The December Weddings

We spent a good part of December taking part in two wedding celebrations in India...one in Delhi & another in Goa. I don't know if it's something about weddings in general, or just Indian weddings in their larger-than-life scope of things, that make you feel optimistic about life. Weddings make me believe in lasting family bonds, in love & friendship, in connections across countries and continents that get bridged over a Punjabi dance number or a groom covered in haldi from head to toe.  

Too sappy? I need to stop writing. 

2014 in Retrospect

It was a strange year, wasn't it? While Christopher Nolan made a movie about space travel to another galaxy & India launched a mission to Mars, here on earth, we couldn't find an enormous passenger airplane which just disappeared into thin air. Literally. While intolerance & extremism took its biggest toll on humanity & it appeared like the world is going to drive itself to a manic hateful end, it was a year when a homeless man became a YouTube sensation by buying food for others. And closer to home, it was a year when I stepped out of corporate life and pursued other (more domesticated) interests, and moved many notches higher on the happiness scale.  Who would've thunk!*

It was a memorable year. It was a year of new beginnings, in more ways than one. Getting out of a comfort zone wasn't at all as uncomfortable as I had imagined it would be. Our first mom-son trip, my first exhibition, my first book, our first big extended family reunion, K's first time to our family temple. These are treasures made of memories. 

We made another momentous decision this year (lets call it "Project 2015") & hopefully it's going to work out fine. The best part of the year was the breathless wait for the new year!

*I even baked. For pleasure!

Boyhood

So this is a movie made with tons of patience (filming only a couple of scenes every year, over a span of 12 years), so it's only fair that the movie demands the viewer to have some patience (it's a long movie that trudges along slowly and lyrically). I don't know if I loved the movie because I'm a mom of a little boy (very much like the 5-year old Mason at the beginning of the movie), or because it's a movie one can relate to irrespective. Loved the sensitive passive-watcher-through-a-secret-camera feel of what seem like petty everyday events which add up to a portrayal of a little boys coming-of-age journey. Loved, loved, loved it!

Yes, it's an extremely long movie & almost documentary-like, but never got bored. Not for a minute.

The benefit of filming a movie over so many years I suppose, is that the filmmaker doesn't need to stage any of his surroundings to the appropriate era. Britney Spears was the queen of pop 12 years ago, smart phones came along roughly 6 years ago, video games evolved, fashion evolved, hair styles and definitions of "high school coolness" evolved, and it's all captured while it happened. What a master stroke that is!