Story of a life

There are some people who enter your life like the wind. Fast, howling, turn everything topsy turvy.  But just like a windstorm, you get used to the screeching and noise. When they are gone, nothing seems as meaningful as it did with them. You feel you just cannot, for the life of you, enjoy anything without them ever again. Your days lose their color and nights become meaningless. You want to hate them with all your being but are unable to. No matter what they do, they occupy a very special part of your heart, sometimes without any contribution of theirs. This is just how you feel. One of the most desperately sad things is when the feelings are not reciprocated. Why, oh why do we give people this power over our lives? We, the independent, world's-at-my-feet, career-oriented women. Aren't we supposed to be tainted by society for having no heart and achieving our career goals at any cost aka at the cost of our relationships and families? Why do we then let someone enter o...

I was reading 'Andheri Raat kay Musaafir' by Naseem Hijazi for the nth time, curled up in the creaky old wicker chair that was just oh-so-comfortable. A little hot cocoa sat forgotten in the mug on the ottoman in front of me. Slow tears rolled down my cheeks. I heaved a sigh and looked up. Mark was standing in the door, leaning on the door frame, watching me. With a gentle smile, he asked: "Missing Spain again?" I offered him a watery smile back and said wistfully, "the Spain that was..." "I know, baby", he smiled warmly, walked over and planted a swift kiss on my head. "Where's Sophie?" He asked. "Soph? Must be out with Sasha and Lisa. I think last I heard they were whispering about sneaking over to the shop"                                                                          ...

Last year, I vowed to myself that I'll live everyday as if it were my last. For a while, I did. Didn't make a lot of people very happy. But it sure was a great time. I fulfilled some of my life's oldest dreams, overcame some deep fears and it improved my life A LOT. I made a choice every day to do so...and for a while I stayed on track. Now, I feel lost. I feel that I do not know what 'living everyday as if it were your last' means anymore. I do not know when it happened. Somehow I let the understanding slip away and here I am, wondering what happened and when. I can hazard a guess and say that my conscious self became overwhelmed with the newness of a lot of things and just retreated back to the old and familiar...it did so stealthily because it knew that I'd stop it if I catch it. I have done a lot of things that I am proud of this year and a lot of things that I am not. But one thing I have done is to take my chances...way more than I ever had. Can't...

Picture credits:  Humans Of New York My best friend growing up was the neighbors' boy (also the only boy on a block full of girls) who gave me a genius idea about how to marry my doll but still keep her. He became my friend because I'd let him play with my dolls (I had too many toys, I was spoiled) when no one else would because the girls didn't want to play with a 'boy' (see I have always been surrounded by women who put  the other gender down a lot, no wonder I planned a masculinist movement in middle school :D) and his parents won't buy him any.  The oldest of our pack, now a lady with two children, had been banned from buying any dolls because she ruined them all within a day of buying them and then wanted new ones. To get more dolls, she coined a great plan. Her sister and cousin (who lived next door) had boy-dolls. 'Lets get our dolls married' she said to us. 'These boy dolls are of no use otherwise, this way we can play with them....

If you can keep your head when all about you        Are losing theirs and blaming it on you,    If you can trust yourself when all men doubt you,     But make allowance for their doubting too;    If you can wait and not be tired by waiting,     Or being lied about, don’t deal in lies, Or being hated, don’t give way to hating,     And yet don’t look too good, nor talk too wise: If you can dream—and not make dreams your master;        If you can think—and not make thoughts your aim;    If you can meet with Triumph and Disaster     And treat those two impostors just the same;    If you can bear to hear the truth you’ve spoken     Twisted by knaves to make a trap for fools, Or watch the things you gave your life to, broken,     And stoop and build ’em up with worn-out...