Gift from My Little Angel

                  Towards the last quarter of 2013, I had decided to quit my job to focus on my writing. I already had a plot of a novel in my mind. All I wanted to do is write it in peace, away from the grinds of daily routine.

                   I had started buying the books I thought I needed for researching the background of my story. And I found most of the books I was looking for.

                   At the office, I had put down my papers and had started serving out my notice period.

                   That Monday morning, I was just preparing the files that I need to share with the team for knowledge transfer that day. When I got a call from the Mailroom – which handles the deliveries of couriers inside the company campus – I was a little surprised. I have not ordered anything – which basically means books – in the last few days. And I did not remember anyone telling me of anything that they had couriered to me.

                    I went down to the Mailroom to collect it. After signing for it, when I saw the parcel, it was from my kid sister.

(I have not written about her before because she is so much a part of my life, that writing about her seems impossible; maybe because I still doubt that I am a good enough writer to describe what a great sister she is.

She is that most beautiful surprise that life offers you at the most unexpected moment, making you believe in an all merciful power looking over us, that most beautiful surprise that makes you forgive all the nasty stuff that life has pulled on you before and instead makes you feel kind and humane towards other beings.

She makes me humane and human, makes me feel kindness and empathy. She makes me believe, in myself. When a little angel accepts you as her brother, you realize that you are not as damned as you thought before, or as evil as you were accused by others. Her presence makes me believe in the power of love, and my ability to love someone. She broke the dark, cynical spectacles – through which I had been watching everything; and I could see the beauty of life.)

                  My kid has sent me a parcel. I was already smiling. I hurried to my desk to open it.

                  Once I opened it, what do I find? Lying inside, well wrapped is a book. No, not just any book. It was a book that I believed I needed to understand the geographical background of my novel. Unfortunately, the book had gone out of print. No amount of searching of book sellers – online, offline, secondhand – has brought me any luck.

                   I must have mentioned it to her, about my futile attempts, and also how important that book is for me. That was a month ago. In my hand was now the same book. She remembered it. But I knew that she was busy with her studies. And the book was not on the market.

She must have spent a lot of effort and time on tracking and then buying that book for me, not to mention the monetary cost. (Later, when I insisted, she only mentioned that she got it from abroad.) It was one of the best surprises I have ever received.

                    Even more than her efforts, it was her belief in my dream. Writing has been a lonely dream for me. But her trust in me, my writing – epitomised in her act - is an even more precious gift to me.

I am still working on my novel. But I also write the occasional short story and send it out to magazines. But no matter, what I am working on, I keep that book right in front of my eyes, on my writing table. And every time I get a rejection email – which is almost too often – I just pick up that book, hold it for sometime, maybe read couple pages, and I could feel that same surge of emotions I felt when I got it. I feel motivated, inspired and I start writing again.

                     Each gift from my kid sister is very precious, very special to me. But this is the best gift that my Little Angel has gifted me. Her trust that inspires me to pursue my dream.

Now, I believe, I should mention the name of this person. Her name is Priyanka Dey. She is already a renown blogger and poet and short story writer. And she is my Little Angel.

The Journey for a Sister

I barely managed to grab the plane home. Home, the phrase sounded unsure in my mouth, as I turned it over on my tongue. I was basically running back to see my mom. Home was incidental.

I was born with wheels. My parents kept on moving around with their jobs. I saw quite a few homes, but never home. The only family I knew was my parents and my sister. There were uncles, aunts, cousins whom I met annually; they were festival persons, never family. 

But this time, Mom has returned to our home town, settled in the house we have built, a building I can dubiously call home. My uncle and aunt stays close by with their two children. I have been hearing how my uncle and aunt, and especially the daughter made sure my mom felt at home in home. Practically, she made home home for mom.

So, I was going home. But I knew I was going to my mom. I'll meet everyone. 

(Aside, even though I have never felt home, I have always been, ever since I was a kid, looking for the one person I can accept as my sister, my younger sister, the younger one I can take care of.)

I reached home a day earlier than I told mom, just to surprise her. I was spending couple of lazy days as the previous week was 12 hours-a-day and I was bone tired.

Every day I would be meeting my uncle, aunt and almost always the girl cousin. Every moment she was preparing something for me to eat, getting me something. She, a practicing lawyer, taking as much time out as is possible. I had never seen so much care from a younger one. To be honest, never have I been close to her. But this level of caring. Still, I am a hardened outsider, never easily felt anything.

One night, Mom & Me were invited over to my uncle's home for dinner. Just across the road from our home, we walked over. 

Being the family, we just sat down in the cooking area, chit chatting with aunt and my cousin. 

Just to stretch my legs, I got up and walked around a bit. Then is when I heard my cousin's shout. 

What happened to you?

I had a vague feeling that one of my foot was feeling sticky. But then I put it down to the rain. When I looked down on my foot, it was on the bloody red side. But as is my norm, I tried to shrug it off, when I got a stern look and a soft plea from her to sit down and let her have a look at my wound.

I had to bow before her wish. I had to put up my bloody foot on a stool. She got on her knees, trying to gauge my wound. But the blood flowing as well as that which has already dried, made it hard to point the wound. She hurriedly got some Dettol soaked cotton. I extended my hand to grab the cotton to clean off my foot. But she shook her head. 

She bent on her knees and gently started to clean off the blood from my foot. I felt bit embarrassed. I have never had anyone attend my wounds in a long, long time. And with my multitude of wounds, it was a high hope.

I noticed how much caring there was in every time she cleaned off my foot. My blood had never been in short supply. It kept on flowing. She gently kept on cleaning it. Finally my blood gave out before her persistence. 

For those who no longer remember, Dettol still burns like hell. I flinched once or twice. Then I just noticed the warmth of a sister's care. It no longer burnt.

She hurriedly applied some ointment on my wound. I am not sure it burnt or not.

She kept on inquiring whether my leg is alright, whether I can walk or not. I did actually limped a bit while walking down my dinner. She walked just at my right hand, in case I need any support.

After dinner, she actually walked along with me and mom to make sure I reached home without any further bloodshed.

This uninhibited care, the loudness & the softness of caring, never seen ever. 


I realized that this is the younger sister I was looking for. The one who cares so unconsciously, so completely. The one I can call my sister and care for and never again feel the sense of loss I have carried within me always. The same sense of loss which turns me careless at most moments in my life. From now on, I will always be thinking of this caring young sister and be a bit more careful.


I am a thick headed person. So, it took me so long to recognize the younger sister I have always looked for everywhere.


This was my pilgrimage, the one journey where I found the one being, one invaluable being I have seek like forever. I realized the truth of family and found my younger sister.


By the by, her pet name literally translates into younger sister.

This entry is a part of the contest at BlogAdda.com in association with imlee.com

The contest came before me may be a day after this revelation for me. And I decided to break my rule of distancing an experience before writing about it. This is one journey I had to shout about from my roof top. The My Family Memory Contest was even better. I am writing this out of that pure sense of awe I felt when I found my dear young sister I had been blind for in so many years. To you, sister.

Jaane Tu...Ya Jaane Na Moment

Few days back, the movie Jaane Tu...Ya Jaane Na was coming on one of the TV channels. As I did not have anything really interesting on hand at the moment, watching the movie seemed a good idea.


I have an idea that most people in India, including me, have seen the movie at least once. Most people have a rough idea of  the story. I am not going to talk about it. Neither am I a critic to discuss the movie at length.


But somewhere in the movie occurs a scene that made me think, maybe even feel.


Now, if you have seen the movie, you may remember the scene where the character of the brother, played amazingly by Prateik Babbar, have a talk with his sister, the bubbly Genelia D'Souza, about her choice of a life partner. You may remember it, solely for the fact that it is like the Now-I-realize moment for Genelia's character. (As an aside-cum-confession, I don't remember clearly the names of the characters portrayed, but I think Genelia's was called Meow.)


But within the Now-I-realize moment, there was a small bit that struck me this time around.


During the conversation, Prateik almost casually makes a half comment, that puts his whole character into a deeper background. Till that moment, he is an eccentric character, taunting his sister's friends, keeping a mouse for a pet. Almost absurd.


And the few words he says now: my sister...who was my best friend...


Suddenly, he is no longer such an absurd existence. He is a brother who misses his sister. And because he misses her, he has made his room his fortress, not venturing out too much. And whenever he misses her too much, he comes out, taunts his sister's friends, so, that his sister would notice him, even though with anger. In a slightly mad way, he was just trying to spend a bit of time with his sister, who has moved away with her friends, away from him.


It could be a comment made by most brothers, who misses their sisters-who have grown and moved into their friends. Sisters, in a most elemental way, are a part of a brother's life: with their sharing, caring, simple demands, and in countless different ways.
But with growing, they completely move away. Friends become such an important part of their life. Things change. Brothers feel abandoned. But they cannot say that either. They too make their own escapes, in other ways.


Like Prateik's character, who just rolls up into his shell of a room, coming out only when the missing becomes unbearable. He has accepted it as inevitable. But at the same time he knows his sister so well, that he is the only one who understands her heart, and knows whom she really loves.


But does the character says all this? No. He uses only six simple words: my sister...who was my best friend... And with those six simple words, the whole character comes into a different light altogether. All his eccentricities becomes meaningful. He's just a brother missing his sister. Each of his activity till then becomes suffused by that meaning. Now, I don't want to go ahead and make an assertion that Genelia's character was also supposed to make the same realization, and she did. But I just could not help hoping that she did, that she got the meaning of her brother's half said, yet most telling confession in the whole of the movie. For me, that became the most important slice of an otherwise another routine love story. 


But the most amazing thing about that scene is its simplicity and effectiveness. So much telling, with so few words - six to be precise.


That's story telling.