“Heaven knows we need never be ashamed of our tears, for they are rain upon the blinding dust of the earth, overlying our hard hearts.”
Closure.
They say time heals everything. As time passes by I realize things that I didn’t before. It may be months or years, and sometimes even days, but as time passes by I get closure and I am able to move on. After every core-of-my-life-shattering episode that I have been through, I have managed to take away some good from it. Some lesson, or some character of mine that I never knew I had. I believe that every bad has something good in it if you care to look deeper.
I don’t just believe everything happens for a reason, I now know that everything happens for a reason. When I tell this to people they say “oh that’s stupid. This, this and this happened in my life, what do you think the reason is?”. You need to look closely within yourself to know what the reason is. An outsider can’t point what it is. If you search for a reason and if your intentions are right then you will always find a reason. If not a reason, then a lesson. A lesson that you can carry with you through your life. A lesson that will ultimately make you a better person and a lesson that will, either directly or indirectly, influence the decisions you make.
So many many times in my life I’ve had revelations from incidents that happened years back. I keep carrying the pain and the disappointment for so long but once you achieve closure and satisfaction, the contentment you get is immense.
It is very hard to let the bitter feelings go. It is very easy to forget but it is very very hard to forgive. But every once in a while you need to let that feeling of resentment go. Possibly to make room for new ones, but that is not the point!
The point is letting go. Of a person, an idea or a feeling. It definitely isn’t the easiest thing to do in the world. But once you overcome the bitterness, once you overcome the soreness, you will see everything in a much clearer light. The load will be lifted off your shoulder, the chain around your heart will be unlocked and you will realize that the day has never been brighter than this.
Rain.
It’s been raining the past couple of days and I love it. There is something about the rain that makes me feel so happy. Hearing the thunder and watching lightning light up my room somehow helps me put things in perspective. Granted the roads are flooded in the morning but it pales in comparison to the beauty of the rain. Every night I sleep with the curtains drawn open. Lighting continues to flash and I don’t sleep for ages.
In the morning I wake up to bright, unadulterated sunlight pouring in through my windows. Seeing all this gives me some kind of hope. Seeing all the plants washed clean makes me feel that you can start over.
During Ramadhan I stay awake till around 5.30 am to pray fajr (morning prayers) and I never sleep till I see day break from my window, every single day. To actually see the night become day is so magical. And it isn’t sudden or abrupt. Morning comes very gradually, very elegantly. The sun is in no hurry to come out of the clouds. Everything is so serene. The dark night becomes an intense shade of grey. Then the grey has just a tinge of blue. In a few minutes, a dash of orange is added. The orange gets brighter, gradually and finally the sun comes out shining happily.
Just watching this play unfold scene by scene, every single day without a hitch gives me a feeling that everything is going to be okay.
I can fret and fume and agonize about the future as much as I want to, but I know that in the end I will find what I’ve been looking for and then, everything will be okay.
Hope
“Far away there in the sunshine are my highest aspirations. I may not reach them but I can look up and see their beauty, believe in them and try to follow them.”
– Louisa May Alcott
– Louisa May Alcott
True Story
I can’t see the light at the end of the tunnel.
Summer.
Summer is almost over. The days of sweltering heat are broken up by sudden bursts of rain. Is it the monsoon? Or the winds receding from the north? I don’t know. I never paid much attention in Geography class. In fact, I never liked Geography.
I miss summer vacations. Yes, it is summer now and I am on a vacation (a perpetual one if I so desire). But it is no match for the summer vacations I had in school. Summer meant two months of lying around and doing nothing. When I was in school we never vacationed anywhere fancy for the summer. It was always Tirunelveli for a week every year. The fanciest place I went was Ooty and Kodaikanal. But the rest of the holidays were spent watching an unhealthy amount of television and eating copious amounts of food.
I did attend the ubiquitous ‘summer classes’. I dabbled my hand in painting for a while and never returned to the paint brush after that. I went for swimming classes three summers in a row. Considering that I was in the water most of the time I couldn’t wear my glasses so I did not exactly make a lot of friends. I was more preoccupied with squinting my way through the water and making sure I didn’t bang my head in to somebody else’s.
My mother could never stand the sight of me lazing around the house. So, after swimming it was tennis for the next few years. Tennis involved a lot of wearing short skirts and running around. I loved it. My dad, not so much. And since I got to keep my glasses on, I made a few friends and met one of the weirdest girls I’ve ever seen in my life.
All these semi-exciting summer vacations gradually came to an end thanks to tenth standard and the attack of the Public Exams. And from then on, summer vacations were filled with preparing for the twelfth standard Board Exams. Although I did visit a few countries in between, they were never a match for the summers of my childhood.
During college, summers meant studying for semesters that were scheduled on days when the school kids had their vacations. So I had to study amidst screaming neighbor kids and had to withstand the temptation to watch the ‘summer blockbusters’ on Sun TV.
Although I love summer, I am a winter girl at heart. My mother says this is because I was born during one of the rainiest Octobers. Every summer my body reacts to the heat in disturbing ways. Two years back my face was entirely covered with heat boils. Nothing I did or ate or applied on my face made it go away. But once the heat reduced so did the boils. Thank God they left no scars. This year, the heat boils have spread to my scalp and neck and other weird parts of my body. But this is the effect of eating an obscene amount of mangoes.
And thanks to the daily power cuts, I don’t think I will be missing this summer all that much. As much as I love summer I hate the sweat and the heat and the permanently sticky skin.
I am so glad I don’t have to travel two hours every day in a bus full of heat and dust anymore. Four years of that was more than enough.
If you are stuck in traffic at this time of the year because of ‘Metro Rail/Mono Rail’ work (last year it was bridge work) my condolences to you.
Happiness.
I was reading The Museum Of Innocence by Orhan Pamuk when I came across a chapter called ‘The Most Important Thing in Life Is to Be Happy‘. For a long time I was always in search of Happiness. Not Earth shattering revelations or amazing achievements, just Happiness. Reading that chapter made me realize that ultimately, Happiness is what we aim for. It is what we expect our life to ultimately give us.
Another chapter was named ‘Happiness Means Being Close to the One You Love , That’s All‘ and I strongly disagreed. I always though of Happiness as a selfish thing. Something that you need and is present within you. Happiness can be found in other ways, I thought, not just in the company of those we love. Happiness meant getting something you wanted, reaching your goals. It was meant to be personal. Something that you could give to another person but personal, nonetheless. The whole of yesterday I had an internal conflict in my head, trying to disprove what Pamuk said. By the time I went to bed I was so sure of myself, so sure of what I thought was right.
Today was an entirely different story. I learnt that Happiness IS actually being close to the ones you love, that’s all.
Happiness is seeing someone after months or even years and realizing that no matter how much time passes, some things never change. Happiness is opposing teams being shot down by paint pellets. Happiness is listening to the same song on loop. It is food that satisfies a hungry stomach, the breeze in my hair that tugs my scarf away. Happiness is looking at the endless sea and knowing that everything is going to be okay. It is the knowledge that no matter how bad things may seem, they always have a way of working themselves out.
It is knowing that no matter where life may take us or where we may end up ten years from now, we will still have the memory of today, the sea and the sand.
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“In fact no one recognizes the happiest moment of their lives as they are living it. It may well be that, in a moment of joy, one might sincerely believe that they are living that golden instant “now,” even having lived such a moment before, but whatever they say, in one part of their hearts they still believe in the certainty of a happier moment to come.”
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Tip Your Hat
What is it about a top hat and a walking stick on a man that makes my heart skip a beat I do not know.
Case in point :
The top hat was made for men like Fred Astaire who was every inch the perfect gentleman. A man with a top hat has style. The morning dress is SUCH an elegant and gentlemanly piece of clothing. Men should wear it ALL THE TIME. If the eighties is in vogue now, then people should work at BRINGING BACK THE TOP HAT!
Just LOOK at Fred Astaire. He makes me want to give up everything in the world and just dance with him.
It’s sad how these days chivalry and gentlemanly behavior is just lost on men. Fred Astaire would NEVER be disrespectful to a woman. He is just too darn charming.
Well, and Humphrey Bogart too.
Sometimes I wish I could just ‘time-travel’ myself back to the thirties and forties. Everything just seems so much more pleasant then. The gowns were gorgeous, people still called each other Mr. Blah Blah and Miss. So and So, men wore tailcoats and top hats and looked like Humphrey Bogart.
A girl can dream.
Maybe In Madras 