happiness

The hands that warmed my soul – a short story.

laughterbubbles The deep well of words. , , , , , , , , ,

I was being wheeled away into surgery. It was time to face the inevitable.

The brains were already a little fuzzy with the sedative they had administered an hour before. I saw serious faces around me, peering from above, trying to push their positive feelings into me through their touch. But it was all superficial, because no one was feeling positive.

And in the middle of all this I was giggling. Not because of the sedative, but because I knew this was the end – of something. The final point, the final dance, the final sigh!

As I sunk into deep sleep, and slipped into oblivion, I felt cold all over. Almost immediately, a warm hand slid into mine and lifted me up. I did not hang around the operation theatre. I did not see the surgeons. But I heard them – there was no panic in their voice. The body was still breathing they way they deemed perfect. But the breaths I took, when I left with the warm hands were deep, and pure. It felt that if I leave those hands, my breath might just leave me altogether. So I clung harder. I felt complete and utter trust.

The breaths were different. My chest did not move, my nostrils did not flare, but still the lungs filled with deep satisfying pure oxygen. We flew over the hill, across the sea. I could see the lights of my city fade away. Somewhere inside that city, in the hospital, they were still operating on my body.

The hands holding mine had no face. Just a feeling, of intense love, of happiness and freedom. A massive heart warming energy. I could see a formless floating body next to me. The hands stayed steady in my focus, but the body kept shifting and stirring.It was like every movement of the air, did something internal to that body and changed it’s appearance. It shifted form but the colour remained the same. Weird colour. I could not put a name to that colour. It was somewhere between a hazy transparent thready blue grey. Everytime the form shifted, the colour got more or less intense, more or less transparent. It had no face yet it had a contour. No features yet I felt the eyes on me and the breath sweet on my neck. I named this creature Love. Because no other name seemed to fit better. And no other word was in my brain. All language and its accessories had vanished.

There was no feeling of space or time. No thought of wonder. No anxiety about where we are headed. Yet my mind was clear – of the pre surgery fuzz, of the anesthesia. My body was floating, mindlessly, but the mind was all there. I had never felt clearer, or more confident and intelligent, yet at the same time more thought free.

There was no talk. Just words communicated by the touch of warm hands. I felt enlightened, filled in with what seemed like very pertinent information. I knew that information, but if that time some one asked me to write it down, I would not have the words to. If someone asked me to communicate through osmosis I could talk volumes!

We did not float, as much as just moved. It wasn’t jerky. It wasn’t even smooth. I felt like I am skidding along a wire, balanced to perfection – with no fear of falling or even a perception of plunging into a depthless pit. Like I am a creature who has done this since the time I have walked.

I don’t know how long we were up there. To this day, I have lost the sense of time.

We did not meet anyone else. Did not see any other person. Nothing. Just plain blank space, yet a feeling of being in connect with everything and everyone. Connected but not disconcerted. Involved but not disturbed. Happy, but not excitable. A perfect state of being. A utopia of emotion.

We neared the city again, and I started hearing distressed voices. As we neared the hospital I heard everybody in the operation theatre shouting “ We have lost her! We have lost her!” And I realized I had died.

In the next instant I was in my body again. But not in the theatre. It was just that moment when I was fuzzy brained and people were peering down at me with concern and I was giggling.

I went in – and the entire story repeated itself.

I was trapped in the astral plane of happiness forever and ever.

 

 

( I have joined a writing workshop – the prompt for the day was – stare at a picture and write a story on it)

 

Dead Ends

laughterbubbles The people around us!, Those words that rhyme. , , , ,

Dead Ends,

And long roads.

Closed doors,

And uneven floors.

 

Chilly winter nights.

A lovers’ fight.

Hefty bills.

Betrayals that kill.

 

So many negatives,

In one small life

We forget to see

The beauty we can derive.

 

Block them out.

Those that don’t value you.

 

Words that give their mean plans away.

Deeds that make you a game that they can play.

 

Leave them out.

Push them off –

For lives equation has too many variables

and no place for such incompetence.

 

Live

Live my friend.

But amongst those

Who love you,

And with them –

Who you choose.

 

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Rites of passage.

laughterbubbles The people around us! , , , ,

From that tiny fetus swimming and kicking in my stomach to the time I held a hungry, squirmy yelling kid in my arms, to now, when he leaves our home and flies the nest, we as parents have come a long way. The rites of passage have been happy, sad and sometimes heart breaking. This kid, our last one in particular has given us a few heart attacks, but many many more happy times. And to think we had him in the most unplanned and disorderly fashion, in the midst of life changing decisions the family was making.

The day he cut his first tooth was a delight. We were as it is struggling with feeding, with me wanting to feed him for a few more months and he struggling to break out and venture into the world of chewing and masticating. This fellow with his puppy fat and soft skin, whom I forever kept in diapers only, so that I could cuddle him any time I felt like, started school. The sight of him in a brand new uniform – Had I known then, that it would lead to this day, I would perhaps have kept him home. But again life has to spin and move.

Days of fever, heart breaks and happier days of winning matches, being chosen to lead the school in games, friends leaving, new friends, voice cracking, girl friends and girl friend issues, studies, SAT’s, Essays and now here we are.

It’s time for the kid to leave. I’ve already sent off the first one. It was heart breaking enough. We know in our hearts that this is their step into the real world. They might never come back home. Their rooms will remain empty for months on end and one day we shall hear that they might not occupy that room again. We don’t know, we think, but it’s a damn close possibility.

But whatever the future holds, what ever their lives lead them to do, we parents have years of spit, poop, pee, gurgles, laughter, love and hugs to hold us together for the rest of our lives.