An Inside view.

I turn a year older soon. When you are a carefree kid and you see these folks running around always seeming busy, how they have to get to work on time; you can’t wait to know how it feels like to be one of them. But hate to accept that you will outgrow your fav. pair of jeans before you realize.

When I was 16, I was gawky, wore sneakers with baggy pants, didn’t own a pair of black heels ( what’s the point? I’d fall flat if I did try to walk in them!). Had a knapsack that continues to remain loyal n hasn torn or given away the zippers, didn’t care about my outta control wavy hair, went to the libraray n made notes with dfferent colored pens in a neat writing after searching the shelves for a new book to read, had doubts which were always answered with a li’l twitch of the head, didn’t see the logic behind math, dreamt of being a war correspondent on tv, read every book I could lay my hands on, stole some of those restricted reads from my sis’ cupboard, didn’t have a crush on anyone I knew- alas can’t count Milind Soman, Rahul Bose, George Clooney and Rahul Khanna as men I know! The last straw came with the doc telling me that m short sighted n need to wear glasses! I got used to them quite quickly though, despite all the cursing under my breathe that I had to wear them!

I sometimes see that teen now, while im waiting for a signal to turn green, when I drift away staring at nothing with a hot beverage, when I happen to flip through some old pictures. I see that smile that didn’t have a reason behind it, I see those eyes with a thousand dreams. I wonder what happened of her?

I want to talk to her and maybe show her who she is today. She’s a young woman who remained the same, who also changed. It’s always the same story, it’s also a different one. She no longer goes to college, but loves her books with the same passion. She wears those black heels sometimes but God knows wishes she could damn well wear her sneakers with that new clingy top. She has bags in beautiful colors that she adores but that knapsack remains an o’l favourite. She doesn’t bring pen to paper often, but types her mails to friends in different colors with italics! She can go ahead and buy that book straight off the shelf from Crossword but takes guilty pleasure in reading Calvin n Hobbes and short stories while ‘browsing’ thru the store. She has lenses she paid for herself but is reminded she cant do without her red framed glasses when she’s stuck in downpour. She knows the men she has crushes on, she will still smile when news of Milind Soman dumping his latest find is printed by the scribes. It’s always the same story, it’s also a different one.

I also want to tell that gawky teen this: The young woman today is independent, a dreamer still but with will enough to realize those dreams. She’s drawn to making her destiny with a commitment to herself that is devoid of any lie. She’s met some amazing people, some people who weren’t so great, some intelligent freaks, some dim wit geeks, made friends for life. She’s laughed till her tummy hurt, cried till those eyes were swollen like a toad’s. She’s had her share of success, her share of pitfalls that stripped her off the confidence she so swore she had. Took some radical decisions, some that left a lot to be said. She made new friends, never forgot the ones that stood by her. She still thinks her dad is next only to God. She didn’t become all that she envisioned herself to be, she did things she wouldn’t have even dared to see. She no longer wishes to change the world. She has one of her own which she walks tall in with family and friends she holds close.

I want to tell her that growing up wasn’t as scary as she feared and was every bit as exciting as she had hoped. Whenever she’s ready to walk across to the world of grown ups, I want to tell her, that I will be there, to hold her hand. Together we shall wade through time and live our lives without those tinted rosy shades. We shall glide to a place so fine, where rainbows end and joy shall be mine!

Redemption

“ Consider them both, the sea and the land; and do you not find a strange analogy to something in yourself? For as this apalling ocean surrounds the verdant land, so in the soul of man there lies one insular Tahiti, full of peace and joy, but encompassed by all the horrors of the half known life. God keep thee! Push not off from that isle, thou canst never return.”

- Herma Melville, Moby Dick.

Moby Dick was one complex book. If I read it now perhaps, it would give me a whole new meaning I did not quite see earlier. Isn’t that how quiet life is as well? Each time, there’s a reason to rejoice, every moment of despair, of success and failure, of laughter and unexplained anxiety, of tears and fears; life does not wait and watch..it moves on and you just have to traverse along.

Hope is a very good thing and goodness never dies. That scene from ‘Shawshank Redemption’ will always play in my head. While I’m sitting at home on a break from work, my mind is cluttered with a million thoughts. One of which forced me to give it words. I believe in my principles. They haven’t been rewarding always but then these are things I trust in which are not dependent on what they give me in return. I may never be as strong as Howard Roark of ‘Fountainhead’ whose integrity was as unyileding as granite. I have my fears, I worry a lot and am pessimistic about certain things. But I also am fiercely independent and will not change my core beliefs no matter how I’m told to otherwise by the wise world.

Don’t let anyone take the music away your head, your heart. Its yours and no one can destroy it. There’s an island of my dreams, my hopes and my believes. No horrors can steal it from me if I hold on to it. I have questioned others luck and my misfortunes with it. I, like the normal person, gave up, spitting at my own fate and damning existence; that requires a breakdown of principles. Some give up at the first touch of pressure, some sell out, lose their fire, never realizing how and when they lost it. Then all of it vanishes in the vast swamp of society which tells them that maturity is abandoning the emotions of the heart; security; practicality and keeping your eyes and ears open to new ways of clawing your way up the ladder. Yet, a few hold on, knowing that the fire in you is not to be betrayed for the sake of fitting in with the more successful world. They will cry their eyes out at the bubble of dreams that burst. They will learn to give their hopes a shape, a purpose. It does not matter that only a few will learn to respect the voice from within which refuses to join the mad chorus outside- and the rest will betray it, shut it as the voice of the weak hearted. It is those few that move the world and give life its new meaning. I am a normal girl, who always did her homework on time, who rarely got caught doing mischief, who listened to her folks breathe down the neck sometimes and still never forgot to respect them. My journey is far from those happily ever after tales. I don’t know whether it would ever account for. But this I know, that no matter how many times life gives me a tough ride with new faces or ordeals, I will just have to keep my hope alive. I will redeem, I will be free of my fears. Every man has just one destiny. Each time I break, I just have to keep telling myself that. My dad didn’t name me after talent for nothing. I have a destiny, a hope as unflinching as my trust in God. A core which no one can steal. I will make my destiny and my peace- sooner or later. I will remain those few who may be rediculed for holding on tight to their hopes and their dreams. I am willing to not discuss my luck or the lack of it but work hard to not give up on what is my right- my right to happiness. That will remain mine, just beneath my wings of hope!

I may remain conflicted with the world that defines the success and failure of another, but at complete peace with myself.