Unsent Letters

To the boy who has his nose buried in the books, 

Look up! The real world is as beautiful and as perfect as it is in those books. Sure, there is pain and there is disorder and chaos and more pain but when you look beyond it, there is greater happiness. Just like the pot of gold that the goblin planted for you to find. Read to fall in love with words, with expressions, not to escape reality.

- Me who used to hide behind books when life got hard. But never realized that the solution to the problems lay elsewhere.  

To the girl who falls in love too easily,

You have only one heart and piecing it together after it splinters for the nth time will hurt more than you can endure. Love as much as you want but protect the wee little heart – give that all-consuming, ever-lasting power to only those who really deserve it. But even if you don’t learn, I shall be around to put you back together.

- Me who likes to pretend to have a barricaded heart. And hides the marshmallow-like softness behind the façade of cynicism.

To the man with the coffee and the quick stride,

You have worked long and hard which is why the meeting will wait. You should lengthen the stride, slow it down a bit, let your coffee simmer down from the scalding hot that it is now. You gaze straight ahead but you see nothing more than the path in front of you – open your senses to the fresh green foliage, the earthy smell of the first rain, the spicy aroma from the chat stall and the incessant babble of the women around.

- Me who learnt to live better. But not before God numbered my days.

To the people who are obsessed with ‘finding love’,

If you don’t stop underselling yourself and overexpecting from others, if you don’t stop looking for something that is not meant to be found that easily, if you don’t let others’ happiness sway you in the wrong direction, if you don’t stop with the endless rounds of self-pity which help you spiral only in the downward direction, you will never be truly happy even if you do find the great love of your life. Let it happen when it happens. And leave it alone till it does.

- Me who has fallen in and out of ‘love’ a million, billion, trillion times. So much so that I don’t know what true love feels like.

To the pantry boy,

The genuine smile that you serve with your burnt tea is what will get you places.

- Me who doesn’t remember the faces of any other pantry boy. Except you.

To the married woman,

If you ever come by here, I want you to know that I’m proud to be someone you call ‘friend’. Right from the quiet maturity that everyone relies on to the art of dealing with the most difficult people that you seem to have mastered, I wonder how you do it. I love how you are not perfect and your husband is not perfect but together you are picture perfect. I want that for me and some day, will you grant me the honor of being my bridesmaid?

- Me who has found a role model in you.  

To the raindrops that caught me unawares on a Friday night,

The tumultuous events of the evening did nothing to dissipate from the pleasure you gave me – I felt the heat rise from my person and disappear into wisps in the strong winds that you brought with you and I truly understood the meaning of ‘water for the thirsty’. Stick around, won’t you?

- Me who hates the summer with all my heart. Despite all the fleeting summery feelings the season is supposed to bring with it.

To 2014,

Be nice to all those who are less than lucky. Be nice to all those who aren’t as blessed. Be nice to all those who need you to make things better. Be nice to those who suffer at the hands of Fate. Bring more hope as you go along as that alone will take us forward.

- Me who has had bad days in the year. But cannot really recall them.

To Perfection,

Stop being so elusive.

- Me whose hands you slip out of on an everyday basis.