Identity

Back To School

by IdeaSmith
I started teaching an undergraduate course at a college that is allied with the one from where I graduated. I have taken exams in this very building. I’ve also represented another alma mater years later in a college festival and performed on the stage of this one. Now, I take the same road, stop at ... Read More

What Do We Owe Each Other In Shifting Normals?

by IdeaSmith
After I wrote yesterday’s fan post about And Just Like That, I stayed up late reading reviews & the subreddit of the show. Well. There is so much vitriol. I believe most of it is the punishment our overly capitalist world is wrecking on anyone who hasn’t paid the requisite influencers. Add to that good ... Read More

Being My Age Is A Feminist Act

by IdeaSmith
I’m often told I ‘don’t look’ my age. It’s served up as a compliment. It’s not. What’s complimentary about telling someone they don’t fit the box into which you’re trying to put them? I already know that by being open about my age (43 a week ago, when this photo was taken), I’m pushing back ... Read More

The Compassion Chemical

by IdeaSmith
I have been thinking about compassion. I find there’s no room for it in the stories we embrace to guide our lives. It is this that makes me feel I’m overflowing out of my body, spaces & life. What I have in me is labelled & pre-valued for tangible effects. Skills, decisions, actions. Feelings are ... Read More

What’s In A Name?

by IdeaSmith
IdeaSmith is not just my name My Clubhouse bio says “That is my name. Say it like that only.” IdeaSmith is a filter on who bothers to read the bio and who wants you to explain why you won’t fit the boxes they have in their heads. “What an idea, sirjee” assumes gender & regional ... Read More

Lemonade

by IdeaSmith
Little bits of crueltydrop off your wordslike ice shardsoff a glass of nimboopanithat still has a sliver or twoof lemon floating in it And I hesitate to point it out I want to pick it out of your beingBefore you taste your own sournessBefore you have to swallowyour imperfectionsAnd before the acid of itEats away a ... Read More

Sweet Tooth

by IdeaSmith
This was written for the prompt Sweet | given by Girish Krishnakumar for Alphabet Sambar’s weekly themed mic room. ~O~O~O~O~O~O~ Sweet Tooth. I didn’t have one. There was no room for sweetness in my world that demanded the efficiency of kitchen logistics & transactions of nutrition. Or the speed of an ambitious life or the ... Read More

Bombay Meri Hain

by IdeaSmith
I’ve been calling myself a Mumbaiker by identity. But yesterday, a compilation of Konkani songs sent me down nostalgia lane. I realised my history is a specific slice of Bombay culture. It is a Bombay of Koli fisherfolk, their current descendents dressing in westernwear rather than a kashta draped saree but still walking the pani ... Read More

A Skin Of Dignity

by IdeaSmith
The first ebook I ever bought was ‘Cuckold’ by Kiran Nagarkar. It had come highly recommended by the man seated next to me at a literature festival. A stranger, the two of us bonding in those sudden intimacies that are the magic of city life (if you don’t try to make them into something more). ... Read More

SOARING SOLO

by IdeaSmith
Life feels easier when you realise they don’t understand you. Can’t, won’t try & probably never will. But that is okay because when there’s no one around to live your life for you, is when you start to breathe. And you realise you don’t need anyone to understand you. It may make things easier in ... Read More