Memories
2007. It was early in the morning and the five of us were in Naukuchiataal for a family vacation (the last one we’d have together). It wasn’t too early, the time when the sun had just come out and your eyes are slowly opening and you can feel a new day slip in. We walked down to the creek by the cottage, just the two of us. I was in my lime green pyjamas and him in his tracks and t shirt. It was peaceful. Like the morning breeze. We didn’t speak much. Just a lot of silence. And that’s how our relationship always was — as a brother he never found the need to give us many a doses on how to go about life, be good girls, etc. He let us be and watched over. Always. With a smile, in silence. Like he does, now.
2012. It was a long, long day. Like many hours of the week filled and crammed together in one tiny room. We finally managed to steal a few hours out and landed up at the bridge where only the three of us went to. It was nestled in a quiet part of Singapore, with a restaurant or two around and a few beers on many tables. We had our burgers and sat down right in the middle, in our usual spot. With our thoughts tucked in and our minds finally slowing down. We lay down and looked at the stars, there weren’t many but enough to count and tell stories about. We saw swings, flowers and unicorns that night. And it was just that. The sky, the stars and three friends. And a bridge that saw us through a lot.
2014. I liked long tram rides and aimless walks around the city. Aimless, with no google map directing me or a place to go to or a friend to meet. Just me and the streets. Hop in to a tram and hop out when I felt like. Sometimes ride it all the way back to where I got in at. That Saturday night, with Love In The Times Of Cholera and a coat that felt unusually heavier than before, I took myself on a date. It was raining and Milan felt quieter and the evening felt darker. But there was music and through the stained glasses in the tram, I spotted a bar called E.E.Cummings. Smiling, I entered the place and asked the bartender to make me his favourite cocktail. Sitting there, for the first time alone on a date with myself, I was reminded of Cummings’ most famous line, “i carry your heart (i carry it in my heart). Me. And myself.
Memories are so strange. On some days they are so clear, with every detail in your head like it had just happened and on other days you struggle to recollect the same. It’s also selfish. You never know how it’s going to make you feel. At different stages you feel differently about the same piece of memory. It never asks you, it’s the hostel warden who does her own thing and gives no fucks. It has all the control and all you have to do is wait to remember. Or maybe even forget. But you’d never know if you can do either.
But if not for these little pieces of memory fitting in like the most irregular puzzle, what would we be?
Without the sky, the stars, a friend or just yourself?
