It doesn’t matter if we are in the middle of a deadly second wave. Some things don’t change, dear women. If you share your number on social media, even if it’s an SOS for oxygen or an ICU, it’s nothing but an invitation for creepy men to slide into your DMs and say “nice bobs”.

For so long, our anxieties had been at an all-time high. Some of us are clamouring for hospital beds while the rest of us are trying to safeguard our jobs. Earlier this month, I was infected with the coronavirus. Now, cooped up inside taking laboured breaths, my only respite was to write poetry.

Chaitanya Tamhane’s The Disciple, now out on Netflix, is set in the world of Hindustani classical music. The setting is incidental. It just as well could have been a story of athletes, painters, or poets. In this festival hit, Tamhane tells us the story of a young talent who realises with painful slowness that some people are simply not meant for greatness of any kind.

As the second wave continues to batter India, “woke” media organisations and ad agencies are all about well-being and mental health. The problem arises when this performance of empathy does not extend to their employees. Stories of bosses expecting you to work beyond office hours and making one demand after another on WhatsApp groups are all too common.

I knew my grandma for 15 years but there is so much I didn’t know about her. I realised this after reading her favourite novel, Anna Karenina. Why did my very traditional grandma love a book about unfaithfulness, extra-marital affairs, and fractured families? It made me realise that one way to really understand a person is to discuss their favourite books.

It’s easy to hate on Rupi Kaur. Social media is replete with mockery of her work. Yet her fame has only augmented over the years. She has sold millions of copies around the world and given several TED talks. So what keeps people coming back for more?

After two decades of trying to tame my curly hair, I let it breathe. With time, the comfort of not having hickey-looking burn marks on my neck and forehead from the straightening iron became something I looked forward to. Embracing my curly hair has been synonymous with embracing my person.

There are several reasons why this second wave of the coronavirus may prove to be more lethal than the first one. Most of it has to do with Indian behavioural impulses. Indians haven’t been able to stand in a queue for the longest of time and it comes as no surprise that the pandemic-taught etiquette has worn off.

Lee Isaac Chung’s Minari is a poignant portrait of a Korean immigrant family trying to live the American dream in the Reagan years. It is a tapestry of tender and touching vignettes, drawn from the filmmaker’s memories of his childhood spent in Arkansas, where the film has also been shot. These vignettes work not just as a portal to a different time, but also a different way of life.

She’s turning 40 and has turned temperamental, refusing to cooperate. I give her all the TLC and all this isn’t just a ruse to make her mushy. I reminisce about the good ole days when all it took was a kiss on the neck in a dark nightclub to get her going. She is amused but does not change her stance.