A Lot Like Love?

We all have loved, at some point of time.

We all have lost, too, at some point of time.

The luckiest of us have made it already. Few of us have changed courses. A lot of us have been hanging by a thread. Some are still figuring out what to do.

The idea of love is as cloudy to us since we heard about it the first time on TV. If you are a girl, you might have seen DDLJ a dozen times, played in your mind how your soulmate would bump into you in a train in Europe.If you are a boy, you might have stood outside a certain girl's tuition classes to catch a glimpse of her.

From those days when we had half-baked dreams and pimples to now, when almost all of you out there are either looking for, losing or fighting for love; we need to know..things change.

It starts with rainbows and butterflies. You hide the cellphone from your mother. You pretend there is no girl, in front of your father. You type out lousy emoticons because you fall short of words to express to your special one. Your phone has a contact saved as "," or "@".

You start saving pocket money and remembering dates on the calendar.Your friends think you're acting like a blithering idiot but you are more happy than embarrassed.

There is always a window blinking with new messages. SMSes flood your inbox. Your phone needs top-ups every week. Books are opened and closed after hours, without turning a single page.

The last page of your notebook has a name that has been scribbled over to avoid scandal in the classroom.

You look into the mirror in the morning and touch up your make up a few extra times. That messy haircut is gotten rid of. Metallica is replaced by Backstreet Boys in your playlist. Some perfectly grown up person in the world has suddenly become your "baby".

You talk for hours and your battery cries and dies in writhing pain. You charge it up and sit tethered, close to a safe plug point and talk some more. Seems lame when you look back at yourself years later but it's really important when it's being done.

Teddy bears and roses and cuff links are bought and sold all over the town.

Time goes by and the rainbows start fading. The butterflies look like moths and the garden of love looks weedy. Those eyes don't seem magical anymore. That hairstyle looks hideous to you. You find a couple of more "punctuation marks" saved on your partner's phone and all hell breaks loose.

Your parents wonder if it's the hormones or peer pressure when they hear you screaming within your room. Some gladiators among us break objects. Some dramatic ones wail into a pillow. Some head for the bar. Some slash their wrists. Valentine's Day is creepy now. Birthdays are forgotten. Phones are switched off to avoid that special someone.

You unfriend him/her when you have been hurt. Yet you stalk them online, hoping to see them miserable without you. You never grow up.

Still further in life your priorities change. Love is no more about dates and Valentine's Days or teddy bears. Now you can't take work pressure and relatonship problems and worries of future all at the same time.

You bend, often break. You snap, often at the people you supposedly love. You rethink your entire life and the choices you made.

You are attending weddings before you know it and you know your turn is coming up. If you have made through all this, you still fall apart when the families don't agree. You don't know whose side to take: the person you want to spend the rest of your life with, or the people who brought you into the world and raised you to be who you are today. Some crumble, some elope, some give up and take the easy way out. Before you realize, it's no longer a fairy tale. You are struggling to move on/ start over. Sometimes you walk back make amends. Some times it works, other times it doesn't. You lose hearts and you break them.

If you're lucky you are back to the rainbows. But then, very few are that lucky.

Things change, people change. Priorities change and everything else does, in due time.

You still made it further, and managed to tie the knot. The honeymoon went great and you have albums full of memories. But now you feel that's all there is. There are bills and mortgages and in-laws gnawing at you. There is a kitchen that needs cleaning, a house loan that needs to get paid. You work hard to make ends meet and are planning ten years into the future. You keep wondering how your own Mom and Dad dealt with it and go back to them for advice. Meanwhile some where a bunch of people are waiting for a grandchild/niece/nephew. You don't know what to do once again.

Career is going downhill at one end and there is a leak in the bathroom pipe. Between the two you don't have time to tell your wife she looks beautiful. And amidst the job, housekeeper and kids, you don't have the mindset to prepare your husband's favorite dish once in a while. Egos clash, unkind words flow and you think that DDLJ was the stupidest movie you ever saw in your lifetime.

By the time you have figured out what has happened, you have a kid who has a contact saved as "QTpie" on the phone and is bunking classes.

A meeting can wait for a few minutes. A TV can be turned off to listen to someone. A call can be taken during lunch. A message can be sent once in a while to find out how he/she is. 

Maybe she shouted at you because she had a bad day at college. Maybe he didn't take your call because he was with his boss. Maybe she is just emotional, not a psycho. Maybe he is silent because he's hurt, not egoistic. We have to spare a moment to understand the people we value.

Love is not for the impatient. It's not for the weak-hearted. It takes you, breaks you and makes you into a new person, often a better person if you've loved the right one.

And you often don't realize that your family has taught you the kind of love that lasts, the kind that movies don't teach you. You need to share that with the people you add to your life, along with the people you already have in it.

Life is short, though it doesn't seem so. You never know what will happen next, that's for sure. You don't want the last words to you guy to be "I wish I never met you!", before something happens to either of you.

You don't want to come home with roses a day too late, and find out that she has packed and left for good.

It is not always a garden of roses, it is a complete mess sometimes, waiting for you to get up and clean it up, together. It's for those who can admit mistakes, who can be honest and accept. Those who can take the sunshine and the rain alike. If you have not found that person, keep looking. If you are not sure if this is the person, get out. If you have someone and something's wrong, fix it. 

The tiniest things you do can save the rainbows that grow old with you.

Love is always there, you need to bring it to the people around you. You may not know, but they need it as much as you do, maybe more.

Bereaved

"Parul!!", I heard Nilima screaming my name from somewhere. I felt myself disobeying her and walking in the opposite direction.
"Come back here! The bus is about to leave!" I heard some other voice calling after her. I sensed my feet taking steps towards a familiar bench in the college campus. I heard the voices dying down and the buses driving away. I sat down in the shade of the tree and glanced at my watch. He should be here any minute now. 


It seemed like I had been sitting there for ages but no one came.
I felt absurd thoughts coming to my mind while leaves decayed and dropped on me and the sun set down...
Why hasn't he come yet? Am I alone in the campus? How do I get back home? I have an assignment to finish and submit tomorrow morning! How do I get back home?

Suddenly in the distance I see the silhouette of a tall figure walking towards me through the twilight. I feel a sense of deep relief and anger at the same time.
I see him coming and I start shouting at him, he stands still.."You know how long I've been waiting?? You're not supposed to leave me alone like this, you know that?!"
He smiles and absorbs my abuse, which he always finds sweet rather than annoying. I realise he's looking as cute as ever in the same shirt he wore on the day we first met.
I don't let that dilute my fake exasperation and I continue scolding him. All of a sudden he turns and walks away. He waves as he goes and doesn't turn in spite of my frantic shouts. Somehow even I'm not able to go after him. He fades into the twilight just as he came and it turns dark. He's gone! How am I supposed to go back home?




I wake up with eyes bloodshot and body shuddering. I feel my head reeling and realise I am breaking down into uncontrollable sobs. It turn and look at the clock to my bedside: 5.23 AM. I turn and look to the other side: an empty side of the bed. An unused pillow. I bury my head into the pillow and cry till I drain out all I can...


It's 11 in the morning when my eyes open again. My head feels heavy. My heart feels heavier. My spirit feels heaviest. I wish there was one hour each day instead of twenty-four, so that I could spend the remaining 50 years of my average life expectancy in...what would that be...fifty times one times three-hundred and sixty five hours....still a lot of time to spend alone. There was no work to do today, and it has been the same since around a month. No alarm set at 6 AM,  no hurry to prepare breakfast for two and lunchbox for one. No keeping the shirt and trousers pressed neatly. No tea in the bed and newspaper by the bedside for my lazy husband. I lied motionless on the bed, thoughts and scenes circulating through my head...



         "Wake up, Pari!"
         "Yeah....5 mins more....lemme sleep...shoo..."

         "Aww...aren't you cute?! now get up and get me bed tea."

         "Get it yourself. ...can't you do it for jus' one day, mister?", I mumbled in irritation.

         "Pleeeejjj", he said with a protruded lower lip, "Plijplijplij!!"

         "Okay! Stop it!!" I laughed and left him there, and he winked and hogged my pillow and snuggled deeper into the blankets.


I could watch him all day sleep like a baby, holding one of my hands and hugging a pillow, all at the same time; as if he'd get lost on the bed without both. I'd give anything to watch him sleep next to me today. I'd give anything to have him here with me...today...any number of teas and breakfasts in bed..whatever he asked for..
Tears flowed again..



I didn't enter the kitchen these days. There was no one to cook for. Me, I don't remember when I ate last..... my mother told me I was looking really sick and deprived. In spite of a million persuasions I refused to go back with her, but promised to come down after I came to terms with Abhijit's ...departure....till then I needed to be by myself. I promised I wouldn't take my own life...he wouldn't have liked it..she was relieved but she was in doubt. But thought it was best to not disturb me further against my will.


The mirror showed me what I couldn't believe, a tear-stained face and drooping red eyes, my features had never looked so ugly before. For a moment I couldn't recognize myself. No wonder Mom was panicky! I look horrendous! For a split second I thought, Abhi shouldn't see me like this and almost started clearing up my face when I again realised that he wouldn't.


Papers and letters lied untouched on the study table...mostly related to Life Insurance and claims. Some medical reports. Some official documents of his that I couldn't make sense of. They all had typewritten statements of how he died, but none of them mentioned when he'd come back...


My wardrobe had a few additions in white and deletions of colours. So many other things had lost colour that the fabric mattered the least now.


I sat down on the sofa and turned on the TV. Led by some instinct, I switched to the Discovery Channel, like I usually did, and he'd come out of his study and settle down on my lap while watching life in the rain forests of Africa or vegetation at the Coral reefs in the Pacific. I'd gently massage his scalp while he'd be engrossed in the polyps and sea urchins, but would immediately react if I stopped.
I turned up the volume, still expecting he'd hear his favorite show beginning and come out of somewhere. No one came...
I turned the TV off...tears flowed again..


The scorching sun slowly started going down, as I stood watching the street  from my window, where the kids came out to play after school hours. I hadn't left the house in days...not since Abhi's accident. I hadn't seen the neighbours after the funeral. I didn't answer the doorbells or phone calls anymore, but they were relieved to see the shades of the windows going up and down, signalling that I was 'fine'. 
The kids cackled with happiness as they played...for a brief moment I smiled when I remembered something..


     "I want a daughter. I want only ONE daughter. Period.", he said, playing with my fingers. I loved it when he did that.
     "Why? What if we have a boy?", I asked, watching how nicely my hand always fit into his, and our fingers locked as if meant to be.

     "No...no ..not a boy, Parul. Just one girl. Cute, little baby girl. Your beauty and my brains."

     "Why not a boy?"

     "Arey...they are so messy, baba..they scribble with crayons all around the house walls, they keep falling off bikes, they keep splashing in mud and catching frogs...they always stand outside classrooms and lag in studies...always restless and destructive...so many reasons! A baby girl on the other hand will sit quietly in one place in a pink frock and piggy-tails, with a Barbie doll, all day looking unimaginably cute. So, a girl. Period."

     "Ha ha....that we can do to a boy, too, but then I can't say much about his future..", I heard his laughter echo through my head...my own laughter tinkling in tandem with his. Bliss..happiness..

Gone.


The clock struck six.
It was time when other husbands came back home to their wives. Cars came driving back from work and backing into their respective garages. Our car didn't come back to the garage that day. Neither did my husband...


Somewhere in the distance I could hear a clock ticking...slowly, and time wouldn't pass. The silence was deafening.
There was this emptiness that wouldn't go away...a void that would remain no matter how you tried to fill it up. I tried to stop thinking and flipped open my cell phone which I had thrown against the wall a few days back. Thankfully it still worked fine when I put the pieces together. It was weird not finding missed calls or SMSs from his number any more, a habit I didn't seem to grow out of. I wondered if I should change the wallpaper now. The picture of us together, both smiling in it like this is going to be forever, was stinging my eyes again. But I let it be...
I went to the Inbox and read the last one I had received from him:


'Booorriinnggg day at work baby, really tired, miss u..wish i was home :( wat r u up2? lunch was awesome, ur finally a gud cook ;) luv u. c u in evng <3'


I smiled. From Abhi's messages no one  could guess how long we'd been together. The same cute SMSs since the days of our early love that blossomed during college, till five hours before he would never message again...the same amount of affection in each one, knowing how important these little things were to me.....frequent messaging and calls every couple of hours.
Some days he would forget. I'd be very upset then and refuse to take his calls when he tried to make up.
He'd repeatedly call me till I picked up, and promise me he'd never forget again. Dozens of sorries later, I'd forgive him.
I thought of all the times when I ignored his calls and gave him the silent treatment. Somewhere inside me I had the urge to hit myself, thinking of all the precious moments I had lost, when I could have heard his voice, heard him say my name, heard him laugh, heard him say a thousand times that he loved me..


      "What if I die? What will you do, sweets?"
      "Come after you. Follow you around like a Vodafone pig."

      "Pug"

      "Haan, whatever."

      "C'mon, seriously!" 

      "Remarry, of course! I'll get lonely you know!"

      "Get a pug, then! Or better still....I should leave around some thousand chits and letters here and there to keep you busy...'PS I love you' style...what say?"

"Wreally...tell me then, what should leave behind to make you feel better if something happens to me?" 

     "Shut up." 

     "Tell me tell me tell me...What if I die first??" 

     "Shut up!", he said and hugged me tight. I remember being scared by the tone of his voice back then.


This was no 'PS I Love You'. He didn't get the time to leave any hope behind. And the things that he did leave behind were too heavy a burden to carry for me.

It was already 10 in the night and I still hadn't done much throughout the day, except brooding over things. I knew these would only pull me further down, but I had to live with it. There is no way you can erase someone from your memories after spending half your life with him. If I had to follow the classic technique of getting rid of his things so that they wouldn't provoke memories, I'd have to burn the whole house down.


There was his presence everywhere. There was a strong absence, too.
The favorite cup he always had his tea in. His shirt thrown on the chair. Shoes lying in the corner of the room. His watch on the desk. Notes scribbled in his handwriting pasted on the door of the fridge. The books he loved neatly arranged on the shelves. The ring I wore on my finger. His backpack on the sofa. His spectacles on the study table. The photos in the frames. The marks I got on my hands during a playful banter in the kitchen when hot oil charred my skin in a minor accident. The left side of the bed. The sheets he used to sleep on. His CD collection. The walls in the house that he had painted himself. The aquarium he loved.

He's left everything he loves here, in this house. Wherever he is, he's certainly missing his belongings. Suddenly this thought strikes my mind...he can't sleep without my touch. He can't eat vegetarian food. He needs to be pampered like a baby all the time. He must be missing his books, there were quite a few he hadn't finished reading. He's too clumsy to take care of his own..He's not happy...he's not in peace...he's without me...he can't live without me..if there is life after death, then both of us need to be living the same life together, that was what I promised him...to follow him like a Vodafone pig pug...


My hand involuntarily reaches out to the bottle of sleeping pills I had hidden from sight. I drain them down with cold water, and try not to think much in the next few minutes as sleep overtakes me.
The window shades won't go up tomorrow, the neighbours will know. I won't be dead and decaying, that's a good thing.
Ma will understand. That I need to go..She'll not cry too much, I hope.
This will be the first night, since he left, without nightmares, particularly the one from the first day we met in college, where he left me waiting without a bus to go home...
I can sleep peacefully today, even if the left side of the bed is empty..

Half in sleep, half delirious, I think I have texted something to his number: 


'C u in mrng. luv u. gn :-* '

Not Blind..... But Retarded.....

"Love is in the air...", chirped Nishi, while strolling beside me in the park.
I pondered over her statement as she heaved a really deep sigh.
It seemed oddly pathetic that the smoke and dust particles in the city air were more conspicuously visible to me than the "love".
She flicked a few popcorns into that love-filled air and did a little jig which she usually does when she is very, very happy.
And she was particularly happy these days...
For reasons obvious from her statement.
She was in "LoVe". Precisely for the third time..........

My cousin Nishi is a confused little soul.
The more she thinks she has a clear idea about what love means, the more clouded her judgement becomes. She has been into the labyrinth twice, and has admitted losing her way, both times.
She hasn't committed yet, and I thank God that she has retained that minimum cerebral functionality to not jump into relationships.
Now it may seem very weird as to what her definition of love is.....
Well, it is as messed up as that of any average teenager's.
She grew up reading Grimm's' Fairy Tales. And she believes that "Knights in Shining Armors riding White Stallions" do exist. Just that these days the Knights have traded their armors for Levi's Jeans, Calvin Klein shirts and accessories from Ray Ban & Fastrack. And the low-mileage white stallions have been chucked, enter "kewl" 150 cc bikes.
She has always dreamt of bumping into her soul mate in some scenic location (the Alps are her favourite), and rehearsed the "love-at-first-sight" thing numerous times in her head. And then comes the "lived-happily-ever-after" nonsense.
I'll say that the Idiot Box can be the worst friend-philosopher-guide to any young mind.
Especially to a mind like Nishi's.
Thanks to the world it has opened up to her, she hopes for a partner who looks like Enrique Iglesias, dances like Hrithik Roshan, has an aura like that of Prince William,as funny as Woody Allen, is at least as suave as Brad Pitt...and the list goes on...undergoing regular changes.
And she herself aspires to have the eyes of Aishwarya Rai, the tresses of Catherine Zeta Jones, the figure belonging to Cameron Diaz and the charm of Kate Winslet (minus signs of ageing).
And as she tells me more about the new "love" of her life, I get to know that this one is apparently much better than the guys she had admired in the past.
The first one she liked had a remote resemblance to Enrique (purely according to her)....her high-frequency "Eeeps!!!" of delight still ring in my ears like they did when she first told me about him. After a couple of months, she refused to talk about him. Coaxing out the reason was easy enough...she found him too "unintelligent".
Then a year later, she couldn't stop talking about a classmate who was so smart with integral calculus that she didn't mind him being average-looking. That was the only phase in her life I guess when she actually took interest in current affairs and social issues, until the long discussions on studies bored her for good.
I couldn't help but smile at her innocent and confused thoughts about this thing called "love". I knew very well that she was far from even guessing how and when these things affect one's life and the very course of existence, right now happy in a virtual dollhouse where everything is supposed to be pink and perfect.
I don't intend to break her happily chugging train of thoughts until the time comes, when she'll grow up and herself realize what it means to be responsible for another person's happiness, how difficult it is to hold on to everything in life at the same time, and what a tough experience it is, to be the reason that holds together someone else's world, too. It'll be a long time before I inform her that there is a really thin line between practicality and uncontrollable emotions she'll walk one day....
Till that day.....I constantly watch over her....
My stupid little Nishi....
In what she thinks..... is......love...

The following lines will definitely make no sense to her......

You have to walk carefully in the beginning of love;
the running across fields into your lover's arms can only come later when you're sure they won't laugh if you trip.
~~~Jonathan Carroll, "Outside the Dog Museum"