The Yellow Notebook

The yellow notebook was filled with gray lines - contoured into alphabets that said something, meant something. People said that she had written them every single day of the last year. Those words that seemed meaningless, like a forgotten memory, were part of her life each moment of the last twelve months. But to her they seemed like shady shapeless figures, visible now but disappearing the very next minute.... like figures in the foggy mornings of chilly winter months. Each word dispersed an aura of emotions that was alien to her....She could smell not their scent as they looked like flowers blooming bright on the spring canvas that adorned her wall. They looked beautiful but emanated no fragrance.

She struggled hard to gather them up in one coherent chronicle but they fell, like leaves falling in August. She shuffled them, rummaged through them but the rake of her mind worked to no avail. The task became laborious to her. She tried to shrug away the helplessness but it stuck on her like sweat pasted on the forehead in the months of May and June.

Exhausted, she planned to dump them , like some leftovers of the New Year party. But despite the cleaning, the crumbs lay hidden in the corners, on the counter, on the table..... poking her to pick them up as she got up the next morning. She took a deep breath, and opened the blinds to let in the sunlight. Then, very slowly she drew them together. They needed nourishment. She poured them in her lap. Steam rose from them reminding her of steam rising from the cup of simmering tea, her morning companion. She got up, cupping them in her hand. Then, she turned the stove on to prepare her favorite brew. As she dropped tea leaves in the boiling water, she realized it was time to spice things up. She added ginger. The pungent aroma enlivened her spirits. She hugged the words she was holding and then let them fall in the brewing pot. It was time to create a new concoction.

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(My post begins with the words 'the yellow notebook' and 'gray'- I borrowed these from one of the most touching children's books I have ever read in my life. It is titled Serafina's Promise. Written by Ann E. Burg, it is a novel in verse form. I strongly recommend it to everyone....will be reviewing it soon....)

Linking it to Indispire #151

Daughter's Diary

She sat brooding over her diary. Had she been a dutiful daughter? She kept wondering. She wished for a time-machine that could take her back to the good old days of happiness and togetherness. ...the times when she was still her dad's little girl, laughing at his jokes, finding comfort in his sturdy hands. 

It was all gone. The life ahead was solitary. She had to wipe her own tears. She had to stand for herself. 

Everyone thought she was happy. She would often smile. She had learnt that a smile was the best tactic to avert questioning glances. She had observed that her smile could hide the guilt she felt at having left her mother alone. So she would often smile.

Sometimes, she wondered why she felt so guilty. Sitting on her imperial blue sofa, she would frown and look down at her diary. That diary was her confidante. It was another matter that it was wordless. Every time, she tried to write, her eyes would well-up and tears would roll down her cheeks on to the blank pages. As a result, the pages had become stiff - very much like her own life. The moistness, the vitality was lost somewhere.

She had no right to be far from her mother when she needed her the most. She had no right to live a life of her own when her mother was weighed down by sorrow and loneliness. No, she had not been a dutiful daughter. She felt bad. She felt guilty. She had failed. Would she fail in other duties as well? Would she fail as a wife and as a mother? Perhaps, she had failed there too.

 Anxiety gripped her. She hoped for a time-machine that could take her and her mother to some cozy place where the two could smile. But then guilt possessed her again. Would it not be unfair to the people they would leave behind? She looked down at her diary. She picked up her pen. She wanted to write that she was dutiful. She wanted to write that she loved, she cared, she felt pain, she too cried. But instead of writing, eyes welled up again and tears rolled down. 

She called it a day.......

This post is a part of Write Over the Weekend, an initiative for Indian Bloggers by BlogAdda.