There was this whole chain of year-end thoughts in my head, when boxes of mutton puffs and plum cake were placed under my nose. My noble thoughts were of course hopelessly left floundering in heavenly aroma.

Now, I shall try and rescue them.

Have been browsing Facebook for the last few days. Why exactly I don’t know. Maybe I have had lesser work to do and more time to fill. Tonnes, literally, of photographs of sunglassed, smiling faces stuck cheek-to-cheek, weddings, travels, sitting rooms, dining rooms, food on the dining table, cats, dogs, cars, homes… everything that can possibly fit into a camera frame has been clicked and is up there. It’s spellbinding what digital cameras can do to our lives, and those around us. It’s like living in a shop window.

On a personal note, I am feeling itchy. No, I have been having a bath everyday, there are no bugs in my bed and my skin’s doing just fine. The itch is somewhere inside. The last one year has been the fastest in my life. And I don’t think Bombay’s pace has anything to do with it really (I am not part of the rush hour, I don’t get pushed in and out of trains and usually have relatively leisurely journeys, I walk to office). So what is it that took up all the time when I wasn’t paying attention?

Again, I don’t know. The only excuses – I can call them reasons if I am in the mood to console myself – that I can think of is: I was settling in – to a new job, a new city, a new house, a new life. And now that none of that is new anymore – and have hence depleted my meager stock of justifications – it is high time I scratch that itch.

Unformed shards of thoughts that swim around somewhere have been poking me. It’s time to put together the – very clichéd – kaleidoscope.