Something out of nothing.
It was just wet mud. Lying there in the midst of grass one could have missed it. One could have stepped in it by mistake and then removed their foot with a loud ‘eeeks.’ But we decided to make it the cause for exhilaration. It all began with the boys playing some harmless football in the rains. They were wet, muddy and looked so happy. After the game they began to fling mud on each other and gradually everyone caught on. There was just no looking back. Or front. Or right or left. There was mud all around. Hair, new white clothes, face everything was caked brown and we knew experientially that looking, behaving and smelling like a pig can be a lot of fun. It was only mud- and yet it became the means for several twenty, thirty, forty and even fifty year olds to find that child within.
A plain looking Amla tree. One could have easily missed it. But it caught my elder sister Nidhi’s eyes and through her pink framed glasses-her huge eyes began to shine like diamonds. My cousins caught the sparkle and gradually so did I. The entire family had gone for a trip to Khandala and just outside our family home stood this big Amla tree. All of us cousins, aged between ten and twenty five, ran inside the house- brought a bed sheet and stood under the Amla tree. The tiniest one was immediately made in to the monkey and he climbed over the tree and gently shook the branches. All of heaven broke free. Tiny yellow green amlas fell here, fell there and we ran with our bed sheet trying to catch all of them. It was as if tiny drops were falling from heaven and we didn’t want to miss even a tiny divine piece. We all were laughing and yelling so loudly that eventually several of our neighbors, unknown to us- but looking for neighborly borrowing- came and joined in the fun and took handful of amlas back for their families. All in all, it was one of the most beautiful afternoons I had ever experienced. And to think, it was only an Amla tree.
It was only a dosa. I barely knew her and she looked skeptical when I invited her to have some of my mom’s golden crispy dosas with melting butter on top. She lived in the building next to mine, she went to the same school as me, we were in the same class for seven years and yet we barely knew each other. She was the class brain and I, the class clown. We both looked at each other with our noses up in the air and yet something, some sadness, some worry in her eyes made me invite her home. Over dosas we spoke. And spoke. And spoke. I couldn’t believe how much we had in common. A few questions led her to tell me all the problems she was going through and since I didn’t have too many solutions I just hugged her and held her hand. Today, it’s been a few years and we are best friends, constantly bringing out good in each other. It could have been over with the last few bites of dosas- but a beautiful relationship began over it…
I wrote my first few words in the first standard. No, not in school, not with the insistence of the teacher who constantly complained to my mother that I would never learn to write. My father was going to America and he asked me if I wanted anything. He had obviously underestimated his younger daughter who promptly picked up a pencil and wrote a nice long list of all that she wanted- teddy bears, squeaky shoes, bridal Barbie, snowflakes, chocolate ice- cream et all included. After that I constantly wrote, not in school, but whenever I felt my sister had been mean to me, when I felt over emotional about my parents love and care towards me and whenever I felt too happy or too sad. At that time, they were just words. Black formations on white paper- and though the emotions meant a lot to me, the words were nothing. And today as a writer, my career, my dreams, and the very expression of who I am is based on words. Nothing has become something, again.
I have come to realize there is nothing only if I am unable to find something within it. If mud can become fun, amla the reason for one of the happiest moments of my life, dosa a means to find a close friend and words, from being nothing to becoming everything then there must be a something hiding in every nothing.
A day in itself will just be a day, a nothing in the larger context of my life, but I can make it in to a turning point in my life. A moment in itself is a tiny nothing and yet I can re-create it, transform it into the most memorable one of my life. A sunset with a loved one can either be another evening of my life or become a memory of a lifetime. There are enough nothings all around- but with a little awareness, a little thought and of course, a little love – the nothing can become something and maybe even everything to us. Hey, I just had an idea- an idea about writing a book- it’s probably nothing- but I am going and working on it nonetheless, what if it does happen to become something?
#itsawowlife 