I want to tell you about 3:36 AM, my
customary – my signature clock read. The house and the world outside the
window, hum with quiet.
I want to tell you about the nostalgia
that shrouds you at this hour from your first memory to random office
conversations to beer-soaked evenings with best friends to all the random quiet
corners of your life.
I want to tell you about this morning,
I woke up to the moon playing a peek-a-boo with the tall buildings – like wisp
of a presence – letting the ambers of street take over, with a grace of someone
who was here when it all began and will be here when it’s all over.
Insomnia teaches you things, you would
other wise perhaps miss – the way the streets play host to teeming automobiles
and humans of various shapes and stature with same equanimity and stands firm
in solitude, the way the sky changes from dark to bright, the way the world
begins to swell then with the sounds of birds, the way the water lapping up the
harbour front turns from ghostly to benign; the way mystery turns to magic to
mundane.
We moved this May. It was a silent
brewing storm in more ways than one.
We moved to an apartment with wall-to-wall glass windows, apartment less than half the size of our old home. Where quiet is complete. It took us a while to create home – we are still putting our lives back together. Lived-in beige cream couches, white TV console – courtesy Ikea; photo-memo holders, fairy lights, throw pillows, the cute kitchen dotted with cuter doll-house appliances and Lego strewn living room carpet.
Nirvaan is on the cusp of the tween he
is becoming and kid he is. I know this move is good for him – yet there are
times – the quintessential parental second-guessing chides. The subtle
negotiating of his emotional terrain whilst keeping my natural reticence in
check – takes all, some days and then the showering of kisses and the run and
tackle whooping “Mumma HUGGGG!” more than makes up for every single moment of
privation of the last decade – not just this move.
We went grocery shopping and played at
the park in the evening. We had fruits and veggies for dinner. We
have plans to sleep-in and then go to the pool tomorrow.
I hold my breath. And soak in every
moment. Alive to each one of them. My time is flying – as it’s wont to do – at
this space and speed. Being grateful for pocketful of seconds, I have been
granted this time around.
At nights I still get to envelope his
9-year-old small boy fragrant frame, in my warmth; whilst missing the warmth
where I could fold myself up like a bird.
It was so incredible and scary and
amazing to start, and start again. Becoming too precious about things. To
question everything. To commit to something. To love. To fight because you are
scared. To find meaning in the scare. To find the right lines, the right tone
and colour of moods.
I have faith in the process of making
this life work, is showing up, resilience, to inhale the bittersweet of moments
and say “I can do this like a rockstar!”
And for the nth time I think – there’s
nothing in the world I would trade my life for.
This is the life I want. A few more
steps...
Copyright © Neerja Yadav