Je Ne Regrette Rein

As a boy I, used to be synonymous with a city - raucous, frenetic, and brazenly lively. Recently, however, I feel have became a park and seem determined to lead a quieter, more pensive life.

I captured the ribald vitality of Brisbane in my youth. I was once the embodiment of Brisbane's flaming youth. The permissive city Brisbane, to which the young boy fled from his family home, was the place where he cast off provincial inhibitions.

For the young Shirish, not much was sacred and no taboo went unviolated. Going back home, - will be all about taking stock of the situation: my life, my losses. I never understood death before, it was just another loss. I never really understood regret, guilt, remorse, heartbreak, abandonment, vulnerability. India, hopefully will sooth my professional and personal distresses. Excluding men from the central roles of my life, I have rounded up a sorority of submissive, adoring female mates, confirmation of my belief that women are communal creatures, sponsors of society, while men remain imprisoned in the testosterone-fuelled inferno of the ego. Speaking to people has had a curative effect on me. I shall try to absorb serenity from the townspeople. It will be like being back in my childhood, surrounded by all those people who used to sit on their patios and gossip. There was something almost spiritual about it.

I used to be a cheerful blasphemer, celebrating a convent as a lair of erotic and narcotic delights in dark nightclubs. Now I seem nostalgic for the consolations of faith.

But which camp do I belong to? Although I dote on my mother, my arrogant exercise of power links me with my angry, cold father, who used to be absent. As Wilde put it: 'All women become like their mothers. That is their tragedy. No man does. That's his.' Emotionally that may be my tragedy, too, but professionaly it is my good fortune. I ought to be grateful for all those unresolved conflicts, which will go on generating dramas.

I lost my grandfather last year. I lost the person who like Mother Earth, nurtured me, tended me, tried in vain to make me a better person. I came to realise the demon I had become – one with no values, no convictions and above all no honour.

Will I ever find peace? Will I ever be able to forgive myself - redemption is what I seek! Failed and flawed are the words I use to describe myself today.