A message to all my readers When I first began writing down my stories in this quiet space, it was nothing more than an open diary. A place to put memories that needed somewhere to rest, reflections gathered over a lifetime, and thoughts that felt too personal—or perhaps simply too ordinary—to share in conversation. Conventional wisdom often suggests that personal musings rarely accomplish much on the wider internet. There are no frameworks here, no quick advice, and no polished agendas. Just the raw textures of life as I have experienced it: the sudden turns, the quiet routines, the moments of doubt, and the steady work of beginning again. Recently, as a small corner quietly crossed 30,000 reads, I paused to look more closely at the numbers. What moved me was not just the milestone itself, but where those visits were coming from. While some readers join from home here in India, so many of you are reading from entirely different corners of the earth—from Singapore across the seas ...
Why? Do you do that early in the morning, leaving me at the mercy of the notorious invaders? I said, slapping the mosquitoes that charged through the open doors and windows. I want you to see the early morning skies and natural light and feel the fresh air. It is so beautiful outside in the garden. Many good things are for free. Enjoy them as they are, quipped my mom. Yes, I nodded in agreement. Everything is so expensive these days. This tectonic shift in inflation made me yearn for all I could get for peanuts, if not free. I remembered reading an article written by my mother's maternal uncle published in an old magazine, Saptahik Hindustan wherein he had compared the expenses incurred at his mother's wedding (which had been documented by his grandfather in his account books) to the present times. That was not a solitary incident. A father narrated how his father-in-law gave him money to arrange his wedding when they migrated to India just before the partition. He carried a t...