Ten of swords

Before I am disembowelled by a Gucci pump – Audrey is NOT five years older than me, she is four and a half years older than me. (Although, if that’s the only thing that a)offended her b)caught her attention in that passage, we should consider relegating her reading/comprehension skill-set level down to pre-comatose.)

Also, because Isha made a SPECIAL request – I’m going to list the top 5 reasons that I am going to London. Just for you.

5. It’s London

4. Isha/Aurelie are there.

3. I need a holiday. And I feel an irrepressible urge to wear a beanie.

2. Travel is the basic building block of integrity (right? right?)

1.. Because I COULD be going to Bangkok, but I enjoy pissing Karan off.

Oh, and Neha is going to be in India, so that’s my entire social life eradicated in a four hour flight. Plus, I want pictures of me NOT on orchard/at Indochine/Soundbar/Coco Latte (why, the HORROR)/Neha’s pool/the Marriot/any MRT station (yes Ish, I do take MRT, no I do not need a special permit).

I want to learn to salsa. Properly.

I don't fully understand why it seems crushingly obvious to everyone but me that Truman Capote was more than a slightly imbalanced individual. I read In Cold Blood after Rishi gushed about it (and trust me, Rishi does not gush. He flippantly insults, he does not gush) to me for about a week, before leaving it on my bed for me to peruse. I enjoyed it. There was a macabre honesty that you just don't see in literature today – an immoral slant to what should have been an incredibly black and white story. Capote managed to romanticize two immensely immoral men to the point of victimizing them. Perry Smith and Richard Hicock were crazy. I mean that. And I'm all for a good horror story every now and then – but the precision and complete lack of passion present in either of them was almost more disturbing than the crimes they committed. It's one thing to pass judgement on two men who walk into someones home and blow their heads off. Thats easy. Condemnation in the absence of personification is not a stretch of the imagination. It's the humanization that Capote puts us through – hearing their conversations, knowing their fears, seeing the world through their eyes that taints a complete disavowal of them. The more you read In Cold Blood, the more you feel that Capote either identifies with something, especially in Perry Smith, or he kinda sorta understands him. Either is terrifying. Because its easy to see how it could happen. So what makes us so different from him, and by inference – from them? If an act of complete violence is met not with unadulterated hatred, but with a starry eyed character study, how much is the crime undermined? The thing is – its all just very human. I dont think Capote was completely unhinged BECAUSE he was affected by the humanity he saw in Smith. I think everyone has their insecurities and doubts – and they bubbled to the surface when he tried to juxtapose the man who killed four people in Kansas, to the quiet dreamer he met in a jail cell. A part of him wanted to believe that there was something more, or something less to him. I dont know – I think its natural, to want to draw some semblance of rationality from any irrational experience, because at the end of the day, all that anyone wants is to be able to understand what is going on around them. So was Capote insane – I dont know. I just didnt think he was based solely on In Cold Blood.  

I had the most wonderfully condescending conversation with Audrey last night. I was on the receiving end of all the down-talking ofcourse, because I'm the one who predicts the future using "a random pack of cards that I picked up from MPH. Not even Borders (because for some reason, that would have given my tarot reading more validity), no no – from MPH (the bastion of poor quality reading, btw)". Audrey, on the other hand, works for O&M, is five years older than me (and consequentially much wiser – which is another issue altogether), has never subjected herself to "permanent body art" (your massage lady thought it was a CHICKEN, Neha) or (I'd love to see what parts of that stretch out when you're pregnant), doesn't think that animal-testing is wrong (so what if Loreal is buying up the Body Shop – animals dont have souls, haven't you read the Life of Pi ((which I did, incidentally – it says zoo animals don't have rights, it says nothing about killing rabbits to make lipstick)), you are SUCH an irredeemable romantic) and, most importantly – she's a Virgo. This is catastrophic to our relationship. You can't put a Gemini and a Virgo in a room together (or over telephonic waves as the case was) and expect them to agree on anything. Anything. By the way, all this started because she started singing that horrible Daniel Pewter "had a bad day" song and I offered her both my I-tunes library (there are better ways to sing a bad day to rest – Twisted Transistor, Vermillion 2, When Worlds Collide – the Poweman 5000 version) and a tarot reading. I said we could "center" her and really "define her issues". She flipped out in her sophisticated advertising way and said I was too dependant on "false probabilities". I think she also booked me an hour with her very expensive (very attractive) shrink. Which I would enjoy, for entirely non "attaining mental stability" reasons. So, all in all, a relatively pointless, accusatory, judgmental conversation. It was like a micro-cosm celebrity death match between a Rumi mystic and an investment banker. And she says animals dont have a soul. By the way, and because she will read this by this afternoon – I did pull cards for you, you got The Chariot, the Queen of Swords and the Eight of Cups. Go figure.