Visit to the Dentist...

I had to get one of my new wisdom teeth removed… Going to the dentist isn’t something I am familiar with… But seen almost all in my family go & their painful experiences… So I was obviously scared due to the 2nd hand and the general 3rd hand experience.
I reached the clinic at the earliest possible. The doc came in and I took the “hot” seat. As I was already on medication for the past 3 days, I wasn’t in pain at that moment. The doc did a regular check up first… then I saw him fill a huge injection of anaesthesia… perfect time for my heart to skip a beat.
With as much courage as I could muster, I opened my mouth as wide as possible.
One, two, three… the doc injected the anaesthesia in 3 places. Within 5 minutes, the right side of my mouth had swollen and become numb. Then began the procedure.
The gums were pushed back… with sheer force the tooth was pushed and finally pulled out using a tweezers-like tool. All this took about 45 seconds !!
Thankfully I didn’t feel any pain, only the applied force. Ofcourse everything happened with my eyes tightly shut. So I just saw no tooth in the start and a huge blood stained tooth in the end.
I was on my way back home with a swollen face and a huge cotton bud in my mouth within 20 minutes of setting foot in the clinic. I didn’t know this was just the beginning. Soon enough I started to feel the anaesthesia spread… The teeth in the surrounding area couldn’t be felt… then the right half of my tongue turns into a stone, followed by right half of the lips. And before I know it, the entire right half of my face is without sensation… my speech wasn’t all that comprehensible, it was an effort to keep the right eye open, the ear seemed to have just dropped off and the effect was trying to make its presence felt even in my head.
A few hours of sleep and the effects evaporated as suddenly as they had dawned. There isn’t much pain because of the medicines.

Now after three days, it is just a slightly painful throbbing, which too shall pass… After all, the visit to the dentist wasn’t as excruciating as I was expecting it to be…!

live canvas...

As i entered the park for an evening walk, my eyes met with a head-on collision with a brilliant clear blue sky... But the patches of clouds spread all over, made the strongest impact…

For the first time, i felt as if i was inside a living canvas in which everything else had been overshadowed by the awe of the clouds in their numerous shades and hues of blue and orange... It felt as if the clouds were left hanging in the sky by invisible strings from who knows where... Being a live canvas, every glance had the fortune to capture a changed aspect of the painting...
Everything had been blended seamlessly within the picture... Everything – animate as well as inanimate (people, trees, animals, birds, kites, buildings, sounds, noises) - was a perfect fit...

Most of the sky was playing with clouds ranging from blue to deep purple... But in one section, the orange of the clouds was way too overwhelming...
My heart was filled with great pleasure at having being able to witness the magnanimity of the picture & the painter... But this pleasure co-existed with the ache of realisation that I am but a mere spec on the canvas, with no power to play with the clouds and add my own colours of imagination to them...

By now, the orange of the clouds had turned deep and I just couldn't take my eyes off them... All this while i was still walking... By the time i turned around a bend for a second look, the sun had gathered its rays, abandoning the clouds... Suddenly, the sky, devoid of its colourful pearls, had been relegated to the background and the concrete structures took the foreground with a towering prominence...

I was knocked out of my trance back into the reality... and was left with the urge to instantaneously transport myself to Alaska to revel in the breathtaking northern lights...

Monsoon arrives...

Finally, some decent downpour… The sky over laden with slowly approaching rain clouds… The small drops giving way to the big ones due to the sudden burst… The fragrance of wet soil wafting through the air for only a few seconds… The first drops falling on me, soaking my clothes & touching me…The kiss on the cheek, the shiver running through me as the wind blows, the face raised up to the heaven, the spirit embracing it all with wide open arms…

The neighbours going into a frenzy to save their washed and dried clothes from getting wet… The kids running out to call on all their friends… Every soul – kid, adult, old – enjoying the first monsoon showers… People can be seen getting willing drenched on the roads, on terraces and balconies. Some trying to capture a few moments, things and/or expressions using a camera, some by painting… Some are attempting to blend their music with the rain…

Since all kinds of people exist in this world, I guess there must be a few who were totally indifferent to this miracle ‘coz its just a natural phenomenon which happens on a regular, though getting delayed annually, basis. Yep, I can be one of them many a times…

Of course I can see all the beauty in this ‘coz I am at home, on my terrace and not out struggling to reach someplace or stuck in traffic ‘coz of the pools on the roads… Otherwise the above space would have been filled with description of hell…