And off you go…

 Bidding farewell to a year filled with heartbreak, a year that saw me on my knees, bent and broken - but also a year that saw me at my strongest as I learn to pick up the broken pieces of my heart and try to make the best out of this life I have been given, a year that made me realise I can behave with dignity in the face of my worst nightmare. To a stronger and kinder me….

The end…

 On a winter afternoon, after more than two decades, our story ended with two signatures. I did not shed a tear but did I detect a tremble in my fingers as I signed the document that would seal our fates? It felt surreal…

Afterwards, we went for a cup of tea and a plate of pakora thongba and we sat and talked about this and that and spent maybe the last half an hour of our lives that we will ever spend together.

As I looked at him, I realised I do not hold any grudge - I just want him to be happy. I guess that is what they call love. Memories are all I will have of him. 

As I rode away in an auto (I don’t know why I love this mode of transport), with the winter breeze blowing my straw like hair (I have no idea what I am writing), I sighed and swallowed a tear…

ckyn…..

Off with her hair

 And to commemorate one month of my world turning upside down, i went and got my hair chopped off yesterday. Not as short as i wanted as the stylist said it would look not good - and i decided to listen to someone who knows his trade, for once in my life. It did turn out good, better than i had expected. Since there is no one else there to admire it, i might as well admire it! For the longest time ever, he used to cut my hair for me…and colour it..i was thinking how does a relationship go from eating together from the same plate to this…stop it already..there is no point beating myself up over things i cannot change..so…

Planning a short break during the long weekend. So much hassle what with the covid test and travel insurance and app to download, but i think i just want a day without worrying what i need to cook for dinner or cleaning up. i just need to curl up somewhere with a book and generally laze around like a fat hog.

Of dreams and pain

 The waking hours are much better. But, in the middle of the night, when i suddenly wake up from a dream when we were together and the knowledge that we are not together anymore hits me again, it is like going through it all over again because i am not fully awake to have the armor of logic to protect me…am i even making sense?

I finally got the appointment to chop off my hair. One less thing to weigh me down - i have enough baggage i carry around as it is…

I told my colleague/friend who insisted on talking to me -in spite of me screaming bloody no - what a persistent haramzada he was. I guess they are worried about me - and i know they are doing it because they care but i just don’t want to interact with anyone. i know i should call myself lucky that the few people i call friends will have my back…

How long does one give oneself the luxury to grieve? How long does it take for the pain to fade? How long will it take for the scabs to form on these wounds? 

..

 It seems to be a case of one step upwards and two downwards sometimes. It seems all sunny one moment and the next i feel like i have stepped into a cave of misery. I guess this is expected - i would have to be exceptionally resilient if i came out of this without some scars to show…

Went to the library - lugged home many books. Sometimes, all you need is the written words to lure you away from the darkness, if only for a while. 

i will go get my hair lopped off the coming week- want it extra short just for the heck of it…

By a stroke of luck, the elf’s weekend extra-curricular activities lined up perfectly with the kick boxing class i have been eyeing for years now. So hopefully, i can start kicking some asses..

I desperately want to travel- just want to go to some far flung place, lie with the sun on my back and just read and doze off…

I continue to refuse to talk to people at work - K wanted to know if it was my ‘mon’ or my ‘shorir’ that was off and i told him both. i am on my way to becoming the most anti-social creature this side of the planet, if i am not there already…

And i had almost forgotten how much i enjoy writing- just gathering all my irrelevant/irreverent thoughts, thoughts that make no sense sometimes, even to myself…

And i was thinking that after a long, long time, i feel free, not answerable to anyone/anything…not having to justify my actions/words to anyone except myself…and how togetherness is over-rated..and what i am saying smacks of sour grapes…   

The upward crawl begins…

 And so on a Wednesday morning, i brushed away the cobwebs in my head and logged in to work…not that anyone seems to have missed me much - just what was needed for an already bruised ego…

After trying to remember the 1001 passwords needed to log in to god knows what applications, weeding mails and tossing them unread into some obscure folders, i settled down to sulk with the laptop in front. It is a good thing we are still working from home because i have zero desire to see anyone or have anyone see me…C called me up - i guess she wanted to cheer me up- but i did not pick up and messaged her i did not want to talk. The rate i am going, i think i will lose the minuscule number of people i call friends.

I did manage to get some work done and logged off at an indecently early hour to sulk some more and plug the emptiness inside me with some raspberry filled biscuits from Ikea washed down with green tea…such is my life…

And i watched videos on Sahara desert and Antarctica (such is the state of my brain that i had to look up the spelling)…and thought how brave some people are..and why people  like me should not dream because all i do is dream and not see it through…i am a hypocrite and a gutless bitch- not a nice combination…

I have enough fabric in my closet to protect the modesty of 20045 Draupadis if i were Krishna - i should seriously start sewing and using them up but i cannot get myself to turn on the sewing machine…

It is raining as i type this - i love the rain, i love (and hate) how it reminds me of days gone by..i want to go walk in the rain, feel the tears mingle with the rain drops…do you think each one of us is assigned a finite amount of tears? I would like to think i am nearing the end of my quota of tears. I would like to reserve some for the day i die - if nobody cries for me when i fade away (which makes me sound like a star), i might as well cry for myself…i have no idea what junk i am writing…

Of thoughts and more thoughts…

i have decided to use my bad cold as an excuse to spend another day in bed, cavorting with my thoughts, books and some tears…i think i deserve at least some days where i can grieve in peace for what i thought i had for life, never mind if it was just an illusion.

There is something to say about the luxury of just just letting yourself slide to the bottom of the grief valley/bucket/whatever…just to let the thoughts run wild in your head of why/how things came to this, knowing so well nothing matters now. It is like watching something you built burn to the ground - you cannot stop watching even though it pains you…i am waiting for the flames to consume everything, for the embers to die so i can sweep the ashes away and maybe plant some cacti on that plot..yes, i am going crazy…

i know i need to get back to work but i don’t have the energy to do anything except the bare needful so the elf can survive and he does not see me in this state. i don’t know how i spent the last three weeks so cheerful - it is like i locked away these monsters and how that i am all alone with no one to keep a tab on me, they have broken their chains and out to run amok in my head…

i know i need to get a grip on it - i am not the first person on this planet whose heart has been broken nor will i be the last. But i am just giving myself the luxury of wallowing in this mucky tear soaked bottomless pit - it is nice to know this is the lowest point of my life so far, knowing that someone i trusted my life with could so casually toss me aside. But then maybe, i did not mean anything to him so maybe the fault is how i perceived this whole relationship. So yes, lets all heap the blame on this stupid bitch that i am…

Wow, that was bitter, even for me..maybe i just need to let it all out, write down everything i feel - that would be good fodder to smile at when i revisit maybe in a year or 10 or however long it is supposed to take to gather the pieces of a life you thought you had…

I will take the first step tomorrow, rejoin work and maybe start my slow crawl up from the bottom…is this why people drink to forget? Let me go drown my sorrow in pomegranate juice and waatin - and maybe order something and stuff my face. Yes, finally, it looks like i am grieving…my way…now, let me grieve in style…

Alone…

 For the first time since the drama unfolded, i am alone - without the need to appear cheerful. And maybe now, the real emotions will surface. Or maybe i have stopped caring. I have a bad cold i brought back with me so using that as an excuse to lie in bed, marinating with my thoughts.

Maybe i just need to take long, deep breaths and listen to some heartbreak songs, cry some buckets of tears and close this chapter and move on. If i was really honest with myself, maybe i would admit to myself that this is for the best. Left on my own, i would not have ever had the guts to cut the strings, scared i would bleed. So maybe he did me a favour.

So maybe it is time to dust the dust off my dreams that i had packed away, thinking i would never see them again -the dreams i forsook because i thought he was worth more than all the dreams i could dream of. The road ahead will be rough for sure. But then, nobody said life was going to be easy. 

So maybe i will chop off my tresses, colour it pink or mauve or whatever, maybe i will take up kickboxing and kick the shit out of life……maybe i will start drinking…maybe i will pack the bags and move away to someplace forsaken…

Or maybe i will just lie in bed and alternate between dreaming and shedding tears…so many possibilities, so many ways this could end but only one me.

 And some nights i wake up thinking everything is still the same until i realise that nothing will be the same again…

And i continue spouting inanities…and i sew away my pain…

Of love and respect

 Is it possible for love to survive without respect? If you lose all your respect for someone, does it mean you have stopped loving that person? Is disgust the same as anger? If someone’s action disgusts you, does it strangle love? 

Phoenix

If someone had told me before that i would be going through what life has thrown at me now, i would have thought i would burn and spew venom. But i find myself thinking i just would not grieve or get bitter just because someone broke my heart.

I have always thought that whatever happens, happens for the best. I have no God to turn to or faith to seek solace in. But i have myself and the knowledge/arrogance that i can weather any storm i find myself in. That this would be my trial by fire and i would rise from the ashes like the phoenix. 

So life, here i am. Throw at me what you will. Break my heart into pieces. I will rise one day, i will smile again and mean it. I will see my dreams emerge from the cocoon. You cannot break me. If my love was not enough, so be it. 

And so it ends…

 On a cloudy Monday morning, two people who took vows to be with each other for life signed a piece of paper that would bring them nearer to the end of the road. 

And we sipped tea and ate kelichana afterwards in ‘celebration’. It drizzled a bit as if our love, or whatever it was between us, cried. I would like to think we parted as friends. I would like to think we would always be there for each other no matter what paper we signed on.

‘I thought when my love for you died 

I would die

It is dead

Alone, most strangely, I live on’

 ‘Tum itna jo muskura rahe ho

Kya gam he jisko chupa rahe ho’

In the light of the day

i hide away my tears

And put on my mask of gaiety

In the silence of the night

When the mask comes off

My tears keep me company

And just like that..

 I have no idea what the title means…i have been scrubbing toilet bowls, floors, clothes, utensils— anything that can be scrubbed to scrub away some of the hurt. There is something therapeutic about manual labour…

And i revisit the different philosophies i used to love. I think what has helped me through this difficult time is knowing that i do not have to react the way i am expected to react. Maybe that is the rebel in me…whatever it is, i hope to find some solace in the fact that he is happy, that he has gotten what he wanted and knowing that, one day, i will be able to look back at this and think i have handled it with grace (obviously, since i so lack in grace, the one time i have shown a trace of grace, i need to harp on it so that no one misses this!).

Life is life- it goes on even when you cry yourself to sleep, or act overtly cheerful so my dear ones would not see my pain. Every now and then, i escape to some corner so i can paint on my mask of cheerfulness. But i like to believe that whatever has happened, it is for the best. I did not have the courage to let go- but he did. I do not need to paint myself as the victim or him as the villain. 

Morality

 I was trying to understand why my lack of anger was getting to me. I think it is because somewhere in my mind, i equate the lack of anger as condoning what he has done. But i do not condone it - on my moral compass, i find it repulsive. I would have thought the fact that i find it repulsive would make me angry. And in my head, i found myself judging him.

But as the thoughts swirled around, i found myself asking what is morality? Should i judge everyone by my moral compass or judge only my own actions? If i judge him by my moral compass, doesn’t it mean i am foisting my sense of morality on him? Maybe what is repulsive to me is justifiable on his moral compass? What do i get by judging his actions just because it hurt and repulsed me? The same deed when weighed on different moral scales would register different weights in terms of right and wrong. 

In the overall scheme of life, how does all this matter? Just because he chose to do something that i have never, even in my wildest dreams, thought he could do, should i condemn his character? Yes, i feel sad that he did not turn out to be the person i thought he was - but then, is it his fault if i thought him to be something he was not? If his love for me was not enough to have stopped him, is that my problem or his?

There is nothing like old fashioned heartbreak like this to turn one into a pseudo philosopher. 

Love or something like it

 Love. One word around which revolves so much joy and pain. When the one you love slams the door on your face, does your love shatter? Is love so ephemeral? Does love rely on it being reciprocated to thrive? Why cannot love be just by itself? Why does it have to be give and take?

I cannot find it in me to loathe him. I know there can never be that connection with him again. But i know i want him to be happy, i want to see him smile…and i think to myself, maybe that is what love is, this desire to protect him from any hurt, this desire to see a smile on his lips even if it is at the expense of my tears.

My hurt is my own. It does not have to take away from the love i feel for him, despite everything that has happened. And that is that…

It is what it is

When a heart breaks, is it the end of the world? When your world shatters without prior notice (as if the universe would care enough to warn you), do you give yourself time to curl up and marinate in your tears or do you shrug off the pain and crawl forward?

I have been gobbling articles on stoicism - like a drowning person clutching at something to keep afloat. The philosophy resonates with me - the beauty of knowing that there are some things beyond our control and what we can control is how we react to those things. It hurts but it is what it is. The world still goes on, i still need to pee (what??), still need to eat…

Understanding that nothing is permanent in life, that all things good or bad will come to an end, this pain i am struggling with right now will fade into a dull ache and then into nothingness. 

I am also struggling with my lack of anger…would it have helped if i was angry at him? Would the fire of anger burn the pain - just like you would burn down the stubble before you plant again? Or have i realised the truth that it just is not worth it. I cannot control what someone says or does. I can only control what i can do or not do.

It is difficult coming to terms with the end of something that i thought was for keeps. Maybe that is the mistake we all make - of thinking that things/relationships are permanent. What is here today might be gone tomorrow. 

Sometimes, this calm inside me scares me because this is not how i thought i would have reacted if someone pulled the rug from under my feet. I keep thinking -am i in shock, when would the reactions kick in, when would the bitterness seep in, when would anger raise its head and sting me. 

Am i hurt? Oh yes…Does it pain? Oh, it does. But inside me, i know i will heal, that i will forgive him and myself and move on to do the things i was meant to do…

I don’t know if i am making any sense, even to myself. Right now, i just wish to close my eyes, open them and find i am sitting there under the skies on the dunes of the Sahara, drinking in the beauty of the stars, preferably all alone. 

They say the best revenge is living well. But revenge has such a negative connotation. Why would i want to avenge myself? But yes, i want to be able to live well. I want to be wise enough to use this as a learning and become a better person. God knows i have made mistakes galore and maybe what happened is the manifestation of all the mistakes i/we made. But i want to be able to forgive myself for all the times i have hurt him, i want to be able to forgive him for all the times i let him hurt me.  

This too shall pass…

Am i supposed to be angry? I am confused by my complete lack of anger - i keep waiting for it to strike. Am i in denial? No, i am not. Am i in shock? Maybe i am…

But is it possible that i have chosen the moral high ground, that i am being stoic? I have no control over what someone says or does. I have no control over what has happened. But i do have control over how i react, over my actions. Am i hurt? Oh yes, i am. Do i want to hurt back? No, i don’t. I do not see the wisdom in it. 

Love - this thing over which thousand and one poems have been written, films made, lives destroyed, lives redeemed. What is it? When i say i love someone, do i mean i love that person only if he/she loves me back? What if love is simply wanting the best for the one you love? It should not matter whether he is happy with someone else, as long as he is happy. Am i being too cheesy? But that is what i feel right now. I do not want to hurt back, i do not want to fling accusations…i refuse to paint myself as a victim. 

I have always been so hot-headed, ready to hurt back when hurt. Maybe this is the one lesson in life that this relationship has left me - that i can always be a better version of myself.

I forgive myself, i forgive him - we loved and we hurt each other. When it is time to part, i want to do that with a smile. 

I know i have to grieve over this, to bury it with the dignity it deserves, wipe off my tears and pick up the pieces. Sometimes, a broken thing does not have to be ugly. Life is what we make of it. Maybe it will take time…but get up, i will. One day….

The beginning of the end

i read somewhere that you never know how you are really going to react until you are really in the situation. A bomb was dropped on me today - even in my worst nightmare, i had never imagined something like this would happen. It felt like something was ripped out of me - i don't know whether i am still in shock and how i am reacting is really how i am feeling. But i did read somewhere that when you are under the greatest strain, what comes out of you is what you are really made of. It is the beginning of the end of something i thought would last forever. But forever is i guess a long time. i guess if you really love someone, you want them to be happy - with or without you. And maybe that is all that counts. i would have liked some warning at least of the storm to come so i could have prepared myself.But maybe sometimes, what you need is to see yourself when you are least prepared. So that you know what you experience, how you react is the whole raw truth. i am scared, i feel numb. i feel like i have no idea what is going on. But, in all the numbness, what i feel is some sort of calm. Life goes on, it has to. Sometimes, things are not meant to be. Sometimes, when shit happens, all you need to do is not let the stink get to you. i hope for strength to be able to carry on, to forgive, to be able to be happy for him. This is the begininng of the end - and the end of a chapter. i choose to close with grace and dignity.