L’s Letter on my birthday (2007)

5th August, 2007

Dearest K,
I have thought of a million ways to start this letter and each time, I had to dig out some words unrepeated in our accounts over the years we have corresponded and told each other about everything. But I know no matter how much I tend to confront the presence of your good self in my life, I seem not to be convinced with the perfect words to choose. Anyways.

You know, as such days approach and I like to look back and wish to see those two naughty girls walking lost on the platform of Bangalore station, the same two girls playing water at Mysore, the same souls traveling to Calicut in a bus full of men, two perplexed creatures boiling with seamless tears at Chennai Central Station and many more to account for. I feel funny, I feel good, I feel weird and I feel stupid. But above all, I feel simply thrilled to have met a person who knew exactly how to read my heart. K, you still occupy that same status in my heart. I find it hard to replace, more because no one has even been so good to me like the way you were/are.

The other day, I was just trying to accept we are now two different people trying to make two different worlds. I know this you may not accept easily but then dear, we need to be practical and realistic. I understand we still stand as we were except for few changes here and there which may/mayn’t be evident. Yet the harder truth remains that gone are the days of sheer fun and joy, carelessness and I-don’t-care life. Gone, they are gone.

In all these rummaging thoughts, I always find myself smiling at the fact that my life has been tremendously happier because of a friend like you. I owe you not one but many thanks. You were truly one soul K, one soul who would show me the stars in the darkness, that silver lining on the clouds, that drop of unfallen dew on a leaflet.

Friends walk in for a reason and remain for many more reasons. I can completely agree you came in to teach me all the beauties of life. It’s even amazing that some can make more differences than the rest and you for one truly do irrespective of who or where.
I would not wish to see you changed, you are good enough already. By and by, may be I could afford to see you grow more matured with time, more responsible and further happier. Remember what we believe: Happiness is a matter of choice, not a matter of chance. Make your choice. Live it. That is happiness, that is life.

I know now that you have entered a life of responsibilities and me too, we are threading on almost different paths. But this doesn’t really encourage me to believe we won’t be there when we need each other. I may be selfish, excuse me but then I can’t help counting on you when I need someone to tell me, ‘Hey L, you can do it!’ K, you make a difference.

So, as this beautiful day dawns on you, I’m wishing you all the best of everything you can hope for. I pray your year passes with so much goodness that you won’t realize the difference of tears and joy but will also pervade the same all around.

I would have loved to hand over the same to you if I had not gone out of station. Anyways, you know I would have done it!

You keep praying for the world. We will pray together as we always have been doing.
Will miss you more on the day.

HAPPY BIRTHDAY!!!!

L

PS: When I write to you, I feel the whole dictionary of vocabulary needs to be rephrased to convey the right message. You understand it right?

Un-fallen Dewdrops on the Leaf

This is an article I wrote on nopkin.com after I received the above letter from L on 9th August, 2007

L had left a gift and a letter with Karma (my husband) last evening. I called her earlier but she didn’t hint me of anything. It brought me immense joy - not because she has taken pain to give me a present but because we have still kept this custom of ours alive. I remember how we both love writing and how we wrote thousands of letters when we were in first year. We always had around four or five letters to post...we even came to be friends with that woman at the post office. We always had something to write to our friends and that relieved us of our sorrows. Grief-stricken, we still found joy in the small ways of finding joy in writing down our thoughts in our journals.

It is impossible for me to forget those days. We might have come across differences but we always had a way to solve it. I remember how often I wilted my mind in front of those complicated subjects – and she was always ready to help me. There were those girls who lived in the same flat who got shit-worried that I might flunk. And they thought I was a careless girl who didn’t know my responsibility. I had my responsibility engraved in my mind, just that I thought I didn’t have to give my life for it. What is the use if you have to struggle and find no joy in your life? But here we are today: grown up and more matured. I feel good sometimes to think that we always live forward and learn. I also feel good that there are times when we can go backward in time and catch those moments back to give us joy. No matter how hard the times, there was always something we could look forward to, and it was our hope that we could really walk out the door one day as independent women. I remember how we ardently read Dr. Schuler’s books and opened our eyes in dealing with people and in being positive in life.

In life we come across such people who can remain a life-long friend and they are the un-fallen dewdrops on the leaf - the dewdrops that don’t dry at the mercy of the morning sunrays.

L wrote, “Remember what we believe: Happiness is a matter of choice, not a matter of chance.” And yes, happiness is a matter of choice. Wouldn’t you be sitting at the porch with a smile, looking at the sunset, if you have made it your choice? Take your chance and make it your choice.