demons

They spring up out of nowhere really.
Dim grey memories of things which other people had made me not like about me.
They reside in dark recesses of the mind, jumping out at a familiar song, a stray photograph or simply a floating memory. Fighting them is easy when I have my pink ladies in waiting or my blue knight in shining armour by your side- demons vanish in poof of multicolured smoke when confronted by happy thoughts or memories or realities. But when I'm by myself, I need to be stronger- more equipped with my faith and belief that I took the right turns all along.

I wonder why demons continue to exist once you have apparently slayed them. Are the short spurts of reminders on how you got to your happy place? Just to make sure we never really get complacent? Or do these spectres never really get slayed at all and are just lying there dormant in you waiting for a moment of vulnerability to spring up to suddenly sink their teeth into your insecurities again?

mirror mirror on the wall

Along with space issues and identity crises, the first few months of marriage can also be marked by strange art on bathroom mirrors - all in the name of love and monthly anniversaries!

magicky.

In countless pre-marriage conversations with some intelligent friends, we came to the conclusion that if you are not happy with yourself inside, nothing can make you happy. Especially not that one person on whose poor soul the entire burden of your happiness lies. We decided then and there, in that hypothetical conversation, that our attempt in life would be to find the happiness, if that's what the elusive butterly is, inside our own selves, by living our lives as we want to and then sharing them with the ones we love, for affirmation. Not by depending on them.
We, in our single clearheaded states, also knew with utmost surity that though magic exists, it's hard work. That there is no such force which will magically hold together 2 people for eternity while differences, in-laws and life spring up all around them, threatening the balance.

Of course hypothetical promises and vows are easy to make and when life hits you in full swing and with curve balls, the exact words of those strong single-woman- statements get a little blurred and it's easy to blame the significant other for the erosion of magic and love.

I'm learning these days. From people around me who let that magic go simply because they refused to acknowledge their own bit in the working of it. Young couples. Happy couples who smiled love-bhari smiles at each other on stage a couple of years ago. In-love couples who fought for the right to be able to spend their lives together. As k and I battle out our first year together, it helps to remember the initial time together, when the feeling was uncomplicated by the dailiness of details, and we try to remember that in the face of all we see taking place. And I realize how much thinking, feeling, understanding and accepting goes into the simple word: magic.

the thing about love.

the thing about love is
that everyone admits its wonderful
and necessary yet no one agrees
on exactly what it is.

for me right now, it's knowing that i am loved
for who i was, who i am today, and who i
will be tomorrow. happy valentines day, k.
wish you were here.

mere piya gaye rangoon...

This time-together stuff is underrated.
People dont tell you exactly how amazing and fabulous and addictive being married can be (with the right person, of course). And I'm not counting Mills and Boons here.

My room is silent right now. Testament to k being in lahore for the next few days. It's weird how loud silences can be when you are not used to them anymore. You try to fill them up with lots of books from Liberty, emails to friends you havent written to in ages, TV shows you don't really want to watch, phone calls to people who you see everyday and lots of random activity like reorganizing closets and drawers, writing extra in your journal, staying at aerobics for an extra 15 monute workout...the list is endless. It's so easy to get used to a person in your space. To have someone to think aloud to, sound out life and the day against.

I remember when I got my own room.
Euphemistically speaking of course. In reality it was a small 6 by 6 feet boxy space behind the front door of our Dubai apartment but to me, it was perfect. Of course. No bickering little sisters (I had a password without which they could not enter), no music other than my own. I could dance to my hearts content without the world judging me. Space is so important. Personal space, to be our own person, hussy said.
So why is this temporary space to be a little more me now bothering me?
Why am I now not enjoying this time to myself and using it to do all the things that I would not, could not do if k was here? Perhaps the concept of space evolves when you start letting someone in your head and heart. Maybe space becomes more abstract. Something that exists inside you, without needing tangible reality of a room to assert itself.

Unlikelies.

In our span of existence, we encompass realities, truths and situations as we know them and sometimes as we can stretch to imagine them. We hardly ever give space to things to be as they could be. To allow in ideas which seem improbable, unreal and fanciful. Then one day, a blog, a conversation or a random get together later, new vistas open up between two unlikely elements and suddenly, the horizons are boundless and possibilities unlimited.

Today for lunch I met two Unlikelies. People who I have known by face and name for over half a decade but people who I got to know in the last few months as result of time, situation and distance. Conversation flowed non-stop, not because we knew each other, but because we didn't. We were people brought together by choice, by a realization that our boxes were no longer working and it was time to step out of them and relearn so many things about the world in general. A little hesitant at first, soon all pretenses at being careful flew out as the real personas emerged; the blog personas, the wives persona, the singles persona, the artists persona, all effortlessly minglling together to create a dynamic between three people who were simply willing to let the unlikely become something likely.