Bollywood Baby

Clyde and I eat lunch at Rucchi, Jackson’s best Indian buffet. (All the tandoori meats fit in nicely with our Atkins diet.)

As we nosh on butter chicken, stir-fried okra, and brightly-colored veggies, I find myself hypnotized by the twin screens displaying scenes from Bollywood musicals. My inability to understand the language obliterates any message from the lyrics, but I am rivited by the frenetic motion, the synchronized gyrations of dozens of dancers, the bright color, and the slender, sultry good looks of the lead actors.

It occurs to me that I want to live in a Bollywood musical.

I want begin my day standing alone atop a snowy mountain, draped in long, flowing white robes. I want to suddenly be surrounded by a dozen other shirtless men, to express my mood by whirling and jumping and snapping my fingers. I want Clyde to come in via helicopter, dressed in flaming red and searing orange. I want him to jump down, to land amidst a dozen other men in matching shirt-vests who shimmy their bodies in perfect time with his.

I want our language to bubble forth like a fountain of sound — an estatic stream of syllables and groans. Without practicing, I want our dancing to incorporate the best moves from Gene Kelly, Madonna, Janet Jackson, Paula Abdul, and Shiva. I want the music to take on a berserk life of its own, to unravel from somewhere in the kundalini center of the universe.

I want every posture, every glance, to be riddled with meaning. I want to wear my sexiness on my sleeve.

I want to embody passion.