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Layers of the Mind

8.45 am: It's a quiet, calming morning. The lush-green view from my office window is beginning to craft magic for me. A warm cup of tea is what I need, I told myself and within minutes, I found myself standing across that view, sipping my tea slowly. I love such mornings. Suddenly, a familiar voice came to join me. He appreciated the view in his usual literary manner - something that drew my attention to so many frequent insightful discussions with this sexagenarian. I responded with a few amateur lines of poetry, but he seemed to like them so much. So much so that he confessed I inspire him to write poetry. That's indeed inspirational for me to be able to motivate a sexagenarian to think and pen in poetic rhythm. "I can connect so well with you. I don't need to think twice to talk to you on any topic under the sun", he told me. Bonding with a sexagenarian mind was a first with me. It makes me wonder how far and wide my mind has traveled to reach me.

10.20 am: I got a brief text message, "Come home, we're hosting the weekend party babe!" I could not help but smile with a twinkle. A get-together, a reunion after a month. A usual hangout that I do once almost every month. My girl hosts this. Or I do. Basically, it's an excuse to celebrate life in any and every possible way whenever and wherever time allows us. It's a group of like-minded youngsters that I met three years ago and became so attached to them. Whenever I am with this group of 20-something, not even for a single moment does it give me a feeling that I do not belong to their age group. Their dreams, those hopes, plans for a better future, their enthusiasm of doing something great and full of life are so in sync with my own. I hosted our last weekend party: basically poetry, songs, serious discussion, movie nights, dance nights and all that young minds do. I feel so full of life there. Without any effort. I sent a smiley in response to her text message meaning a yes to the party. I am still 3 days away from weekend. But my mind has already started floating with the luxury of yet another musical night of carefree souls.

1.35 pm: My colleague knocked the door to remind me it's time for lunch. We decided to explore a new eatery today. A quiet but hipster cafe that serves a wide variety of food at the backdrop of a hillock which is merely 20 minutes drive from my office. It was less crowded today. So we got our space and time to talk. These girls with me are free spirits in their early 30s dreaming, traveling, planning life their way. Talking to them is like talking to my own self - spending my own money, living my little dreams, cooking delicacies for my self, well, I can go on with this list. "How about a movie tonight?" Suddenly, my colleague's voice got me back to our lunch table. "Done". So movie tonight. "Maybe, we can go a little earlier and..."
"Window shopping" she interrupted which I happily approved. I don't like the word 'spinster'. I prefer 'starlet'. We left the cafe with our starlet plan of the Tuesday night. I would call it pre-weekend hangout.

11.45 pm: "Can I see your eyes?" I was a little taken aback when this was told to me. I was video calling an old friend of mine to give him a brief review of the movie I had watched with my starlets. I was so seriously explaining how the protagonist does justice to the character when he stopped me with that question. It made me pause for a while. Nobody has asked me something like this before. It confused my mind a little: Do I reply with a yes or no? Do I let him look through my eyes? Can he? Would he? But why? Am I blushing? Too many whispering questions. I smiled and continued to explain the movie to him. But I kept looking at his eyes without him noticing, wondering why he wanted to see my eyes, what he was trying to find in there. A bit of my mind kept thinking of it even long after he had put the phone down.

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