Domain Maximus

Dearest Fellow Afteryouths,

I know how it is. I understand. You step out of the shower, dry yourself down in front of the mirror, (maybe flex those pecs a little?) and then slip into the bedroom in your towel to surprise the missus.

She looks at you endearingly perched on the edge of the bed. You throw her some manly poses and she coos. “You the man” she whispers huskily. Then you turn around to show off those chiseled back muscles when she screams and bolts out of the room.

Happens dudes.

So waste no time and do what a man needs to do. See pic. Buy product. Right away. Run along now.

There comes a time in the life of a blog when the author sits back and thinks “If seven people can do a piece of work in five days then in how many days can three mallus do the same amount of work but this time if the factory is shifted from Gurgaon to Cochin?”

Can the answer be half a million? Perhaps.

This author can also not be faulted if he sits back and often wonders why God (Knopfler) would give him so many organs in pairs. He (the author) is often philosophical, sometimes whimsical but always well intentioned. He would be open to selling one of his kidneys if push came to credit card default shove. For how much?

Can the answer be half a million Gandhis? Perhaps. (Throw in a PS3 will you?)

So here I am rambling away. You the reader thinking “What the…?”

Well there is a purpose dear friend. For if you leisurely scroll down this page till the hit counter emerges on the right you will see a number. What number could it be? (Hints galore…)

Half a million? OH YEAH BABY…

WOO HOO. Balle Balle Shaava Shaava. Throws your arms in the air like you jusht dont care…

For this blog has finally, after what… three years?… logged up half a million hits. HALF A MILLION! Not bad eh?

And all thanks to you and the hundreds of people out there who linked through to me and clicked on Domain Maximus every once in a while even when I was AWOL, flamed me, left vile but amusing comments and were jolly good in general.

I love you all. Mwaah Mwaah. So from my side to all of you here:

The other day, on my way back home from the gym in a cab, I stopped at a store to buy a bottle of water and some bread. I whipped out my wallet, settled the bill and then walked out. A few nanoseconds later I heard someone call out from behind me. Well he actually puckered his lips and sucked air at me. It was that precise ‘kissing the air’ noise they make in Mumbai which works like accurate telepathy. In a crowd of a hundred people you know when someone is calling out to you via the tight ‘o’ formation and air intake through his mid-face orifice. I have tried it myself but it makes me feel like there is electricity passing my lips. (And not in a nice Mills&Boon sort of way.)

Anyways I pivoted around deflty on the balls of my foot (all that gymming) and saw the shop keeper striding over with my wallet, change, bottle of water and bread in his hands. And his lips were recoiling back to their normal state of rest. I smiled at him sheepishly and gladly took back my possessions. And then I walked back to the kerb and took a cab home. A cab, which on later reflection I noted, was not the one I had embarked from the gym in the first place.

As I stood under the shower soaking away the pains from bench-pressing a hundred pounds (by which I mean twenty) it suddenly occured to me that I might be, gasp, GETTING OLD.

I was forgetting things. I sometimes forget what I forgot and sit at home thinking about nothing in particular but feeling very perturbed. After an hour I get up thinking ‘What the heck! If I dont remember it probably does not matter!’ and decide to go home after one more coffee.

Or something like that.

When does one know when one is getting long in the tooth? When the old cranium is beginning to age a mite? When the youthful period of one’s life has, prepare for simile, slowly drawn its way into the slog overs and is beginning to reach for balls clearly way outside off stump only to potter it away to point and not get even a single thus garnering the spectator’s hatred?

The realization was all too sudden I tell you. And the realization mightily hit me when my little brother was in town last weekend. He is a full four years younger than me and is still gloating away in his early twenties. Just yesterday he was this little kid running around the house playfully spraying window cleaner into my eyes while I was trying to read a volume of the Encyclopedia Britannica with a Letters to Penthouse hidden inside. (Did I tell you that he once got carried away during a wrestling broadcast on TV, bounced around the living room and finally leapt onto me? It ended with the doctors removing an inch long piece of toothpick from my head. This actually happened.) And suddenly today he is urging me to go out and get some fresh air with my friends so he can sit at home and read my copy of Don Quixote but actually polish off my bottle of Smirnoff Green Apple which I keep hidden away in the cupbooard for emergencies.

It is a scary thought you know. That suddenly you are no longer what older people call, with contempt, ‘youth’. Thats just completely horrible. For the last ten years or so I have thoroughly enjoyed being ‘youth’. I could get away with so much stupidity and people would think nothing of it. They blamed it on my young blood, hot temper and stray pheromones. But today I go to a Vijay Sales and click-twirl away on the Xbox360 for a bit and suddenly they look at me like some out of work middle-aged vagabond who is a singer or writer or something. They walk over and ask: “Gift for someone sir?”

I hate it.

Of course how does it matter to all of you? You all are ‘youth’. This is a ‘youth hangout’ remember. You guys can still wear your ripped jeans and captioned t-shirts and dance to loud music and noone would say a thing. (At worst they would blame your parents. ‘Kids today are raised so badly…’ the society ladies at the next table would mutter behind their Daiquiris.)

So when does one know when one has finally crossed the merry but perilous chasm of youth and stepped beyond? It is when the drinks don’t hit you as much and wine seems like a serious drink? Is it when you look at Sania Mirza and think ‘She could be hot when she gets older…’ (She will. Trust me on this.) Or is it when you visit a relatives house and the little kids run around you shouting “Sidin uncle Sidin uncle we want chocolate we want chocolate…!” and then leap onto you making you wish you carried window cleaner with you always.

I don’t know. All this burden of complete adulthood is too much you know. I don’t know if I am ready for it.

You know what? I think I will call this feeling of mine ‘Afteryouth’. Yes indeed. Afteryouth. For Men. Between 27 and 30. Not bad eh? Afteryouth is this mellow feeling of being old enough to look at things like this and frown but young enough to still, say, appreciate Eminem or the Pussycat Dolls. (Though I will most probably appreciate them for a long long time to come.)

I like that. So what do you do in your Afteryouth? Tell me. And if you are still in your youth then leave gentle comments will you? We are very sensitive us ‘afteryouth types’.

There was another important thing I wanted to talk about. You will not believe this but…

“Jhalak dikhla aaja, Jhalak dikhla aaja, ek baar aaja aaja aaja aaja aaaaaja, ek baar aaja aaja aaja aaja aaaaaja… Jhalak dikhla aaja, jhalak dikhla aaj… click“

Hello?

Dude Pastrami here.

‘Sup

Sup dude.

Nuthin much bro… You know. The usual. Running around. Planning. Buying. That sort of thing.

Cool… You read the latest Businessworld?

What?

You know the Business magazine. Normally has CEOs standing back to back on the cover. Or pointing into the distance. Holding imaginary balls. That sort of thing.

Oh yeah. The five-buck mag…

Now ten-bucks.

Oh ok… Whats with it?

Your blog thing is in it.

Awesome! I had no idea really…

Oh… hmm… Well I am sorry that I have to be the one that tells you.

Eh? Matlab? As in its a good thing right? I am getting famous…

Not like this man. Some issue about Indian youth and all. Some crap like that…

Ok. Youth is good you know… They have pots of money and all. Retail boom… Cellphones… Eating out… They are SEC-A+ you know…

Screw you man. Anyways… The magazine has called you a… ‘Youth Hangout’…

Whoa! Too much. I am so happy.

You know what is your problem?

Ayyo… Ok what da Pastrami…

You are an idiot. They called you a ‘Youth Hangout’… That must hurt man.

No it does not! I like being a Youth Hangout… That means people like reading this blog.

You are pathetic… Dude they just made your blog sound like some dark corner of Bandstand or that stretch near Reclamation.

Where people make out?

The same.

Where you went last week to test out your new Camera Phone?

Chill dude! What the…! I am in the office on speaker phone!…

Sorry dude. By the way did you get those clips down on your laptop?

Yeah. They are totally awesome. Now shut up… They tap phones in these investment banks you know.

Oops. Sorry man… Won’t talk about your weekly jaunts to Bandstand, Reclamation, Carter Road or that lane near the Matunga CCD anymore. Not a single word about that folder on your COMPANY laptop called ‘Research Insights’. Not a single word… I promise.

Bastard!

Chuckle Chuckle

You will never understand the pains of a man as single as I am.

Maybe you should.. you know… hang out a bit on my blog. Meet some youth?

Don’t make me regret calling you dude…

Ok ok… So you think its a bad thing that I am a youth hangout?

OBVIOUSLY! The next thing you know they’ll be calling you the Himeshbhai of blogging…

Himesh is cool man…

Ok that does it. Screw you bro. All this while I thought you wanted to make this blog some meeting place for the intelligentsia… Where the educated among us could congregate in an orderly fashion… You are so proletariat man…

Come on. Chill da Pastrami… Its not so bad.

Hmm… BTW coming for the Digweed thing on Saturday? It will rock!

I dunno man… There is this other thing on the weekend… Can’t make up my mind.

What? Something bigger than the Godfather of House?! No way man…

Yeah. Want to catch Vivah with me on the weekend?

WHAT?!! WHAT???!!!

Dude its awesome. Apparently Vivah depicts the journey from engagement to marriage. It’s that phase of life when one glows naturally. During the courtship period, we all do things to make the other person happy whether it is going kilometres to buy a card or dress up well to bring a smile to the partners lips. But after marriage, the zing goes away as day-to-day issues crop up…

Click.