The Ecstasy of Letter Writing + A Letter Was Received (Poems)

With the letters that I wrote 

I put heartfelt words in a quote 

Dear friends & family, near & dear

I hope these letters bring you good cheer

From stickers & cut-outs of magazines

I create art with ribbons in between

Folding it, I place it in an envelope,

Wishing this also helps you'll cope

I think of the journey this letter will take

Perhaps across streets, vehicles, seas & lakes

I scribble on the addresses

And forget all of my stresses

Finally, the stamp I then place

Thinking of the smile on your face

I take a long walk to the post office

Handing the letters, I am so glad that I'm delirious

Post Script: 

This was a unforeseen surprise I got few hours after I published and shared my initial poem. 

This poem written by one of my good friends, Rishabh Jaiswal, was inspired by the above poem that I wrote. These two poems are like two sides of a coin, in the way it highlights perspectives of the letter writer and the letter receiver, which I found so profound that I just needed to publish this as well. Like a sequel to my poem.

Following is the poem he wrote back to me: 

"A Letter was received"

By Rishabh Jaiswal

I received a letter, a friend wrote to me

And the words in it sent me in a state of glee

I had many things to do, but I didn't pay them heed

I left everything aside just to give it a read

O! the magic in her words, nothing could be better

The letter she wrote to me is about writing a letter.

Adulting: Playing the part

    Since a young age, we would look up to adults with sheer wonder sparkling in our eyes. It seemed like such a beautiful perfect world. We all wanted to grow up quickly because of the envy we felt, over how adults could choose and live life the way they wanted. 

    So we fast tracked on every superficial characteristic on what it means to look like an adult. We see it everywhere in our society...the make-up, the clothes, the alcohol and other "adult things". 

    Can you blame an innocent child into believing this was what it meant to be, to be an adult? We don't know any better. Maybe it's time society taught us better.

    When I turned 18...I didn't feel any different. The world treated me a little differently in legal situations...but for the most part, I was still treated like a child. Soon, I'll turn 21, and I doubt it'll make me feel any different as well.

What's the right way of feeling on birthdays anyway?

    Lately, I and my classmates have been busy studying, looking for college courses, scholarships, internships and jobs to apply after our graduation. At every step there's so many more routes we can take, that it becomes confusing to decide which one will be the right decision for us.

    I had the habit of over-planning when I was still in school. Then in High school, I realized, it made me an anxious wreck, so I started planning only for the very next step. It was a good strategy that I followed, until now. 

    I'm back to over-planning out of necessity.

    

    I'm usually a lazy person...so that part of me just wants to keep with the way things are going, instead of trying something different that could be good for me. But I know and fear the reality, that all opportunities come along with anxiety and may pass me by…if I don't act within the specified time. After that, all I'll be left with, will be regrets.

    Turning into an adult wasn’t as dramatic or great as I once thought. However, there is a joy I feel, over finally growing up despite not achieving my dreams yet.

    Early Adulthood is a phase for me where I'm still trying to learn the ropes of life. Slowly transitioning from making my own decisions and bearing the consequences of those decisions. I'm failing at the life standards I set at a young age. But in time I've come to know that it’s OK if your dreams change due to the new information you have at hand. 

    Even if in 5 years, I'm not where I want to be. It's only because of the hurdles I faced; The hurdles of adulthood that no-one talked to us about while growing up. So, I guess I can't only be angry at myself, right? No-one warned me about the boredom of paperwork, anxiety of looking through courses, insecurities of job eligibility, unstable politics, unreasonable restrictions by parents, stereotyping by society, and so on.

    When I look back at the dreams of my childhood self, I know it was too romanticized and set in the imagination of a perfect world. I am happy I had the innocence and imagination of a perfect world back then, but it's time to wake up and play the part.

Dreaming of you

    A peculiar characteristic of a lot of my dreams is that I am often out of my body, looking at myself from afar. It's an out of body experience that I can't explain. Now that I put it in words, it almost seems to be, that my dreams have an imposter in my flesh, who's trying to steal my life. But it wasn't so. I felt and thought everything that was happening, I could just see it from the outside. 

    A lot of us imagine what we look like from the outside....I do too. But how we're seen by society isn't the topic of this article today...it's about how you see your own life. 

    I grew up seeing and imitating a lot of thing I saw in shows and movies. I tried to fit into characters I liked and thought were cool. (Are we all imposters? Or is this just the imposter syndrome?)

And one of these imitations as a kid, happened to be journaling. It started out on an incident of rejection but turned out to be something that helped me gain a great awareness of myself. It has been 9 years since I first started.

    It’s great to have a way to rediscover who you used to be in the past. I often come back to my old diaries whenever I go through identity crises, which, due to life-changing decisions and my questioning, happens often. It’s a way to peep into your past mind…it’s all the information about you that you can’t memorialize into photographs. Though I’ve heard of another method of using photos in diaries. (I also want try video diaries in the future.)

    When you begin writing all about your day, you begin to learn how to capture every nuance of your living experience and convert it into words. It isn’t that other people can’t feel as much as you do or live boring lives. It’s only that they don’t romanticize their lives the way I do.

    They don’t understand how romantically exhilarating it is, to read one’s old diary entries and feel the fondness of self-love swell in your heart. A certain pride from looking back and ruminating over life and thinking, “Her, I knew her, I was her, I am her.”

    Maybe this is how my strange dream viewing from afar began to conceptualize in my mind. I relive moments of my life by reading diaries and dreaming about them. (I also dream of the future and fictional stuff like any other person.)

         Sometimes I wonder if I could live like that, peering at myself from the outside….in romance of how much I’m in love with the person I’m becoming. Then I realize I’m already doing that, in a way, when I look at the life of the one I love. I capture every moment and keep it in my heart fondly.

I see and I like what I see.

The surprising message of "Cuties"

[Don't get me wrong, I agree the advertising campaign of this movie went horribly wrong and there might have been a better way to portray children dirty dancing without using actual minors. But this review considers the movie as a whole and not just detached fragments of it.]

    About a week ago I watched the media-controversial movie called, "The Cuties". This movie had attracted all kinds of hate and insults. I was well aware of everything as I watched a couple of videos, posts and news channel clippings of the movie. The hate was aimed at how bad the movie director was to make the minors wear sexy clothes and dirty dance. The movie was said to be a way people were abusing and sexualizing children. Then, I watched a video by "God is Grey" regarding the movie and I was like, "WOAH" as she said the movie was about conservative religion and growing up. The video she posted was mostly about the various themes of the movie, the hate it was getting, the intended message it was trying to send and that...I should watch the movie myself to form my own opinion on the movie. I was like, "Why didn't I think of this before? It's so obvious." 

    I thus began my own journey to watch the movie and forming my own opinion about it. I was very critical of it at first, but then the story began to engage me. 

    As the movie progressed I realized the biggest issue about the movie, wasn't the movie but the way it was advertised. The advertisement I saw in the opening week verses now, were two different advertising campaigns. An advertisement is supposed to be a realistic representation of the product. The advertisements before made me feel like the movie was all about young girls sexy dancing in short clothes...but the movie was so much more than that. No wonder the movie got so much hate, the reviews about the movie felt so believable...considering the advertisement campaigns. 

    I'll have to admit that the movie was hard to watch and it made it very uncomfortable, but not for the reasons you think so. The movie follows a girl, named Amy, in poverty trying to find who she wants to be when presented with two extremes, following her conservative religious family and the reckless rebellious dance group at school (the Cuties). It showed the pains of conservative religion on people and how difficult it was for Amy to make sense out of what was happening at home. It expressed how young growing children are so curious of the adult world and how much they romanticize the independence of adults. It showed the duality kids express in different situations...at one time, it's more convenient to use the "I'm just a child" card and at other times, it's more convenient to use the "I am an adult" card...this is a reflection of the confusion that goes on in kids' minds during this transitionary period where even adults treat them as kids or adults depending on what's more convenient for the adult in question. It revealed the holes and problems deeply rooted in our society in how badly we treat children's natural curiosity for the world around them, giving them little to no choice (that they feel the need to rebel) and how we don't explain things to kids because we don't think they'll understand. 

    And what about the dirty dancing? Well, since I'm not a pedophile and found it extremely uncomfortable to watch those scenes, I fast-forwarded it, unlike all the other reviewers, who only watched the movie to see & criticize those scenes. Like, c'mon! The dance scenes were only 10-15 minutes of the whole movie. 

    Personally, the movie made me feel a lot of things. I went to watch the movie with the intention to criticize it, but the story ended up being so relatable to me. I resonated to the main character and her struggles, though, on different levels. Growing up was tough for me too. I had health problems growing up that made no sense to me. The girl group I was in were also kind of rebellious and moody. I wasn't ever given a straight answer or explanation to the many questions I had. The internet was my solace as I spent so much time gaming away, "GoodGame Farmer" & other games....and seeing posts on Google+. I too greatly romanticized becoming an adult and the freedom to choose that would give me. I wanted to grow up quickly. I rebelled in ways and I did a lot of stupid things....I hurt a lot of people....the one person I most greatly grieve hurting was... myself. 

    Childhood and early teenage years are so confusing. The fact is, most of us didn't have supportive and accepting guides to help us on our journey. We were always silenced and pushed aside like children in the olden times, I guess nothing much has changed in that way. We were always underestimated and overlooked cause of our age....no wonder we wanted to grow up as soon as possible. Our society needs to celebrate the beautiful phase of childhood instead to pushing kids towards growing up prematurely. Society has failed to protect kids from having a happy childhood...so many children are born into extreme poverty, are harassed/molested/raped, are made to work for wages and are abused. Our society has failed to love our conflicting expanding minds as we begin to question the values and treatment we get. It has done a bad job at giving us a choice and a space to grow into mature young adults. 

    It really bothers me how badly this film was received by media. Children are being abused in reality by being pushed into sexy dancing and beauty pageants everyday. Kids' clothing at stores are made to imitate grown women's outfits instead of age-appropriate ones. Child YouTubers and other celebrities are growing up in the super critical limelight of the media. Child marriages and labor is being practiced as we speak. Those are horrible and don't get any media attention. But you're worried about the 10-15 minute video shots of minors dancing in a movie? Huh? 

These shots can be easily censored by blurring out or cutting it out from the movie without damaging the main story but what about these other problems? Is it easy to fix those problems?

    Childhood is about simplicity and innocence. It's about running around and not having any responsibilities. It's about exploring the new world around us. It's about asking questions of this new world. It's about laughing, crying and learning to express our emotions...and speaking our minds. It's about making mistakes and being given opportunities to learn to fix them & do the right thing. Because if we learn to live well, happy and balanced during our childhood, imagine what we will achieve as adults. Imagine that.

A friend for every trait

What a roller coaster ride my life has been with such a variety of people I call my friends! I’m pretty sure, you too can look back into the past and see the people who have been by your side when you needed them and the ones who didn't.

Whatever our experiences, shared or personal, we gradually understood the kind of bond we shared with those we called our friends.

I get it, friendships evolve as we do. Some end abruptly and some never seem to end.

I used to be the kind of girl that never understood how people would have friends they knew for around a decade. I thought they were lucky back then.

Now I’m not so sure I care anymore. I’m fulfilled with the way randomness gave me the friends I have or at least, did have at some point.

When I count the number of close friendships I have, I feel rich. This is the phrase I keep in mind when I see the variety and complexity of friendships I’m in....

A friend for every trait.

I like how I see myself reflected through my friends....they bring a whole new dimension to my interests and quirks.

I have friends with similarities in areas such as musical taste, germophobia, social anxiety, aesthetic, philosophical reasoning & logic, faith, aspirations, nerdiness, art style, introversion and so on. One friend can have more than one similarity...but what I really get excited about is when I make a friend who’s dissimilar to me...I see it as an opportunity to learn to see the world through another’s eyes....to see something different, to learn something different....it all excites me.

It took me a while to get to this point, but I no longer need to have people exactly like me in order to respect them....I don’t understand my friends all the time nor have all the same beliefs they do....but I know how to be respectful of their life. It’s so freeing. And it has opened a whole new world for me.

Friends leave sometimes....some, out of the blue, some, expected...some eventually....and some come back to you.

This is always a hurtful experience. Some close friends remain distant...and a void exists between us when we see each other. Another stinging experience is when you see someone who used to be close to you, and now isn’t a friend at all. And some friendships, never take root, they never happen.....even though you tried your best to make it work.

Strangely, some kinds of friendships come back in our lives, through other people. I found a friend who is like a friend I had lost in my life. And you feel the circle of life filling the gap that used to exist....maybe that kind of friendship was important in your life....and the universe felt it necessary to fill it. I felt this recently. I felt no more the regret of the friendship that I had lost.

In the friendship hierarchy, sometimes we find ourselves feeling something unusual...especially for a person like me....love, the romantic kind of friendship. Those friendships bring out the best and worst out of us...and we take every failure extremely personally. But eventually, if were brave enough to love again, we’ll find the right one.

Friends, through their love, teach us to love ourselves. Yes, it can be vice versa too. Self-love can teach you to be a better friend to others. It’s a crazy complicated web you’ll realize, when you try to discover yourself. I think who I am, keeps changing .....and so, I try my best to stay connected to my inner self....I think I’m worth befriending after all....do you consider yourself to be worthy of your friendship as well?

Stranger danger

Haven't you ever thought about how strange it is that we credit certain personal experiences to people and how we label those experiences by the person's name?

We could know a stranger through and through... But without their name... That knowledge still floats in the mind as "someone". Until that someone becomes a person whose name you know. We then feel that feeling of ease...like we know the person....cause we can now relate the knowledge and experience of that person with a name.

Just a name... How simple is that?
Just ask them their name.
Cause then we can credit the feelings we feel for that person with a name.
Most crushes begin this way and end this way.
Just a name.

Nothing more, nothing less.

The position of a stranger is really potent. They could be anyone in the future... They may have been anyone in the past. But in the present, they remain but a strange figure of existence.... Unknown.... Unrecognizable... A mystery.

Though I do sometimes find a familiar face in a stranger until I realise they are not who I thought them to be. Maybe their nose is a little more smaller... Maybe the clothes they wear is a little unusual... Maybe their voice is different.... But they remind me of someone I knew.

A certain someone like you.

It's really funny how for so many years, I had a person who I called a stranger for a multitude of reasons. I knew nothing but a name. A personality that was still a blank slate then, untouched by time and pains of living.... Now holds the scarring of life.
Most friends or classmates from childhood are like this... So unknown even when you had spent so much time with them in the past. They are unknown to you now.
Did I make you recall someone from your childhood?

But to be honest, the position of a stranger... The position of you being that stranger is dangerously exhilarating. The persons around you haven't formed an impression of you yet, so be who you want to be.... You have that liberty here.

That's why I sometimes feel like beginning again in another place... No known people around me... No known names... In a different city... It's like restarting a new life while you're still alive. A new chapter, no, a new book altogether.
But we'll always carry a little bit of our history into our present story no matter how hard we try... We'll never be a complete stranger to ourselves.

Marbles

She was sitting and staring at the outside world through her window. A pen in one hand, a notebook in the other. The soft salty wind was blowing. She was enjoying it thoroughly, though the pages of her book was empty. She was facing the sea. Imagining how close she was to it and it being full of life and mystery, thrilled her.

Then she recalled wanting to clean up and organize some of her belongings.
As she took boxes out, she found a box she loved dearly but always underestimated how much she did... It was a box full of marbles.

When she was smaller, she would play with them, making designs on the floor tiles. Mostly admiring it's beauty.

She did so that day as well, when she found it again. She admired the crystal domes once again. Time moved slowly around her. She lost track of it. She's a simple girl like that, gets amused with the simplest of things.
Then, she thought of a marvelous idea, she held a marble in front of the distant object in the sky, the sun. How could it not occur to her before? Could it be true?
Each of the marbles having an entire sea enclosed inside of it.

The hobby of Song-writing

I'm a girl of many hobbies. Most of which, remain dormant for years sometimes because I don't have enough time to do everything anymore. School days were cool like that cause I actually had the time.

Whenever I see evidence of my old hobbies, I sometimes get surprised by how cool I used to be. I mean, I still am. But maybe not as creative as I was back then. 
One particularly cool hobby I used to have was song-writing. It was my way of expressing really restless feelings. I'd feel relieved every time I wrote a song. It was like an accomplishment...like a certificate I wrote myself.

When I smaller, I used to listen to my favorite artists like Kesha, Flo Rida and Pitbull. But there was something very satisfying to me about playing my own songs on the guitar while I sang it. It didn't have the luxurious or hip background music, nor an experienced professional singer singing it. But it was very personal and that made it special. I knew the artist, I was the artist.

Even till date when I play my old songs, I feel younger pearl sitting beside me and listening to her masterpiece.

I mean, yes, we are the same person.
But our personalities and interests are so different.
The things I used to prioritize by writing songs about, now, I don't value anymore. It's not that I don't value those songs though.
It's a reminder that I've grown.

A little piece of the past, you know.

Sometimes I wonder if I should get it officially recorded in a studio. Try selling them. Share them with the world.
But some part of me just wants to keep it to myself.
Leave it like that... Personal. Mine and only mine.

I await the grand summer holidays right now to try and write songs again. Things and people I value right now. All for the future self that seeks to be reminded of who she was.

Booked

I've been told that I keep way too many personal books. And today when I stacked all of them up for this blog post, I see why.

I have 9 different books I keep for different purposes.
And today I shall share with you some of the formats and themes of these books.

So if you have an empty book lying somewhere in your house and you're feeling kind of creative, go ahead, make yourself a book. Or a journal... Whatever you may want to call it. And be more aware of your thoughts, your interests and yourself in general.

1. The Classic Diary
This journal has nothing much to explain. It's the good old diary journaling. In it, exists all your thoughts and daily experiences.
I write almost anything and everything in my diary...from rants to lovely experiences, my day or even to-do lists. Sometimes I even write out quotes.. My quotes, mind you.
This is like a miscellaneous book about your life.
At times, I even write about my life in third person... Which is... Fun, I guess to me?

2. The Song and Poetry book.
I used to write songs as a kid, so this book contains all of them... Or all that I want to remember cause the rest are trash or I've forgotten it before it reached a paper.
It also contains poems and poetic deep thoughts, analogies. I've tried to write scripts too but that was an utter failure cause I got bored.
I like to write the date I wrote it and I also have a column for any extra remarks like... What was the situation in which I wrote it or who I wrote it for.

3. Universal learner
I like to study about random subjects that intrigue me during my vacations and pass times. So I made a book for it so I could have everything in one place. This book of mine consists of lessons I've learnt on YouTube and Google searches on philosophy, grammar rules, C++ codes and HTML tags.

4. Doodle book
I used to doodle a lot on my textbooks until I realized that I'd have to give those textbooks away after the academic term... Along with my previous doodles. So? I made a book specifically for my doodles during school/college hours. Not really to be used during actual lectures (unless your teacher is fine with it and you don't mind studying the same topic at home again)... But during break time or free lectures.
I'm currently using my 3rd or 4th doodle book.

5. Miracle journal
I began to write this book after seasons of discouragement where I felt like God didn't do anything and has never answered any of my prayers. It's like a gratitude journal but.... You say statements like, "Thank you God for ________".
I actually like to begin with what the issue was then I write out the miracle in between two stars...to put emphasis on how God handled the situation. It doesn't matter how small the miracle was.... What matters is that God took care of it... Whether or not you prayed for the miracle or not.
Once I started writing this book, I realized the many ways God's hand was on my life and I felt God's presence more deeply. And this helps me to be hopeful for the unanswered prayers of my life and the waiting period that it requires.
The more we recognize God in the answered prayers, the more we learn to trust Him for the ones He hasn't answered yet.

6. Travel journal
This is a relatively smaller book so that it can be taken along the journey. Though I don't take it out when I travel actually. (cause I'm afraid of losing it)
In this book, I write the dates and timings of my travel, with whom I traveled with or who all I met, where it was, how I went there, how much I spent, what I ate and a description of the entire experience.
Some of these travels aren't even all that great... It could be just going to the bookstore yourself. But the fact that I traveled somewhere besides the places I usually go to.. Makes it worth saving in my book.

7. Faith journal
Yes, by now its obvious that I'm Christian.
So here I write down favorite reflections I've read from the daily readings, cool prayers from the internet, favorite psalms, topics I've researched on, my faith journey for a time period, Pastor Joseph prince sermon points, talks I've heard at youth meetings, my own revelations, titles of Jesus and pointers of Christian articles/videos I've seen online.
It helps me know where I've been in my faith journey and keeps all the resources I need in one place so I can refer to it when I need to.

8. Life goals and favorites book
I'm pretty sure it would've been better if these were two separate books but it's fine... I wanted to save the amount of books I spend doing my random things with.
Life goals... Here I write down all the things I want to do at least once in my life.  Some of these are pretty lame, like, "make it through a whole lollipop without biting it".
And some of these may take a lot of time to achieve, like, "be financially independent".
While some of these are just to have fun, "Sing to the sea at the beach".
There are some challenges here too, like, "Talk to a new person everyday for 10 days."
The possibilities here are endless and they make life fun.

Favorites book.... I list down all the books, movies and songs I've listened to and liked... Or even remotely liked. It helps me keep track of my interests and I can see them change over time. 

9. Book of secrets
In this book, I write down all my favorite quotes, rules I keep for myself, my boundaries, dating standards, passwords  and other secrets.

Extra tips
-always keep an index
-use different fonts, stickers and colored pens
-keep them safely away from nosey people
-don't feel bad if you don't regularly use your books. Use them as and when you please. It's your book, you make the rules.
-begin small... In quantity or quality. See if you can handle keeping one such book first then gradually increase.
-try not to mix contents too much. It may get confusing when you actually want to go back and read your books then.

So now, it's upto you. Do you feel inspired to write a book for yourself too?

Just for a while

He had been away for a while. Felt like floating away for a while.
Get out of his head, all crammed up with incomplete activities, unsuccessful relationships, blurry memories...all while not realizing the many good things he had set into motion by everything he had done right, even if it didn't work out very well for him in the short run. 

He looked over his short life and saw all the people he had come across, every soul he had loved, every art piece he appreciated, every part of him that he learnt to accept. He looked over them and thought, "Wow, things I thought wouldn't ever work out.....did, but I was too busy stressing about the next problem that popped up that I didn't take the time to congratulate myself."
And so, he did just that. Even if it was for just a while. 

For that moment he spent with himself, gave him the calm to face the storms of today and the uncertainties of tomorrow.

Just a little while longer, in this state. Just for a little while let him appreciate all the things he has done right. Let him just be. 

And when he opened his eyes again, he saw in his diaries, written in the different phases of his evolving soul that, every phase he had been in, made him into a better fuller person every time.....Every piece fit together.

Dear friend

As it is "Thanksgiving day",  I thought it would be reasonable to write a thanksgiving letter to all my friends.

Dear friend, 
Thank you choosing me out of all the people in our over-filled classrooms. Thanks for all the jokes we shared throughout class hours as the only means to survive the wrath & boredom of our teachers. Thanks for sticking up for me when our teachers/professors threw me out of class or punished me for petty reasons. Thanks for telling me my drawings were good even though now when I look back, they were terrible.....it was through your motivation I kept drawing and eventually got better. 
Thanks for pushing me towards meeting new people and trying out new things...I found out a lot about myself and the world. You extended my worldview, you introduced me to how beautiful the world could be. Thanks for sharing your thoughts and opinions with me. Thanks for all the support and encouragement you've given to help me be the best version of myself. 

Of course, then things changed and we had to go our separate ways, but I'm still grateful of you for...hurting me, choosing others over me, belittling me, silencing me, blaming me for your short comings, making me feel unworthy, ignoring me... and leaving me. 
   Because I know you didn't necessarily mean to do it (or maybe you did). You were pressurized to do it. You were conditioned to be this way. You believed lies about me over me. 

We all make stupid mistakes. We all have that embarrassing phase where nothing we did made sense to our future selves. 

But I will always treasure you and whatever memories I still have of you. I will treasure those remaining memories that haven't faded yet. 
My heart will never forget my gratefulness towards you, dear friend. Whether you were a good friend to me or a bad one, you helped me become better. And so, thank you.

I'm sorry to all the friends I've hurt. I'm sorry to all the friendships that I let drift away. I'm sorry to all the friends I needed to hurt to be "accepted" or "to prove myself to others". I'm sorry to all the friends I needed to let go of because we weren't the same people we were when we first began our friendship...I'm sorry things changed. I'm sorry I did.
I'm so sorry for the bad friend I may have been to you in the past. 


I understand I can't fix most friendships. Some friendships are beyond repair.
But just know this.....I'm rooting for you to do well in life with happiness, grace and love no matter what kind of history we have. 


From,
Pearl. 

Memories of Springtime

I heard the sound of the Koel bird today. Just reminded me that summer is coming. 

I remember my childhood when in school I used to observe the changes taking place around me on the onset of springtime and then...my favorite of all the seasons.....summer. 

The dragonflies swarming on the newly grown grass on our school grounds. Me, running around the neon coloured grass just to see them take off in flight...To hear the sound of their tiny, yet fast wings. Little me, trying to spot as many beautiful, intricately designed butterflies. And the smell of the buds and flowers of the plants that surrounded me.


The longer days...and more time to play...out in the open with friends who I would have to so soon let go of, that they may go to the paths they needed to go. Away from me. 

My favorite trees....just preparing to bloom, the flame tree and the plumeria tree. 
All kinds of weird insects, coming about to enjoy the fading slumber of nature, and she also continues to stretch out her arms and conduct all of her children, the plants of the world to show off their vivid colours. 

I miss running freely in the grassy ground of my old school. Hearing the sounds of parrots, koels and mynas. The pretty plants around the school office and staff room giving out buds and new leaves. 

It was amazing. And I cherish those days. Those days of springtime at my school. I miss those days. But I wouldn't want them back. I enjoyed it while I could. There is a whole world of beautiful nature in springtime awaiting me to admire and observe and relish. 
And so I praise God for His marvellous works in nature....and in the lives of me and the people around me.

Happenings (From the bad comes good)

It's how it has been. Whenever I find myself defeated in life, I read pages from my old diaries. No matter how much pain is buried in there...I read them. Even through the toughest days, there were good days. Like some beams of light in a ditch. Few, but that little light became so much more valuable because of the vast darkness that had surrounded me.

It's the broken pieces that make me. The broken pieces are the experiences of the things that had been before it was completely destroyed. I pick up the broken pieces and use them to complete the big picture...my life. Because I know I needed something more...something more to make this life meaningful. And these broken pieces became my something more.

As I read my old diaries I gather strength from the past. I did it then, I can it now. I can move on from the people that held me down.

Throughout my whole life I've experienced a lot of toxic friendships. Whether those friendships lasted a few weeks or years, it nearly always left me thinking whether it was my fault that we aren't friends today. But in time I learnt the truth about these things, some things happen to us for a reason. Not to break us down and slowly kill us, but to make us mature and to teach us valuable life lessons.

Many people have left my life so far. And it used to hurt me for a long time that I couldn't make them stay in my life. But now I realize it wasn't because of my fault or theirs. It because that's how life is sometimes. We'll never know of the better that's gonna come if we keep holding on to the past "ok". We have much more waiting for us in the future.

And this reminds me of the time when I began again from a toxic friendship. The damage made me believe that whoever I come across is gonna treat me the same way. But guess what? There are better people who'll treat you better than they (your toxic friend) never tried to.

You can try this for yourself, when you're hung up over something that happened, don't look only at the problem but look at the bigger picture. This hurt that they have caused you is going to heal eventually and make you a better person, stronger and wiser.

The start of something new

30 minutes to 5 o'clock....that's when I first felt the excitement, that the two most toughest school years was coming to an end. 

Before this minute my head was buried in my textbooks. I didn't know this feeling before I felt it. Maybe in smaller amounts....but never the way I felt right now. 

9th standard and 10th standard were both tough. The only way to the other side was prayer and hard work. And that was exactly what I had done. Sacrificing all my fun for my studies. I had forgotten what true happiness felt like probably. 

There I was....in the old desks of my exam center.....staring at my completed french paper, my last SSC board paper. 

A smile and an uncontrollable energy came to me. I felt like screaming out of the happiness. That moment was truly beautiful...the moment I realized that I had reached the other side that I had been working hard for. My summer had finally come, My summer of summers.

I looked at the other students in the exam hall. All their faces were cheerful and bright. I noticed the relief on their faces. Our SSC boards were finally over! The exams that lasted for nearly four whole weeks were finally done! 

The 10-minute warning bell rang. I nearly couldn't believe it. I quickly checked my answers one last time and then stared at my watch hoping the last five minutes would go by soon. It was the longest five minutes of my life. While revising before my exam, the time seemed to go so quickly, like sand through my fingers....but now? I had to just wait. 

The hot wind was blowing. A swaying window frame at the hall hit its wooden casing. We all got startled. That's when someone's watch beeped for 5 o'clock. I knew now that it was just the matter of a couple of seconds for my last SSC exam to end. 

The bell rang. It sounded like soft harps to my ears. The supervisor started to collect the papers. A wide smile came on my face as I gave her my paper. The friction of a second when I gave my paper, I felt as if a boulder was taken off of my shoulders. I giggled. 

Later while I was walking out of the premises I realised something.....this is the start of my summer.....The start of a new chapter of my life.....The start of something new!