Thinking aloud…

Last few days have been strange! Weird realizations, weirder thoughts…and the weirdest part is, the more complicated I foresee things, the more I smile. The more I realize no matter how much ever we want to hold on to certain things, we have to wait to see if we can…the more I resign to future.

Thought # 1

Mom used to tell me that as I grow up, I would miss my childhood... my school... my friends. For a long time, I believed I do.  I believed I miss the innocence, the fun of being together, copying homework assignments. But now as we sit 100 miles apart, planning a vacation over text, I realize I don’t miss it as much as I believed. I could never imagine planning a vacation then. Now, I know holidaying can be crazy fun (we choose to ignore societal warnings of ‘cut down friends and get married’).

Yes, I do miss my innocence, but aren’t we bound to pay a price for everything in life? Which makes me think, have I sold off my innocence for maturity? Or am I trying to buy it back everyday?

Thought # 2

Every call with my dad ends on the same note: Save money Moon. And the same lie: Yup (or I am Dad).  Not that I am a spend thrift, but every time I weigh my bank balance against someone’s smile (be it anyone), the smile wins. Every time I think of postponing a smile to next month, my next thought is: What if I don’t live next month? Who knows!

Yes, I do realize I need to save. But for a future I have no clue of? Ask my present to sacrifice a little for a future I am not even sure of? Doesn’t it sound more like saving smiles for tomorrow that might never come?

No, I am not a pessimist. I don’t wait for death. But if it comes some day, I wish I wouldn’t have to make it wait because I have a life left to live.

ASIDE: Typical me!

Past few days have been gift days. All I have been doing is planning gifts. For my mom, dad, cousin, future sis-in-law, uncle, cousin’s friend’s niece. Wait. Cousin’s friend’s niece…did that strike a bell? Yes, you heard it right. A wedding gift…and the relation almost freaked my mom out to the following conversation:

Mom: How do you know her?

Me: I don’t. I don’t even know didi’s friend.

Mom: And you are staying up nights to think what to gift her?

Me: So what? She won’t know me. Imagine maa,the joy in her eyes when she receives it. She is leaving her being Indian for a guy she loves…won’t a gift from aunt back home make her feel special? Make her feel like a princess? Make her love the guy more? Won’t it make the guy feel accepted by his in-laws?

Mom: But…you don’t know her.

Me: I know how I would have felt in her place. It would make me happy. To think someone smiled at her marriage because she felt special. You won’t understand what it is to decide on marrying someone not from your community. One token of approval…I know how it would make her feel.

Mom: You would anyway do what you want to. So, carry on being crazy.

Me: Love you maa.

Bang! The phone goes dead! And my smile remains!

Thought # 3

I spoke to my brother after days last week. And the call lasted ten minutes, against those hour long calls even four years back. Which made me sneak into my old Yahoo account and re-read those long emails I used to write... with I miss you but I need to stay out of home for good, the pain of missing my pillow to hug on, the hatred behind there is a limit to expectations and micro-managing and asking for who-why-when-what. I could sense the pain of ‘why don’t they let me grow up and be myself’ written large in it.

Over the years, those emails became shorter. Now, it runs for few lines: how are you? How is work? And how are things in life? Which pretty much sums up everything…and make me wonder, have I become quieter? More introspective? Less complaining?  Have I grown up to be more diplomatic in handling the ‘who-why-when-what’? Or have we drifted away?

Thought # 4

My cousin (who I thought I love more than my mom) called in the morning, and after ‘important’ things, asked me if I had breakfast. Liar me said yes, and it made me smile. I refused to eat any meal unless she fed me while I was at my maternal uncle’s place. Even today, she does that when I go back. Even my mom does. She would lovingly ask me to open my mouth and put in the food while am busy reading some crazy ‘need to finish this today’ story book.

Flashback… of days when my brother used to throw (literally!) his daily quota of fish into my mouth as I patiently hid under the dining table to relief him from the torture of having fish. I have transcended from being a cat to cow (or so he says). I don’t miss having fish, but I miss hiding under the table.

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Okay…enough of puking out! Enough exercise for my brain. It needs some rest now…good music, good flashbacks, and present smiles. More thoughts some other day…when reality bites my daily loving routine…and I miss it. :)