A piece of your soul

                                     A PIECE OF YOUR SOUL

When is the last time you read a letter from your near or dear ones? A letter is probably too much to ask for in these times. I should have asked for e-mail instead. Our inbox may be loaded but hasn’t it been a long time since we read something personal, felt the lines and went over repeatedly? It is too much to ask for these days. The instant connect we have has made us less patient and there is no longing for anything or anyone. Change is constant and evolving so it is always better to embrace it otherwise we are sure to be off the track.

But if you need memories about people, to feel nostalgic about, then it is definitely a photograph, a handwritten letter, or a note.

I had the habit of safekeeping the letters sent to me. I wrote letters as a small girl, under the supervision of my father to my aunts who lived abroad. They sent replies as well. It will be usually about the new movies we saw, the heavy rains or about my school and so on. They sent replies asking about my friends and then giving me tips to score better and so forth. We lost track of it in a while when we got busier with our lives and when our voices and even faces could be heard and seen across the seas. We never bothered.

But probing into my old collection has always been a pleasure. It is your soul that you for, in the paper. It is the things you really want to do, who you really are. That is the main reason for the fight between Urvasi and Mohanlal in the movie, ‘Midhunam’. Those letters, which he wrote to his ladylove, played by Urvasi, was probably the life he wanted to live with her. It is his circumstance that doesn’t let him be the person he wanted to be. The letters were her treasured possession because they were full of life.

Writing a letter is alike meditation. It’s a time you get to self introspect on what is happening in your life as well as take time to think about the person who you are writing the letter to. Inhale, exhale and write, that shall do the magic. It need not be long, a short note is fine. When they are not around, these notes let you feel warm and secured. It is indeed a meditation for those who are a failure when it comes to talking. The letters in a letter, for them is their mind, its a relief after you write them. You feel lighter having set aside a whirlpool of those thoughts.

I have read the letters written by my grandmother to my grandfather when he was away at work. Those were full of care and love, a slice of what was happening in and around their house. It always concluded with, ‘love and kisses to chachen (that’s what they called my grandpa) from the kids and myself. That would have been the driving force for his stay in his place of work till the next dose of elixir arrived via post.