Tuesday, January 5, 2010

Kickstarting life

Hi. I am Ronnie and I just turned ten this winter. To commemorate this ‘oh-so-grand’ occasion, my cousin, who is way too old for me for anything sane to be exchanged between us, lavishly gifted me this space – where? In cyber space! She said she got this brilliant idea from a newspaper article she read about this really old Spanish lady, who was supposed to be the world’s oldest blogger. She was quite popular too, as she narrated stories that have gone into the pages of history - from her own experiences. So my cousin, who thinks I am going to be this great whatever, thought not to waste too many years (waiting till I turned really old and gnarled) and kick-start at an early age. After all this is the age where people are doing things way before their forefathers even thought of doing (and yeah I include almost everything you have in your mind right now).

But for me, having spent only a decade in this world, which others think has loads of things on offer if you can manage to grab hold of it, I don’t have much to say. Oh yes, I have loads to say about ‘my world’. But who thinks that’s cool enough?

Look at Mum and Dad. I know they love me and all, but do they ever take anything I say seriously? Like the other day, when I said old Mrs. Ray looks a little unlike herself. Nobody even batted an eyelid. Two days later when news got around that she passed away quietly in her sleep, everybody said that they never got any inkling that something might be wrong. Hello???

Just another day, I managed to extract a face-wipe from my cousin (this is the same one who thought she was too kind to give me some space somewhere), I realized I didn’t have anywhere to keep which I can call mine. With just two rooms and three siblings and throw in a huge dog, it is really difficult to call anywhere your own. Rather it is everyone’s. Even my school bag, which was the last piece of anything on which I thought I had the sole proprietorship, slipped out of my fingers. Why? You want to know why? Our dog Rex, who Mum says is the best behaved in the entire lot, was peeping very interestedly into my school bag. That was the moment - I knew it - that I lost the one thing I could call my own. Next day, as (only) I expected, the bag went missing only to be found in a rather sorry state. And yet Rex gets to be crowned as the best-behaved one in the house.

I know I have a very colourful record of managing to do a whole lot of things that many may get a heart attack while just listening to the narration. Like when I shattered the glass doors of the bookcase in the living-room. I was thrilled, considering that I managed to something as spectacular when I was just one and half years old. But the icing on the cake or the best one so far (oh yeah I am planning to come up with some more awesome stunts) jumped from the table and landed on an open knife and managed to almost chop off my own middle finger (I don’t know why my cousin thinks that it is highly ironic). It bled a lot. Quite gory, I must say! Mum ran around like crazy. Dad was trying to be brave but Mum stole the show for me that day. Hands down. Got a few stitches done. Today I am the only one in my gang who can flaunt a crooked finger and a long scar right down my left arm. Cool ain’t it?

So this is me. I am just the kid next door, with an extra dash of energy. I live happily in this small house with my mum, dad and two very irritating sisters, one of which is my twin – I just wonder how! I go to school like any other kid, braving the taunts of the school bully, who is the only one still unimpressed with my crooked thumb and scar. My Dad is a hardworking employee of a pharmaceutical company (his work is to sell medicine to doctors) and my mum is a homemaker. We have our ups and downs but we scrape through. Each day is therefore something to look forward to, a battle to be won at the end of it. From today, I shall give you a sneak peek into my world and share it with you, ‘coz if I am really going to be famous one day, I better start working on it as soon as possible and now seems to be the best time!

Anyway, happy birthday to me!!

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