Nidhi Katoch blog

I watched green water moving back and forth while sitting on the shore. Fall had arrived. I felt the chill in the breeze. The sun was subtly shining. I always feel like there's a  blue hue in the cool bright mornings. I so badly wanted to pick the colours of the day and paint them on some blank canvas. I tried to understand what water was trying to say. What message was it trying to convey and for whom? Sometimes these sounds of water appear cheerful to me, sometimes sad and sometimes these are neutral as if the lake is immersed in deep thought. This water has listened to many stories and problems. It has become a partner in the loneliness of many people. It has witnessed many winnings and embraced the tears of defeat within itself.  But where does this lake share its thoughts? At night when everyone leaves for their homes, with whom does it share its emotions? When I lie down on my bed I usually hear that the lake is crying. Who is going to soothe its pain?  I was so ove...

After a long walk on June morning, I decided to rest under the shade of pines. I tied my hair in a bun as they were soaked in sweat. 'The cool shade of pines', I said under my breath. My twin joined me after some time and sat with me. We were chatting about how weird the weather is here, we feel so cold in the shade that a sweatshirt is required and the sun is so hot that we tend to sweat in tank tops. An old lady, a native of a nearby village, might be coming toward us. Her toothless lips curled up in a smile. There was shine in her wrinkled -sunburnt cheeks. She started to sing, 'ठंडी ठंडी हवा चलदी झुल्दे चिला दे डारू... ( Loose translation : with the playful pine leaves there blows a cool calming breeze). She looked at us as if wanted us to complete her song. This song wasn't new to us. Every kid from Himachal knows it. There are so many memories related to these folk songs. I could only smile at her. I tried to sing but the lyrics just stuck inside my throat. They w...

I saw the white Bougainvillea vine on the rear gate of someone's  house and ran toward it to click a photograph. This is what we, the slaves of technology do. We first click the picture and then praise the beauty around us. Yeah! I'm ranting like those people who constantly nag about the cons of technology and can't live without it for a moment. After all, it's this internet access which has allowed me to share my thoughts with people all around the world. Then I started  to ask my friend to try different angles to get a perfect picture of me with that vine. Yet the best picture was the one with my back on camera, which I'll share under the hashtag of summer aesthetic. Flowers have always been the part of our lives. From literature to temples, from greetings to the gift to loved ones, from our birth to doom, flowers walk with us. These little petals of colors fill our lives with colors. We compare the smile of our love with the blooming flower and our sorrow with un...

 'There's a musty smell here', said my sister. I nodded in agreement. The paint was crumpled from place to place. The damp walls of that old building were the proof that sunlight hardly enters there except through a window on corridor that too only in evening. The whole place was surrounded by pines and monkeys. Since, the hall was filled with people I decided to stand by the window. I walked through the hall pretending I'm on call. I've always been fascinated by windows. No matter whatever the view is! Sunrays were kind enough to fall over my head. I peek outside the window, all I could see was trees, trees and trees. I started to hum and few lines of Sara Teasdale's poem came to my mind- "But why do the pines on mountain's crest Call to me always, "Rest, rest"? " I've a deep relationship with pines. They remind me of my transition from a teenager to an adult. How I fell in love, how I lose friends, how I experienced my first, no sec...

These empty rainwashed streets, occasionally running late night cars with wild speed, blinking street lights now and then, happily sleeping people in their cozy bedrooms, on lights of tenants' rooms, the random puff of laughter of any family from far place... Don't know why am I thinking about the people living in these block shaped buildings. Standing by the window, I can feel the freshness  in the air after a whole day of rain. Now even moon has prevailed. The cold wind that blows almost the whole year at home has arrived here today. It has the dampness of mountains. Why am I not liking this breeze while everyone surrounding me are enjoying this? How mountains are capable of holding so much coldness? I'm not going to spoil another article with my sadness. When others are getting relief from this hot-chilly summer who am I to spoil their days. (As if I'm going to tell them how do I feel.)  A car just passed through the street and it has left shaken window panes of ever...

I'm weaving a story. The number of hitting backspace has surpassed the number of words written. I'm agitated, I think. I'm thinking, thinking hard but there's hardly any scenario I can remember. I usually twist real life incidents by my imagination and give them shape of fiction. Sometimes my writings are just rage or disappointment. Disappointment usually takes the shape of rage. I hate this word Rage. I hate the word Hate. I don't like these words but still practice them in real life.  Again I hit the backspace, this time I hit it so hard that whatever I wrote get erased. It seems that weaver needs rest. But why? When are we ever allowed to rest? How hard we might try to present our progressive mindset but the reality is we don't ever leave our backward thinking. By backward, I mean we judge others through the lenses of prejudice. What our family/ societal environment inculcate in us, it's hard to get rid of that. We want to be modest, or atleast want them...

After a long day of discussion about where should we go, we finally decided to go to Rose Garden, always a favorite place to hang out. It was the time of early summer. I was afraid that my white Kurti might get dirty from sitting on the ground. But still, you convinced me to sit there. You brought two ice creams from the nearby booth. We chatted for hours or one can say you were doing the whole talk and I was making hilarious remarks about that.  We have never been a relationship between flowers and chocolates. Even I like flowers more on plants than on bouquets. I don't know what came over you and you plucked a few blades of grass and place them behind my ear like hair accessories.  'Who needs flowers when you can wear grass', I said laughingly. I started brooding over our negligence toward the grass, we never romanticize it like roses. Still, we can't imagine a garden without it. I was about to think and write a whole thesis on our inattentiveness toward the grass, yo...

The dust of memories enters  in my room through window and doors  and settles on the bookshelf.  Even when I sweep that dust,  its scent left behind.  When I flip those dusty pages the earthy scent fills the whole room, I try hard to recognize  that fragrance,  which might be like petrichor or uneaten dryfruits in my mother's box,  The first coffee date,  or rusk in tea stall, The musty smell of those old wooden doors, behind which we all used to hide. The reminiscences of old days  come at once,  But I'm still failed to figure out that particular smell.  I keep going through those pages after a day or two, And smile on the recollections of me and you.   

I was lying on the bench with my head resting on your lap, when I captured this photo. It was the breezy noon of October.The aroma of tea from nearby tea stall filled our surroundings. The blue sky and the pale-green leaves of trees were making the view more beautiful. I mused how in childhood, we used these leaves as currency, which could buy every happiness in our small world.  The leaves were swinging along with the breeze. It seemed as if they wanted to flow with the wind. But they didn't not know that they wouldn't be able to go far after getting rid of the tree.  Only a few moments of flying in the air then they would fall to the ground and lose their being. I noticed one pale leaf was coming to us from its twig. But you held it in your palm before it fell and put it in one of the books that we had bought from the roadside stall.  I realised some leaves don't lose their existence but stay forever as a token of memory in the hearts of people, the way this photo will ...

Once upon a time,  in the barren land of my heart edifice of modesty was built.  I was asked to remain inside, to not cross the threshold.  A Wallflower creeped out  from the cracks of veins,  fed on my blood,  multiplied itself and spread  all over the place,  on every wall, roof and windowpanes.  Oh dear, for how long one could put the wilderness  behind the bars.  The roots had reached  below the substratum, Weakened were the walls now.  On one dark night,  thunder came to play,  Shocked were the walls,  took the roof away.  Walls fell down,  There came light,  Rainbow smiled,  Wind blew calmly Flowers grew happily ever after.   

 I was in the final year of my college when I met my first love. Although we had seen each other but never tried to had a talk. I had never been in relationship before and had no plan of getting into one. But the destiny always has her own plans and everyone has to bow before her.  The sunny days of September  and the evening hour,  While sitting on the grass,  I was looking at you like a sunflower.  I knew you had the same  instinct as me but I was caged bird, full of colors,  with a frigid heart and You were free.  You came near me,  the clamor inside me arise,  I couldn't hear the people around me my heart was about to fly,  to the farlands of love which it had never been,  the feelings had never felt before,  the bright colors, it had never seen.  The outer world for me  was full of hardships and still it is,  You promised to come along  and are still with me.  I believe it was the plannin...

The sun of hope rises,  Along the grey clouds, brings shower,  Fall on the grass blades,  Sunlight and rain dance together, The young birds are learning to sing,  feed and how to fly,  Petrichor rises and filled  the whole surroundings,  The view of Rainbow on the northern sky is astounding.  The earth bathe in colors and the flowers of love bloom. 

What is more exquisite than a  night sky after a long day of rain, Dark and blue illuminated with stars and clouds And the tint of moonlight spreads on cloudy lane. Long standing white hibiscus, Buzz of cricket, Raindrops over tree leaves and the fireflies' visit. What is more exquisite! What is more exquisite!