Jothi's Private Notes made Public

A poem which is a good example for “auditory imagination”.

The Cataract of Lodore- Robert Southey.
The cataract strong
Then plunges along,
Striking and raging
As if a war waging
Its caverns and rocks among:
Rising and leaping,
Sinking and creeping,
Swelling and sweeping
Showering and springing,
Flying and flinging,
Writhing and wringing,
Eddying and whisking,
Spouting and frisking,
Turning and twisting,
Around and around,
With endless rebound,
Smiting and fighting,
A sight to delight in:
Confounding and astounding.
Dizzying and deafening the ear with its sound.
Collecting, projecting,
Receding and speeding,
And shocking and rocking,
And darting and parting,
And threading and spreading,
And whizzing and hissing,
And dropping and skipping,
And shining and twining,
And rattling and battling,
And shaking and quaking,
And pouring and roaring,
And tossing and
And flowing and going,
And running and stunning,
And foaming and roaming,
And dining and spinning,
And dropping and jerking,
And gurgling and struggling,
And heaving and cleaving
And moaning and groaning,
And glittering and struggling,
And gathering and feathering,
And whitening and brightening,
And quivering and shivering,
And hurrying and scurrying,
And thundering and floundering,
Dividing and gliding and sliding,
And falling and brawling and sprawling
And driving and riving and striving
And sprinkling and twinkling and wrinkling
And sounding and bounding and rounding,
And bubbling and troubling and doubling,
And grumbling and rumbling and tumbling,
And cluttering and battering and shattering,
Retreating and beating and meeting and sheeting,
Delaying and straying and playing and spraying,
Advancing and prancing and glancing and dancing,
Recoiling, turmoiling and toiling and boiling,
And gleaming and streaming and steaming and beaming,
And rushing and flushing and brushing and gushing,
And flapping and rapping and clapping and slapping,
And curling and whirling and purling and twirling,
And thumping and plumping and bumping
And dashing and flashing and splashing and clashing
And so never ending, but always descending
Sounds and motions, forever and ever are blending
All at once and all over, with a mighty uproar
And this way the water comes down at Lodore.


Benjamin Franklin’s Virtues:
1. Temperance: - Eat not to dullness: drink not to elevation.
2. Silence: - Speak not but what may benefit others or yourself: avoid trifling conversation.
3. Order: Let all your things have their places: let each part of your business have its time.
4. Resolution: Resolve to perform what you ought: perform without fail what you resolve.
5. Frugality: Make no expense but to do good to others or yourself, i.e. waste nothing.
6. Industry: Lose no time, be always employed in something useful; cut off all unnecessary actions.
7. Sincerity: Use no hurtful deceit think innocently and justly and if you speak, speak accordingly.
8. Justice: Wrong none by doing injuries, or omitting the benefits that are your duty.
9. Moderation: Avoid extremes: forbear resenting injuries so much as you think they deserve.
10. Cleanliness: Tolerate no uncleanliness in body, clothes or habitation..
11. Tranquility: be not disturbed at trifles, or at accidents common or unavoidable.
12. Chastity: Rarely use wine but for health or offspring, never to dullness, weakness or the injury of your own or another’s peace or reputation.
13. Humility: Imitate Jesus and Socrates.

Quotes:
“Being in love is like a sweet dream. Marriage is the alarm clock”- S.S. Tang.
“Friendships multiply joys and divide grieves”- H.G. Bohn.
“Isn’t it strange how often small talk comes in large doses?”
Democracy is a large balloon filled with hot air and sent up into the skies for all simpletons to gape at, while the smart ones went round and picked their pockets- Bernard Shaw.
Science without religion is lame; religion without science is blind-Einstein.
Conversation means being able to disagree and still continue the discussion- Dwight Macdonald.
“IS life worth living?”
“IT depends on the liver!”
“The trouble with not having a goal is that you can spend your life running up and down the field and never scoring”
Youth looks ahead. Old age looks back. Middle age looks worried

Jothi's private notes made public

“A man’s life is dyed the colour of his imagination”- Marcus Aurelius.

“The trouble with sleep is the going to and coming from”- Bob Kaufman

“A good scare is worth more to a man than good advice”-E.W.Howe.

“Absence is to love what wind is to fire; it extinguishes the small, it enkindles the great”-Comte de Bussy Rabutin

The Last Moments of Socrates

Plato has described Socrates last night on earth in the dialogue “Phaedo”. Socrates spent that night, as he had most of the others discussing philosophy. The subject was:” Is there a life after death”. He listened calmly about the subject from his disciples in the gaol.

When the attendant brought the poison cup in, Socrates said to him in a calm and practical tone, “Now you know all about this business.. You must tell me what to do”.

“You drink the hemlock and then you get up and walk about” the attendant said, “...Until your legs feel heavy. Then you lie down and the numbness will travel to your heart”.

Socrates very deliberately and coolly did as he had been told only pausing to rebuke his friend for sobbing and crying out as though he had not done the wise and right thing. His last thought was a small obligation he had forgotten. He removed the cloth that had been placed over his face and said,”Crito, I owe a cock to Asdepius-be sure to see that it is paid”.

Then he closed his eyes and re-laid the cloth and when Crito asked him if he had any other final directions, he made no answer.

Plato was the disciple of Socrates and Aristotle was the disciple of Plato and Alexander was the disciple of Aristotle.

- 2 – Leonardo da Vinci

He used to write from right to left. If one wanted to read his papers, he had to keep the paper in front of the mirror and read. His favorite sport was taming a horse. He was so strong that he could bend a horse shoe in one hand. The notebooks of his prove that in military science he was ready for the II W.W. He had designed a 33 barrel gun, firing at a time 11 shots, made time fuses, hand grenades, gas bombs etc..

“You don’t waste time, time wastes you”- Gene Fowler

“Never argue at the dinner table, for the one who’s not hungry gets the best of the argument”

“It’s possible to own too much. A man with one watch knows what time it is: a man with two watches is never sure”- G. B. Shaw

“Professional football is like a nuclear warfare.. There are no winners, only survivors”- Frank Gifford

“English is a funny language... A fat chance and a slim chance are the same thing”-Jack Herbert.

“How you spend your time is more important than how you spend your money. Money mistakes can be corrected, but time is gone forever”- David Norris

“I fear 3 newspapers more than a hundred thousand bayonets”- Napoleon

“Men kick friendship around like a football, but it doesn’t seem to crack. Women treat it like glass and it goes to pieces”. Anne Morrow Lindbergh.

Reading on a train

A newspaper is public property on a train. I made this unpleasant discovery the other day when I made the folly of taking one along with me.

I took my seat and looked around. All my fellow passengers had that bored, vacant look-so common on Mondays. Some were staring out of the window, others were not particularly communicative among themselves. Ah! I thought, now to catch up with the day's news. No sooner did I take the newspaper out of my bag, a remarkable transformation seemed to come over the people in the carriage. I began to feel uncomfortable for it seemed everyone's eyes were focussed on me. Why had I become so interesting? I brushed back my hair-unnecessarily, I thought. I checked my buttons-they were all right. I checked my shoelaces-nothing wrong there either. In embarassment, I buried my nose deep in the newspaper.. It was not long before the mystery was solved.

A tap on my shoulder by the person sitting on my right was followed by a request for a sheet. The person sitting in front, emboldened, asked for another. Within no time my hands felt light, for I was left with only one sheet. When I had finished with it, I had to stare hard at the one who started it all. He looked at me at last and with considerable reluctance exchanged his sheet with mine.Meanwhile, I noticed the other sheets had also changed hands. One had even reached the other end of the row and I can vouch, that the reader (who had arrived later) did not know who its owner was.

Of course, I had a tough time collecting the sheets when I reached at my destination.

I tried a magazine(of all the things a film magazine) the next day. It was still more uncomfortable. The fellow passengers crowded on me, and, breathing down my neck, took in the gossip and the photographs. One even casually asked me to wait as I was about to turn a page. A magazine, I found out, has the advantage of being pinned and so its pages cannot go around. But take your eyes off it, even but for a moment, and the magazine will be out of your hands.

Since then I have made many 'friends' on the train. It took me but a few days to recognise a unique breed of commuters. Its members can be seen attaching themselves like magnets to a person who had b(r)ought a newspaper. They are a most well-informed and friendly lot, I should say.

Last night, I had a dream-and a sweet dream it was. In it, I took my seat and the usual gang was there waiting expectantly. But their eyes bulged when I took out a copy of War and Peace instead of the usual newspaper. They all made a mad rush to the door leaving me alone with my pipe and my book.

The Morning Walks`

I like my morning walks..and I have been doing it religiously for several years. I had to take to it because my playing cricket years were over. I played till my forties.. and even now get to play a match or two every year..which leaves me aching all over the next day..Once a cricketer , always a cricketer, they rightly say. But, of late, I often wish I had taken my father's advice seriously..which was to take to tennis rather than cricket. But that was unthinkable then. I was already deeply committed to that sport. But the reason why I regret not taking dad's suggestion is that , tennis doesn't require a team. All you need to do is to land up with your racquet in the club and find someone to have a hit with you. But it's not so with the case of cricket. You gotto find an entire team. Which is difficult for a man well in his forties.

So the walks have replaced cricket. And I am fortunate to have a couple of close friends who live in the same block as I. It's become a habit for us to generally wake up each other around 5'o with 'missed calls'. And then they come to my house and then we start off on our one hour walk. So addicted are we to the walks that we can't imagine how others don't take the trouble of coming out in that early hours and enjoy the fresh air. There's simply something magical about the hour. We leave our houses even as its dark, and by the time, we make a u-turn , it's dawning. And the birds are chirping, the insects humming. I am lucky to be inMysore, a small town in South India..which has a small hillock in the eastern parts..so it's a beautiful sight to witness the sun rising from behind the Chamundi Hill. I have never tired of the scene. It puts me in a good mood for the rest of the day. The part of the town in which I reside was actually the outskirts of the town. So in the initial years, i.e. in the 90's the walks were country walks really. There was a mud road which lead to the fields where jowar,ragi,cocunut trees were grown. Only one bus used to pass us. And since it was the bus carrying villagers from a nearby village to the market with their vegetable produce for sale, we hated it. For the bus would leave a trail of beedi smoke besides its own diesel fume. But things have changed drastically now. The mud road is now a ring road. And our walks are interrupted to give way to those huge, monstrous looking trucks which ply the highways during the night. So often we deviate to the parallel roads to keep ourselves from breathing the diesel fumes instead of fresh oxygen. But still there are lots of pleasures left. For instance, there's one tree which bears a wild variety of flower , whose fragrance, especially during a particular part of the year, pervades a goodly half a kilometre!

My friends do opt to stay at home once in a while. Even then ,I enjoy my walks. Those days I have my ipod for company. The music provides me the right rhythm. Often I concentrate on the lyrics, the music and the walk is pleasure filled. Going out on walks on your own is quite an experience indeed. You can start meditating on your future plans, or for the day ahead. You can set your own pace. And no one to disturb your thoughts.

And when there is a holiday, we decide to go around the Kukkaralli lake which is at a striking distance. The University of Mysore, with the assistance of the state government, has helped preserve, nay , beautify the lake which had inspired such legendary writers as R.K.Narayan and the famous Kannada poet, Kuvempu. If one goes around the bund we will have taken a walk of nearly four kilometres. There are a couple of islands where there are birds like spoonbills, pelicans,cormorants, darter birds. etc.making early morning noises , and the rising sun reddens the water. Altogether , it is a beautiful place indeed.

There is another special place where we go to a couple of times in a year. And that's the 1000 steps up to Chamundi Hill itself. Once upon a time we could climb it in ten minutes flat and come down in five. But not so now. We do it leisurely. As we go higher, our lungs pant for air, and the heart goes pounding away..We have to take breaks regularly. We stop to take in the view of the city down below. The buses, and the cars on the Nanjangud road look like insects, and there, is it really the water tank near our home? So goes the conversation. Sometimes our kids joins us. Then it is a different experience totally. The tender coconut tastes really good at the end of the climb.