Aarzu, Armaan,

The next 30 days belong to you. I want to be able to talk to you everyday. It would have been so much easier had you been a little older. I would have just talked. But I can’t. So here I am, typing away.

We won’t be discussing specifics. Just vague letters which might make sense years from now. Because one day, when you are both grown up, we will revisit these times and I will tell you about our journey. The whole story. I don’t know where we would be then. Whether we will be happy or sad, rich or poor.

Just think about the possibilities of not knowing. I could be diagnosed with bi-polar disorder, suffering from hallucinations and schizophrenia in the next 30 days. I mean what crazy woman would write letters to her children knowing they can’t read yet. What? It’s a possibility, isn’t it? But don’t worry; I am sure there would be a knight in shining armour waiting to rescue me if that happens.

Another possibility, I could die in the next 30 days. Yes, that could happen too, can’t it? May be I am writing to you as a premonition.

Now that the worst that can happen to me is out of the way. Any circumstance other than the above two would be bearable, tame-able and worth placing our bets on, right? You with me?

I write this with a heavy heart. Because I will be writing the last of these letters two days before your bday Aarzu. I should be planning your bday, sending out emails, figuring out what theme I am going with,but I am not doing any of that. I hope serendipity will intervene again and I won’t let you down. Guardian Angel, are you listening? My faith in you has grown stronger over the years. Please be there this time as well. I want Aarzu to have a fabulous day on her fifth bday. Please make it possible.

So what else should we be talking about? Armaan, I did write you a letter on your Bday. Its sits on my personal drive in my office comp. Never posted it. Wanted to give up blogging. I will post that letter soon.

What else, yeah I am reading ‘Bridges of Madison County’. Read the first few chapters. Haven’t felt anything yet. The whole sanctioning of an extra marital affair because she was lonely is kinda putting me off. Let’s see how I feel at the end of the book. But right now, it’s not doing anything for me. A married woman in her 40s, with 2 grown children is falling for a man who is so different from her husband. The book is about their love. I am not questioning their love. It must be real. Just because something lies outside the collective morals of the society does not make it less real. I could fall in love with someone else if I were trapped in a dead-end marriage. But what would be so great about that love no matter how real it is. Why devote a whole book to it? I keep wondering if she would still love him, if she could just be with him. His nomadic ways would cramp her style, won’t they? Their love is real but as fragile as a dream. Yeah dreams are real too. I think so. But they all break.

Here is a line from the book that I did like or rather identified with. This is how it goes:

 The old dreams were good dreams; they didn’t work out but I am glad I had them.

 Isn’t it true for all of us? Just because it so happened that our life today is vastly different from the way we wanted it to be, should we go ahead and snatch a small window of time in which we live our dream? Just because?

I don’t agree.

So dear children, if you ever find yourself in such a situation, this is what I think on Day 1 of this 30 day long effort to reach out to you and tell you how I feel each day. It’s easy to love an idea, past events or future possibilities. And it’s alright. Alright as long as you are not doing any thing that’s called ‘crossing the line’. We all need something to hold on to. Sometimes we hold on to the past, sometimes we hold on to a future that no matter how uncertain seems brighter than what ever situation we are stuck in at the moment. However never make the mistake of regarding something that you have not held and felt in your own hands as an answer to your prayers. The love could be real but the promise that it brings is not. You haven’t had the chance to test it. Don’t compare it with something that has failed. Only a married person knows how easy it is to stay yet stray in a marriage and have affairs. All you have to do is cross a mental moral line. Stay in a comfortable marriage, have friends with benefits outside. So many men and women do it and that too under the garb of ‘stayed for the sake of my children’. The hard part is to have the courage to walk out of the security and comfort, tough it out alone and then find love again. And the new love, now that it just won’t be a four day fling as in the book, you will know whether the promises it brought were any different than the promises that were broken the first time. This is the clean way. This is the right way. This is the only way. Extra marital affairs are stealth and cowardice and having your cake and eating it too. So no, the love in this book is not the kind of love I would want you to ever seek. I would be proud if you stay fight in a marriage and bring the love back. If the love is gone forever and the marriage is not worth fighting for any more, I would be proud if you walk out with you head held high and self respect in place. Love will come to you again. I promise.

Love

Mamma

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