuckles,Zonita Zand Zee

Soma Mukherjee — Tue, 21 Feb 2012 05:55:17 +0000

We worry about what a child will become tomorrow, yet we forget that he is someone today. ~Stacia Tauscher

I know the title of the post is self-explanatory but want to share more.

When my daughter was 2-year-old we noticed the only way she would play with anything and everything was to line them up …no matter what she had, cars, toys, shoes…. They all would fall in same line and then the game would end. She never used to play like other kids…this was when we started noticing other things and then came to know about her Autism…we were told most of the autistic kids don’t or can’t pretend play….you know how we would take a comb or a pencil box and act as if it were a phone or a microphone and talk.

Most of them( Autistic kids) will have no idea what to do with a car or a doll ….And we were told by the doctors and special educators to teach Bonita pretend play…..that is wroom with a car,or dressing up a doll,make up,pretending to be doctor,or teacher etc…and age appropriate plays and language.

And this is how our journey to Zonita began.

[I was quite a naughty kid and I always thought Oh all these brilliant naughty ideas and no one to share with....and look at Gods mysterious ways...he must have really loved my naughtiness for now he wanted my daughter to learn them and that too from one of the best in the business.]

Our pretend play sessions were full of mischief and laughter (otherwise what is the point) like this one time we pretended there was water in the room and we swam across room and fought with crocodiles and a snake.

Oh there were so many things we did…One Day I told her we both have to talk loud as we are in a market and there is too much noise all around, And then next time we whispered as we were in jungle surrounded by dinosaurs

We still do a lot of things Crazy and fun.

One day we decided we will only talk in NATO phonetic Alphabets….Oh! that was tough and we could not continue it for more than half an hour ,For just to say “Bonita finish your food” meant

Bravo Oscar November IndiaTango Alpha Foxtrot India November IndiaSierra Hotel Yankee Oscar Uniform Romeo Foxtrot Oscar Oscar Delta

That was tough and we laughed more than we talked every time some big sentence came up

Anyways the point of all these were to introduce her to endless possibilities…having fun with whatever we had, teaching her to be naughty too….so in all these crazy moments we decided we will have alphabet days.

So on a B day every word would start with B

Bonita finish your food would be Bonita binish bour bood and then she would say bes bommy

One of the Tuesday afternoon after picking her from the gate where the school van drops off all the kids,we were in the lift and having this ‘B’ routine, there was one more kid in the lift.He must have enjoyed it a lot cos he told me Bauntie boo bar bo bunny

To which I said- Bank bou.Bi bam blad bou biked bit

He laughed and said this is fun I have to tell this to my friends

I asked him his name and he said I don’t like my name. That… that was the point I fell in love with his cute little kid…..You See I don’t like my name too ( It’s a long story will tell you some other day, Hope my parents are reading this ). So I told him I will call him chuckles cos I love the way he laughs. He laughed and agreed( and his names keeps changing Zuckles on a Zday,Nuckles on Nday)

Now I have to mention here,Even though we live in the same building Chuckles and I don’t meet that often due to different school timings

So next time we met it was a Z day and he joined in

Zello Zonita,he said

Bonita was happy to have a new Zriend and she said Zello Zuckles

Bonita told him she didn’t like one of her teachers and zuckles said that was normal and so on

And yesterday all of a sudden zuckles showed up at my door with his friends and asked me what day was it I said it was Zday and he grinned and said he loved Z

So all of us spoke about anything and everything in Z they laughed and rolled on floor.And told me they will have these funny days when they play.

Then one of the kids who was 6 years old said he hated math’s( he said Zi zate Zaths)….Everyone understood and sympathized

Then he asked me auntie can’t we live without learning math!

What??? there was a pin drop silent and all of them were looking at me And I was desperately trying to think of something clever.I said I didn’t like maths at all ( I really don’t) but some things in life you must learn, like riding a cycle…or learning how to swim…

How can math be like cycle zuckles asked?

Well, I told when you grow up you may or may not need to ride a cycle but if you learn riding one you will learn how to balance and this will come handy in other things too…Similarly when you grow up you may not have to solve the same questions you solve now….But plus minus, multiplication, division, fractions…are the basic math which you will need in your day-to-day life.

So they all decided they will learn basic math ( atleast)except for one kid who loved math

Phew

So zuckles and zis zriends zaid zeir zoodzyes zand zent zaway

What a day we had…

Oh before I go… Today is Nday

No nave na neautiful nay nall nof nou nand Nake nare

Filed under: Autism, Insane Zone, Story Tagged: Autism, fun, humour, Kids, Postaweek2012, Special education, WordPress, writing

In this restless World

Soma Mukherjee — Fri, 17 Feb 2012 07:20:38 +0000

I wanted to share some of my poetry and stories but today’s post just didn’t let me move on without it being written and shared…such are some topics..such are the ways of today’s world.

This world we live in has become a vessel containing hot air balloons( and in some cases volcanoes) waiting to explode.

every where I look I see frustration either bubbling inside threatening to erupt waiting for that one moment or constantly erupting on every thing big or small.

and this kind of rage isn’t just contained to one specific gender,group or age..its prevalent every where in every strata of society….people all eager to get hysterical over everything and historical too in case you know the “opponent”.

War over Dog poop

Mr. A took his dog out for a walk in a park and didn’t even bother to pick up the dog poop and was about to move on when Mr.B interrupted his walk and requested him to pick it up and throw it in a dustbin,to which Mr. A took offence and said how dare you tell me what to do? do you have any idea who I am, how much i earn..blah blah blah

Mr B unable to hold on to patience anymore started showing off his wealth,health and whatever he could manage…in between Mr.C who seemed to be sensible quietly picked up the dog poop, put it in a dustbin near and requested Both the “wealthy gentlemen” to go their own way and not scare kids around.

but hey….

so Mr B and Mr A joined hands and started arguing with Mr C over who told him to interfere, who does he think he is, people like Mr C do menial jobs in their office and so on..By the time president of RWA(Resident Welfare Association) came along with other members there was a big fight in the park which can easily qualify for the biggest war over dog poop ever..

Adults = Maturity ( rarely)

One day I was standing near the main gate of our colony (where the school van drops off kids) waiting for my daughter.There were groups of parents all around discussing life and kids and everything. That day one of the kids came crying from the school , when asked he told he got punishment over not doing his math homework.so began a three day long fight between parents and teachers over who is to be blamed. Since I have worked with kids someone asked me what to do and I asked if anyone from school or home has checked whether the kid has understood that chapter or not.

well what do you know no one did!

They were all so eager to blame the other party no one even bothered to ask the kid why he was not able to do the homework in the first place.

Two very different set of issues both ending in huge fights.If you think the examples I cited in this posts are lame trust me I could have written hundred more where a communal fight broke over garbage pits,people fighting over parking spaces,a child killing his teacher over test results…..people can fight and kill even for a bag of chips or a sale.

Take any news paper and its full of printed horror stories of yesterdays and today’s.

And they all point towards-

low self esteem

the restlessness

the subdued anger

lack/absence of patience and tolerance

The great wall of class,caste and religion

Now I ask you all what do you think of the above situations.

Don’t you guys feel that of all fights,arguments going around most can be easily solved if people use their head and give it a thought before jumping in?

Don’t you think in today’s world fight over religion has over powered the very reason they exist…faith in God?

Don’t you think we are such a frustrated lot that all our pent up anger just sits, accumulates more hatred and then one day erupts into a fire which leaves huge scars?

what happened to us,when and how did we forget we were kids too?

unless we all get up

not wait for someone else to take the first step

unless we all open our eyes

not just get up from the bed every day

unless we all start listening

not just let voices travel in the ear

unless we all speak out and support the right

not just for us but for others too

nothing will ever change

I will be there for you

will you be there for others too?

Filed under: Uncategorized Tagged: Kids, life, Parenting, peace, Postaweek2012, school, World, writing

venez m’aider( Mayday)

Soma Mukherjee — Wed, 15 Feb 2012 07:03:02 +0000

one fine spring morning

I sat near a tiger in his cage

to entertain him

read poems from my blog page

I told him how I loved tigers

even the ones in zoo

and that we were not that different

as I was a carnivore too

I even sang him

a praise the tiger song

but somewhere something

went terribly wrong

for now I am in tigers belly

waiting for rescue

and reading my horoscope

just to get second view

It says Hola taurean

your chart has improved

last night mercury and venus

have danced and grooved

creative professionals

will reap benefits this week

singles get ready to mingle

and love will be on peak

it said my sun and mercury

are in travelling mode

and I should be walking

on a spiritual road

I should wear blue

and my lucky numbers are five and nine

and as long as I follow every thing

my life and luck will be fine

why the tiger would eat me

I am still puzzled looking for clues

It was my lucky day 5th

and I was wearing blue

It is dark in here,network is poor

leg space really bad

last meal is staring at me

and tiger is roaring mad

I was told he would not attack

cos his stomach is full

May be I shouldnt have told the tiger that

I was a taurean, a bull?

Filed under: Insane Zone, My Poetry Tagged: fun, Horoscopes, humour, My Poetry, Postaweek2012, Taurus, WordPress, writing

A Valentine Run

Soma Mukherjee — Sat, 11 Feb 2012 14:08:43 +0000

We were born to love

We were born love

And those who do not believe

Let us show them how

And bring them back

In the wet kisses of a baby and the baby talks

In the curled kitten resting on the lap

In the girl sharing secrets with her doll

In kid covered in mud smiling cos he saved a little puppy

In the father double checking the door locks every night

We were born to love

We were born love

And those who do not….

In the friend who stood by you

In the teacher who taught how to finger paint

In the storybooks taking us on a journey every where

In grandmothers hug in “war against parents”

In all the expected and unexpected gifts

We were born to love

We were born love

And those who do not……

In the first love and sleepless nights

In comforting coziness of the old ones

In the fight over remotes and car keys

In every I will never talk to you again and sulking over it

In the old couple walking on the street

We were born to love

We were born love

And those who do not….

In going through old letters and pictures

In going through marriage pics and smiling at some thoughts

In the first summer sun

In the first winter month

In the seasons and celebrations

We were born to love

We were born love

And those who do not believe in love

Let us bring them back

For we are earth mates

Souls of same sphere

So this valentine

Gather your friends and run

Run for every soul you have ever loved

for the library, bookstore, garden or park

Plant a tree in their name

And spread love and warmth

Let’s bring smile on every face we can

Let us bring all the lost souls back

And celebrate Love

Filed under: My Poetry Tagged: Freedom, poetry, Postaweek2012, relationships, Romance, Run, Valentine Day, Valentine run, WordPress, writing

Hugs,Smile and Chance- a fairy tale

Soma Mukherjee — Thu, 09 Feb 2012 06:50:55 +0000

I used to teach in a school, it was a kind of arrangement that worked out well for both my daughter and the school. They were taking good care of my daughter ( those days it was near to impossible to get an autistic kid in a normal school set up..still is but we are working on that) and I in turn used to help them out . During the short teaching career I taught science, geography, drama and dance. But my main job was to help out kids with learning disabilities( dyslexic,autistic,and other kids with learning difficulties)

following are just a few incidents from those days ……

“Fairy tales are more than true; not because they tell us that dragons exist, but because they tell us that dragons can be beaten.”

― G.K. Chesterton

life is a dance i said

every one dances

even the ones with two left feet?

asked a kid

cos I can’t dance

oh they are brilliant you see i said

for anyone can dance but to dance like you

now that is hard

the kid looked at me and then laughed and said

OK i will teach you mine and you teach me yours

so we danced to every music on the CD that day

he learned to dance pretty soon

and me oh i am still learning

its hard to unlearn you see

life is a song

every one sings i said

even the ones who don’t follow the beat?

asked the kid

cos i cant sing like others

oh anyone can sing like them i said

but to be you its hard will you please teach me

and we sang every thing we could that day

and the kid is now a lead singer in one of the bands

and me well it really hard to be that different you see

life is a drama i said

every one acts

even the one who freeze?

the kid asked i do well in rehearsals but

out in front of people i cant say a thing

oh its easy to say some lines i said

but to know what you can’t and ask for help is brave

let’s do one thing

start with helping others say their lines

and you stand out in open

and then slowly one day we will get you into the play

and the kid today is doing pretty well in plays and debates

and me oh well i cant freeze i just have too much to say all the time you see

ever wondered how a little encouragement

and warm smile makes such huge impact on a kids life

well try it

don’t force anything on anyone

just a friendly push is all that they need

some will start early

some will be late bloomers

some will do it in no time at all

and some will take months

but they all have something

all they need is patience, hugs, smile and chance

we can give them all that

can’t we

Filed under: Autism, My Poetry Tagged: Autism, Dance, Fairy tale, inspiration, Kids, Parenting, poetry, postaweek2011, WordPress, writing

The News Just In

Soma Mukherjee — Mon, 06 Feb 2012 14:12:43 +0000

Life is full of breaking news.. in the television, on the roads, relationships, and …….

Do you have kids?? Well then you must know what breaking news

Really mean.

And of all the explanations ever given on the incidents kids can and will come up with the most ground breaking excuses for the ones they create.

This post is a dedication to those cute little pranksters -

This is channel AMADS (AFTER MOM AND DAD SLEEP)

And there is breaking news

That we are reporting live

This is going to break a lot of hearts

But the truth has to be told

Little Ben painted his little brother yellow and red

When he was sleeping in his cot last night

And this morning Ben was going to wipe his Brother’s face clean

Before mom and dad could see that

But got caught

And then one thing led to another

You know how parents have nose and sixth sense stronger than a wolf or a dog.

Crumbs of cake mom baked last night were found in Ben’s cupboard

And even when Ben told them it was eaten by a Tiger named Pine,

No one believed ( it’s a cruel world out there)

And they found the broom he broke last night( under his bed) fighting aliens

But they refused to believe it too

However there are reports some other kids (Ben’s friends) have seen aliens last night too!

They are all willing to testify!

And there were some paper planes in dads trash can which made dad pretty angry

Ben took it from his file but only to make them look better

According to our sources dad is jealous of Ben’s creativity

When asked how he could end up doing all that in one night Ben said it is his duty to protect his house and he was doing just that

As for the paint he said he wanted the aliens to be scared of his lil brother

And….and…..and….

What do you think please post your reactions in our twitter account #theamads

So they made Ben write which looks like an essay on

“Things I should never ever try”

The news just in-

Ben has broken all records by writing another “Things I should never ever try”

(Oh boy! When a kid writes apology for second time…)

But this time with his friends on their tree house

They all wanted to make the entire event flawless for next time

New resolutions passed/new treaties signed on the tree house-

1) Never eat cake in the cupboard eat it in the kitchen

2) Broken brooms/dusters should be thrown out of window

3) Any craft made from dads files should be thrown in the trash can outside

4) And baby brother’s face should not be painted in the night

There have been unconfirmed reports that when the kids came down after making such historic decisions they found nosey Sean Pentucky standing near the tree

And when he threatened them to disclose all the new secrets

He was told they knew who ate all the cookies in this house last week

And who put a frog in Melisa’s tiffin box..

That took care of the problem…..for now

What a historic day

For the weather reports stay tuned in…

Also coming up after the break who killed Humpty Dumpty

Filed under: Insane Zone, Story Tagged: humour, Kids, Parenting, postaweek2011, story, WordPress, writing

My 7×7 Link award

Soma Mukherjee — Fri, 03 Feb 2012 06:31:53 +0000

I have been nominated for the 7×7 blog award by

Maiya from http://achingforpng.wordpress.com/

And Jen C http://jenchay.wordpress.com/

Both the Girls are wonderful warm lovely souls

and they write such beautiful soul stirring pieces..

each leaf is an inspiration each leaf is a Gem.

Thanks girls its a pleasure and an honour to be sharing space with you

now the rules-

1) write something about you

2) Link upto 7 posts of yours you like

3) Nominate fellow bloggers

1) something About me- I love mountains and rivers and one day I will leave this city life and live in a cottage near a stream..oh my dreams but this one will take shape I know that for sure

2) Links to some of my posts worth the mention

http://somkritya.wordpress.com/2011/06/25/the-ravaged-canvases/

http://somkritya.wordpress.com/2011/07/18/beneath-all-that-cobweb/

http://somkritya.wordpress.com/2011/10/18/green-cravings-a-song/

http://somkritya.wordpress.com/2011/07/16/fly-fly-fly-away/

http://somkritya.wordpress.com/2011/07/29/daddy-longlegs/

http://somkritya.wordpress.com/2011/08/09/frogga/

3) sharing the love and warmth

http://gabrielleangel115.wordpress.com/

http://adamsart.wordpress.com/

http://lscotthoughts.com/

http://nandinidhiman.wordpress.com/

http://ushus.wordpress.com/

http://vampireweather.wordpress.com/

http://indianthoughts.wordpress.com/

http://jakesprinters.wordpress.com/

http://talesfromxira.wordpress.com/

http://susielindau.com/

http://ravenofleyla.wordpress.com/

http://arjun1097.wordpress.com/

http://bloodinkdiary.wordpress.com/

http://amaltaas.wordpress.com/

http://awakeningpsyche.wordpress.com/

http://mystafied.wordpress.com/

Go ahead spread the love I will be waiting to read/see your links

Have a great day

Filed under: Uncategorized Tagged: 7x7 link award, Blog award, WordPress

Kato’Ki

Soma Mukherjee — Thu, 02 Feb 2012 17:27:55 +0000

When I was a kid

i wanted to become a pirate

sail to far away lands

find treasure troves

and fight the sea dragons

when i was a kid

i wanted to become a knight

Flash huge swords and win wars

kill the bad kings

and save people from monsters

when i was a kid

i wanted to become a detective

solve cases like nancy drew

help the police

and earn a badge

when i was a kid

i wanted to become a teacher

who would understand kids just like me

who would listen to us

and help us understand our dreams

when i was a kid

i wanted to grow up

do a lot of things

yet not change a bit

and that i did

and became a story teller

tell me one thing that is not possible

and i will weave you a story

of how it can be done

that is the beauty

when the kid inside

never says good bye

for the kid inside

every thing is magical

everybody is somebody

every dream is important

and nothing is impossible

if only you would believe

so if you are like me

who belives in magic and dreams

come let’s weave stories together

and give others new dreams

if you are not like me but do like me

let’s share and see how far our dreams go

and if you are not like me and do not like me

oh boy the things i have for you

in my bag

you would not believe

* Kato’Ki means, “Lets help each other” in Cakchiquel, the Mayan language spoken by the people in Patzun.

Filed under: My Poetry Tagged: Freedom, hope, Kids, poetry, postaweek2011, WordPress, writing

Safar(सफ़र)

Soma Mukherjee — Mon, 30 Jan 2012 11:56:14 +0000

We started the journey(सफ़र)

Of the known and unknown

The day we were born

The day we shook hands with death

And agreed to meet him somewhere in between

Or in the end as he called it

And then spent the life wishing never to see him again

Somewhere in this journey we found ourselves

We lost ourselves

We understood, got confused

And in this journey

we trusted God

we blamed God

Ignoring, avoiding, being indifferent to suffering around

And still hoped and prayed for his mercy

Somewhere in this journey

We became rebels

Stood for values

Fought for one

Agreed with none

Stood up for something’s

And regretted not standing for that one

Somewhere the hope died

Somewhere a new shoot was born

Rainbow failed to show up

Sun peeked through heavy clouds

Somewhere in this journey we found love

Lost it, all heart broken

To be filled with love and warmth again

Or may be never

Some rivers found their oceans

Some lost their route or the zest

Somewhere in the journey

Some found courage,

some lived with conscience muted

Some wrote, some listened

Some got married and some..

Well some of them still say single makes sense

Some lived happily ever after

And some never found out what it was

And in these alleys of the life we travelled

We ran, we gave up and sat for a while

And in these alleys of life we expressed

Sometimes we howled out loud

Sometimes we muffled the screams and the laughter

And just let our body talk

And in these alleys of life we lived

Dying every night

Coming to life every morning

Wishing for more, hoping for less

What ever worked…

And in these alleys of life

We met death

Some called him, embraced him

And some begged for another chance

Sometimes he came straight to us

And sometimes he just shook hands and said

Some other time

And in these alleys life ended

life began..

Filed under: My Poetry Tagged: hope, life, Life and Death, poetry, postaweek2011, WordPress, writing