the box under the book of love...

After a few sentences exchanged, automatically, evidently, inevitably, each time that i have made new friends, we somehow end up at the question of love. if you are married or in love, everyone's interested in knowing other's story of love.. a story that always leaves people smiling and wondering.. each story of love is so special and so unique..

incidentally, i have made so many new friends and narrated my story of love so many times that its by heart now, word by word... but is that truly the story that matters..

My point is, we are always shown a picture perfect for love, but is that all? is love waiting for hours for each other, sharing all dirty and good secrets, doing wild things, going on mad drives at midnight, watching movies together, writing mushy letters to each other, arguing one moment and then cuddling the another, dancing in the rain, walking by the beach, resting under a tree, sitting hours in just silence of togetherness, buying silly things for each other, singing songs after couple of drinks, is this something what you have in mind when you think of a story of love? when a gal meets boy, boy meets gal, they laugh and argue, they party and socialize and "accidentally" fall in love and become inseparable. however we start a story, if it ends up with girl and boy falling madly compassionately terribly in head over heels, rollingly and quite roaringly in love..  so much so that they end up thinking marriage would be the ONLY(i exclaim, so you understand the depth of what i mean) salvation to their love... and then... they m a r r y...

NO No , am not starting the typically same story about gal meets boy, love happens, marriage too and then starts nagging, taking for granted, complains, MIL nags, complications.. don't wait for melodrama about how love terribly changed and my life was ruined after marriage and how my husband took me for granted...i have been all over there..been madly, blindly in love, fought with parents to marry to remain in love, got married, fought with his parents for obvious reasons, fallen out of love, betrayed, anchored back, won over, head over heels in love again, mysteriously disappointed at times, but mostly in plain comfortable zone of love, happy and reconciled and i call it my little box of love, a box where i store away all these years of togetherness, to which when i give one look, it revives me out of disdain and gives me the ability to fall in love again..i  plan to have this zone longer..

Because in these 10 years of knowing my husband(mark it, knowing, not 10 years of marriage), from day 1 when he started wooing to this day, we carry our own boxes of love, separate from one another, but of each other, with borrowed happiness, with shadows of sadness, with a few achievements and a trail of disappointment, with a few layers of awesomeness and some rugged ones of the years taken for granted, but owing to our varied perspectives, we choose to have them apart. and i know i open my box every now and then to bring me a new shade in love, to redeem any reining dullness, to remind me to love the man who for sure takes time out to open his box of love too...how else, otherwise, does he too smile and gaze like an ever so surprised and indulged lover. how does he put a neat velvet cover over my book of blunders and own upto it and decorate it with frills and colors, so much so that it intrigues my very core and how does he, otherwise, embrace it with full responsibility?

and no matter how long i go on to explain how the magic of love works, married or not, presently in love or not, if once you have loved, you know its magic and its just not worth regretting if just the person involved is not part of your life anymore, moral of the story is Peter Gabriel's got me speaking and i am gonna leave you now with the comfort of cherishing love....go on, slip out your box of love and refer to the book of love as you indulge in some heart felt memories...

sealed with love
Somi

Nani ka ghar...

i just sat with my legs folded, my hands embracing them tightly to my chest and i just sat and stared into void as rain drenched me, i just sat on my Aai(maternal grandmother)'s house's terrace( in puri, orissa )and i just stared into void as rain made my hair wet and they fell on my forehead and shoulders and i shivered. This is the house where i learnt togetherness, where i jumped and ran and screamed and played with my cousins.. this is where most of my holidays were spent.. this is where a part of heart remains, always...

my youngest Mamma(maternal uncle) ailing from quadriplegia was taken care of by Aai for 14 long years..it was her routine, she lived for him.. for 14 years, she got up to only turn him on his bed so he didn't get bedsores, for 14 years, she brushed his teeth, for 14years she fed him tea with a straw, for 14 years, she fed him before she ate, for 14 years she had a companion[considering my ajja(read maternal grand father) died  16 years back] right by her bed. He just lay, ever so waiting, waiting to be turned, waiting to be fed, waiting to be scratched..

and she just faithfully lived and pampered her baby of 44 years at her own old tender age of 76, she just smiled, and made her way along for him.she ignored her knee pains, her aching back, her bending body and her swollen ankles, she complained seldom with her priorities straight, she lived for him and made sure her baby was comfortable, through day and night.

when we visited on holidays, we sat in their room as he told us stories from the TV and of his own. We watched movies together as Aai would slip out her tressure box from under the bed, her box of Masalas and Beetle leaves, she made tiny paans for all of us(cousins) and teased us and pampered us. we sat with them and watched the rain from the window and later made boats and put them in puddles outside his room...

he was her living encyclopedia, he knew what medicines she had to give him and what she had to take, he knew what channels were there on the TV set, he knew she had a stock of biscuits in the cupboard, he read messages on the phone for her, he even read the newspaper, they talked about all the relatives and sat together through the night as Aai made pan for both from her big box of masalas and Beetle leaves. 

they were each other's world, one lived for another.. they knew no other routine. We all lived in our big cities with the only comfort that both of them were fine with each other.. always worried what Mamma would do lest anything happened to Aai at her old age. but they were a team, they pulled on...

everything went on like it was, until the morning of 14th of July, 2011, when suddenly in his sleep, Mama left the cage of his ailing body and passed away, just like that. not a word of pain, nor a complain..He just left.. and left us all in a spell. in a spell of shock, in a spell of confusion, in a spell of anxiety and in a spell of fear.

shocked we were because he didn't show a trace of pain or a sign that he was going..

confused we are because we don't know if we shouldn't be happy for he is now free...

anxious we are for my dear Aai doesn't know an alternative living, she always considered she was going to be the first one among them to go. 

scared we are to teach Aai a new routine, a new way, a new life...

i sat on the terrace of the same house, wondering if Mama ever dreamed of coming out to this terrace and staring like i did, as am surrounded by trees so green, the wilderness of a village and rain drops. i wonder if he wanted to be ever so free.. he is now and i embrace myself stronger to feel him standing somewhere nearby, contently exalting in a life after death.. I prayed for his soul, i prayed for my Aai, for her to move on...

i packed my bags and watched her wiping her tired eyes as tears rolled down her wrinkled cheeks and lips stained of Paan masala as she's week to speak. the house was not the same, not for me, not for her, for none of us... for 14 years we came to a duo, the duo who made us smile. for 14 years we came to the house with the hope of progress..

Death won and freed my Mama and the house is just not the same anymore. As the Taxi honked outside my Aai's old big house, to take us to the airport, i hugged her and asked if she would make me a paan. She smiled and hurriedly took out her box of tressure, made me a Paan and packed it with love. and as i put it in my mouth and waved her good bye, i felt warm tears rolling down my cheeks. 

My first love, my first companion, the partner in crime, my love at first sight!!

He took me for walks, he took me for rides, saved chocolates for me and made up stories to make sure I smile... We would sit hours through the night talking about the whole world, we pushed and scratched and almost killed each other and later laughed... he counted the number of scratches i made with my nails and i counted the swollen marks...we screamed, shouted and blamed each other most of the time, we shared, we nurtured, we laughed and were there for each other all the time..

i was one and he 4, when Mom says he refused to accept chocolates if the person giving it didn't have two(one for him and one for me).

i was 2 and he was 5, when he proudly shared his toys.

i was 3 and him 6 when i started imitating him

i was 4 and him 7, when we sneaked around the house to search for the biscuits and chocolates mom hid.

i was 5 and him 8 when we played ludo and snakes and ladder and blamed each other of cheating.

i was 6 and him 9, having come back from a school camp, he would make up stories to give me goose bumps.

i was 7 and he 10, when he had threatened to beat the shit out of a boy who tried to hurt me by saying annoying things on our way back from school.

i was 8 and him 11, when he woke me up in the middle of the night to accompany him to the kitchen for a glass of water, lest ghosts and lizards attack(lol).

i was 9 and him 12, when i looked up to him as he won prizes for singing, debates, extempore, and sports. he was my inspiration and i died imitating.

i was 10 and him 13, when i hurt myself while playing on the school playground and my nose was bleeding, he carried me and ran to the first aid room as if i did die if he didn't rescue me.

i was 11 and him 14, when he made up stories to keep me reassured and locked both of us in the bedroom as our parents ever had an argument.

i was 12 and him 15 when he almost got rusticated from school for beating up the Principal's son for teasing me for some bullshit.

i was 13 and him 16 when our teacher had been unfair to me and had acted partial and he risked his practical examination score to only protect me.

as we grew, we became the best of friends, we went for bike rides which eventually turned to car drives, we shared our darkest of secrets and searched for answers to world's silliest and deepest questions in each other. We talked for hours, gave lost out suggestions to each other.

If troubles rained, He has always been my umbrella...

we grew up to go to other people. moved on to make our own lives...

But they say, brothers and sisters are friends God gave us. and i believe them, and how!

i came to this world to wonderful parents who gave me the gift of a life long friend, a life long shield, a life long throw pillow, a life long of love.

My brother was the first boy i opened my eyes to, my first glimpse of companionship...my love at first sight!