Artlexicons

Dear Arundhati Roy The words you wrote over twenty years of your life summed in the book ‘The ministry of utmost happiness’ gave me an understanding of Kashmir that was clearer than my experience of living in this state all my life. I was 13 when I started reading and in six years of me burying my head in fiction, I hadn’t yet found a voice that resonated with me more soundly than yours. Once while randomly browsing youtube I had come across an interview of yours and was more amazed by your hair than anything else. It took me just 30 seconds into the video to realize whatever you were saying matched exactly what was in my head. Only you could put it more blatantly and gloriously than my 19-year self could. I got your book as a gift on my birthday. It was the first and only book of yours that I read. How funny is it, that you might be reading my words for the first time on your birthday as well? The letter was supposed to be a short birthday greeting. I am sure you got many f...

To my almost best friend Hii! It has already been 2 years and 6 months and you still haven’t replied to my last text. People wonder how crazy it is to have an almost best friend on the internet. Yes, there is a thing called an almost best friend. How mad it is to get upset just because one of your internet friends suddenly stopped sharing the best coke studio's music with you, forgot to share semester results and all the gossip of real life crushes with a virtual friend. Suddenly they are nowhere on the internet. How crazy is it to spend hours thinking of them. We became friends because I posted lyrics of a song that was your favourite and then we started talking about music. Conversations began when I posted about how badly I needed chemistry revision and you shared your chemistry notes with me. Our love for books, psychology and trees made us almost best friend. Your love for Anarkali and my love for sarees made us switch to each other’s likings. For the first three months, I ev...

I have turned so indifferent when it comes to you, I think even hatred would be better than this. Do you realise what being someone's buddy means? A person can only have one buddy in their life. And that person comes before everybody else. It is like soulmates, only, you CHOOSE the person and then place utter faith in them, out of your choice and they do the same. That buddy is placed higher than everyone else in the world, whether it is family, friends, love or even oneself. And you already knew the kind of person I am, always placing people above my family, doing anything for my friends, never believing in love. But I did always place myself on the highest ground. Everything came after. But it is different with a buddy. I could take it if someone messed with me or someone else I cared about but for that buddy, I'd burn the world down before a single bad thing befell him. It is the person you want next to you when you are convulsing on the floor in the darkness, hoping fo...

I've hated the person I was years ago but turns out I've still been hating myself for being that person and it's so wrong because all that WAS me and this is also me so there's no point in hating. But I think you're doing the same thing with yourself for whatever reason. The way things ended in your relationship, you hated your past self for it but you've been hating ur present self too. And this isn't right because it makes you so fragile and vulnerable and you're stronger than that. It makes you a people pleaser and you shouldn't be. I don't think you are like this way with other people but you are definitely like this with me. And I DON'T feel good about that. Maybe it's because you see HER when you talk to me or maybe you just see yourself. But I have evolved from the phase you're going through. I still have some shortcomings that I'm trying to work on but I don't make myself dependent on just ONE another person anymore ...

I don't even recognise you anymore. Your face, your words, your personality is all different. And I'm sure if I heard your voice now I wouldn't recognise that either. And now that I think about it, it would probably feel the same if I looked in the mirror now. Time has changed right? And both of us have as well. But amidst all these changing years you have been the constant AND the variable. We have been the best of friends and yet fallen apart so many times. Only to find our way back to each other. Sorry that it was always you who made the effort. I let people go with too much ease. But it's always a happy feeling to have you back. Maybe this will be the last time. We WILL stay friends after this. It just is so weird. Me seeing you after a year and half, without realising it had already been that long. You not noticing me and me mistaking it for you ignoring me. You looked scary, truly. Because of the air of determination around you. You looked larger than your p...