Life begins when you start living.

I was retrospecting and trying to figure out how my 23 years of life have been. I was surprised that my meories are of only 10 of them. Where did the other 13 go? And that is when I realized, we are all essentially either surviving or living or dying - all the time.

Surviving - Eating, sleeping and being happy. 

Surviving is when you are a kid, you are fed food, sent to school, picked back, washed and freshened, sent out to play, forced to do homework and forced to bed. If you are lucky, you will have a few minutes of TV watching in the midst of all this. If you are unlucky (like me) you will have a few minutes of Doordarshan news to watch since your parents never thought of cable TV!

Living - Drinking, not eating and being happy. 

Living is when you are grown up, sent some money from home to bear expenses (if this part is missing - there is no point reading further. You have never really lived.) and from which you scringe for the next birthday gift to be given on the 29th of the month. This birthday gift can either be a music CD (to start with) or a half bottle of Absolut Pepper (as you grow up.) Living is looking longingly at that bunch of guys and girls, who you hope, will make friends with you. Living is realising that they made friends with you and you are eternally broke. 

Living is then spending quiet nights endlessly in your room, with a book to read. Living is waiting for your localite friends to call you over for 1 home-cooked meal. Living is meeting 8 other friends over 1 cup of coffee at CCD. Living is dying to go home and dying to go back when you go home. Living is writing the most popular competitive exam of your field. Living is standing outside that cheap thali joint for a sumptous meal. Living is sitting on your college parking-lot forever (and fighting with the parking boy saying you took care of your own bike, so you wont pay.) Living is recharging your mobile fone for 50 rs and giving your parents a missed call. Living is looking for the cheapest cyber cafe, since you are hooked to Yahoo Messenger. 

Living is writing your first resume (with nothing to write on it) and printing out 5 copies. Living is randomly looking for 'job opportunities' in Times Ascent. Living is learning what 'soft-copy' of resume is. Living is wondering how you will live after those beautiful 5 years. Living is packing up and doing everything 'one last time' - One last movie, one last dinner, one last chasing, one last 'meet up', one last re-union. 

Phase 2 of living is when you get a reply from your resume soft-copy. Living begins again and when you phone call them all about your proud job. Living is when you buy yourself 'formal wear' and go to 'office' and everthing out there seems awesome. Living is when you get your first, first ever salary. Living is taking a color-photocopy of the cheque and sending it to your parents. (and blowing the money therein on buying stupid gifts for all your best friends, best aunts, best cousins...) 

Living is making a new set of friends and going on endlessly about your phase 1 of living! Living is planning vacations since you have the money! Living is buying your mom a saree and dad a Reid and Taylor shirt. Living is the ecstasy of seeing your old friends and having them over for new years eve! Living is guzzling Long Island Teas on ladies' nite. Living is dying of your job after a while and living is looking for the next option. Living is resigning your job and counting how much you saved. Living is cuddling up beside your mom, the way you did just before you started living. 

Dying - It is loving. Dying is knowing that the best 5 yrs of your life, with which you are now madly in love with, are over. Dying is loving your college and leaving it behind. Dying is being asked out by the guy you no more have a crush on. Dying is when your best friends' boyfriend walks out on her - and you always thought they were meant to be. Dying is hoping someone else played you this song on the juke box, and not this guy. Dying is loving your sister so much that it aches to see her married. Dying is about all those big things of small consequence...