The enclosed conch {Terrarium}

My dear blog-peers, 

I have been away from this space for a while but this space always comes along with me wherever I go. It is sacred for me and the people who come here to see me are sacred to me as well. I mean every single word of it. It’s the quietness of being here that makes me write more and say more. Lately I have been sharing visuals on an old but ‘new for me’ platform that of Instagram. Within a click I get to converse with so many likeminded people or rather people who seem to be like minded.

It gets life back on the same page as others and quietly whispers in my ears, “The world is huge, with bigger dreams; little betrayals; tiny shadows and much larger expressions.”

                                                            

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So unlike the end of last year when I told you stories about different people, places and expressions, in the next few days I have a mixed platter for you. A visual platter on which you can sprinkle as much salt, pepper and olive oil as you wish to.

I am letting you drift away with some drawings and floating words that have been traveling with me since I spoke to you last. So come on board and I shall tell you lots of short stories, one of them is of Ankit.

I know Ankit for the last few years, rather our introduction was uncanny. A mutual friend of ours introduced us over a social networking site saying that we look alike. That time I had just entered design school and Ankit was about to join an art school. His work was very expressive then. I would often wonder how he spoke to colors so boldly and why I related to someone’s work I had never seen in person and was it because I took extra efforts to see someone’s work because we are look-alikes.

Every person we meet comes with a riddle. Today after knowing him for over five years, I finally saw him in flesh and blood at the Faculty of Fine Arts in Vadodara, Gujarat. Now we laughed loudly for the first few minutes and spoke like we had always known each other. When I opened my travel journals, Ankit seemed familiar with them because he had seen the blog quite carefully and he would point at things in the book and say, “Hey this is on the blog, I have seen this!”

How lines have an identity, they are like people. Colours are like confidants; mutual friends in today’s lingo. How sometimes words are less mighty than elements of a painting. How sometimes…

I was in Vadodara for a short while and before I could sit with Ankit and see his work, which I was very keen to see; it was time for me to leave. As I walked with my bag at the Fine Arts campus, Ankit came running with a beautiful little plant in a glass bottle. There were shells and conches peeping out of the soil and colorful stones stood still in the firm but loose soil. A little plant shyly emerged from the uneven surface and as I turned the bottle around to see what all was there inside; my eyes caught this little note hanging from coiled threads, it said ‘inspire’.

There was so much synergy in this whole situation; someone whose work inspired me; himself gave me a note saying ‘inspire’. Someone who is supposedly a look-alike takes the effort to make something for someone he is meeting for the first time in person. All we knew about each other were strokes, colors and expressions.

We are look-alikes, perhaps. And if I was not able to see his work this time maybe there is another time planned for it. Who knows!

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Here’s what Ankit told me about the plant;  its called a Terrarium, its a mini ecosystem and functions exactly like one. The leaves release the water vapour which condense on the walls of the glass and goes back to the soil, and the process of photosynthesis makes the plant get the air it wants within the enclosure.Ii love these and am tying to learn better what plants and what arrangements work best for them...

                                            Much love and more to tell soon in the March sun