Abi:original - If you aren't original, what are you?

Train travel has always inspired me. Sure the Mumbai suburban train service has its flaws. It packed like hell on most days. But it also provides solace and a chance for one to find your own little corner to catch a breath and think. Some of my best ideas have come on a 50-minute train ride to college or work. And that’s been no different 20 years later on the Dubai Metro. Here is one piece that came up recently. On motivating, passionate women at any age. Danica's free hand drawing, December 2015.  I don’t have to look far when it comes to women who are passionate at any age. My daughter provides sufficient inspiration. At the age of five she wants to be a mother above all else. I tell her I would simply love to be her age again but there's no going back. No adult logic that works with a five year old and for now she says she can’t wait to be a mother as I’m gathering she believes it’s a fun job. Noted poet, author and my English Literature professor is another ...

By Abigail Mathias I couldn’t bear being apart any longer. I willingly sent my laptop for repair, knowing pretty well that I was leaving it vulnerable to outside forces. Thank heavens it is finally back home. My laptop is about five years old which in computer years makes it way past its expected expiry date. It has been working decently, contrary to what many would have me believe. Yes it is super slow, but I’ve gotten pretty used to starting the laptop and getting myself a cup of tea (or two) before sitting down to work. However I was getting more and more frightened of having the laptop collapse at the very touch of a button. A few weeks ago I hesitatingly took it to see if there was some hope of giving the machine a facelift of sorts. Unfortunately the laptop’s been acting up since its return. As I type this, the text keeps shifting in between lines without warning and certain alphabets fall off without hesitation. Arggggh! Thank heavens spell check still works. Perhaps the laptop’...

Inspired by Elmore Leonard's 10 rules for writing, The Gaurdian came up with 10 points shared by various authors. I'm sharing my favourite, Ms. Atwood's. Margaret Atwood's rules for writing fiction 1 Take a pencil to write with on aeroplanes. Pens leak. But if the pencil breaks, you can't sharpen it on the plane, because you can't take knives with you. Therefore: take two pencils. 2 If both pencils break, you can do a rough sharpening job with a nail file of the metal or glass type. 3 Take something to write on. Paper is good. In a pinch, pieces of wood or your arm will do. 4 If you're using a computer, always safeguard new text with a ­memory stick. 5 Do back exercises. Pain is distracting. 6 Hold the reader's attention. (This is likely to work better if you can hold your own.) But you don't know who the reader is, so it's like shooting fish with a slingshot in the dark. What ­fascinates A will bore the pants off B. 7 You most likely need a the...

After a rather horrific week of high fevers and hospital visits, I wonder if thinking objectively is ever a possibilty. How does one try to be objective when a doctor says, 'We really have done all we can and you need to decide what to do.' Thanks but I'm not the one with the medical degree. Do you suddenly scamper for your thinking cap, when your heart is already in your mouth? Or how about being objective when you are writing a book that is closer to home than close can ever be. Do you say all the horrible things that are true, or do you carefully white wash realities that are better left unsaid? Does that make you less of a truthful writer, person, family member? Or does it just mean that you are as diplomatic as a Nobel Peace Prize winner who really doesn't think he deserves the prize, but accepts it anyway? Objectivity...easier said than done.

Bringing passion to your profession is something that requires daily nurturing. Especially if you may be stuck at a job where you are constantly plagued with the question, ‘should I do this for the pay cheque or do I have more interesting things to do with my life?’ Someone recently sent me a speech by Bill Watterson, creator of the witty comic strip, Calvin and Hobbes. Watterson was addressing the graduating class of 1990, but he could have been talking to any one of us today. You see Watterson drove his now famous comic strip for five years without pay when he was starting out. He accepted heaps of agony for what he believed in but it certainly paid off in the end. He says, “We all have different desires and needs, but if we don't discover what we want from ourselves and what we stand for, we will live passively and unfulfilled.” So I guess I’m at peace with the fact that I have to sometimes write a less than interesting release or two. It doesn’t stop me from writing this blog, ...

I’m still a Fernandes at heart. No passport can prove otherwise. When first posed with the prospect of changing my second name, I freaked out. Imagine being called one name your whole life, and suddenly 27 years later, when prince charming appears, you have to give up that right and take on a new name. It just isn’t something a man would easily do. Thankfully my prince didn’t think it was necessary for me to change my second name. He didn’t need it as validation of my love for him. Unfortunately it didn’t matter what he thought. We were relocating to the Middle East soon after the wedding and everyone was certain no immigration officer was going to speak my language or understand why we didn’t share the same second name if we are husband and wife. All my gender biased arguments seemed insufficient. I had to resign to the fact that life will be easier for my children if I just go ahead and adopt my husband’s second name. No hyphenated names either. A Fernandes-Mathias or a Mathias-Ferna...

A lot of people think freelancing means you are 'free' to do anything for them, for free! They'd like to believe you have hours of unoccupied time and they are doing you a favour by giving you work...I have news for you, HELL NO! If I am working on a particular assignment, I do expect to get paid for it! Manic deadlines, racing against the clock, weekend plans, bills -- I have them too, the only difference is that I'm not tied to a corporate office like most people. But make no mistake, I take my work very seriously. So do me a favour, don't give me your resume for 'free rewriting' and don't ask me for help with letters to bank managers or senior associates. I hate, no, I loathe writing them as much as you do. But I'd never ask my neighbour to write them just because they know how to spell. And hate to burst the bubble, that is not what I do for a living. If you want to risk sending me work, with a 'please help me this one time,' go ahead. Ch...

"A writer is only as good as his/her last byline," a former editor and friend warned me, not too long ago. That was when I was a columnist and full time writer. When we were expected to produce literary works of art, even in our sleep! But would wake up to find them ruthlessly chopped by sub editors making way for advetorial content. That quote still comes back to me, time and again. Though I'm treading on the freelance side of life now. A writer must keeping writing to keep from rusting. A blog ties in as a perfect platform to sketch those rusty thoughts. Ab:original is a name I coined way back when I created hand made cards. The cards still happen when the occasion matters...Here Ab:original will be a mixed bag of published and yet to be published work. Musings and meanderings. Ideas and reviews. Just another regular blog? Read on to find out for yourself.