G,
Remember that day when we were so proud to have successfully dismantled my little cane chair without breaking any of the parts? You responded with just the right degree of urgency and seriousness that the six year old me could expect from a playmate and helped me do a thorough job of it. And I am told the six year old me had extemely high expectations of people.
Today, everytime I get told that I don't come across like an 'only child', I look back fondly on our shared sunny, quirky, magical childhood. I grew up assuming that everybody has a cousin their age living within get-told-off-by-parents-and-run-to-crying distance. When it eventually dawned on me that I might just be one of the lucky few to grow up with the privilege, I was thankful for it. Even if I wouldn't have you know about it then as we were too busy pinching each other's necks and inventing new names to call each other.
If there is something I treasure about my childhood memories - it is the reassurance of knowing that I had you to laugh with, to seethe at my wounds, to conspire with, to get it, to share made-up stories with, to spend summers with and most importantly, to care. And isn't it fantastic that this feeling has endured through it all - through that impossibly difficult age when we wondered about our acceptability/popularity indices to now, when we begin to know the permanent from the transient, to what I know will be always.
During all our singing lessons, I know you weren't particularly thrilled to be told that our pitches matched rather well. One day you woke up with a different voice and several feet taller and that was the end of us standing together and singing for guests at home. I miss that, you know - especially because of how revolting you find the idea.
This is to tell you that you are more precious and important to me than you can ever know. I haven't been the best of sisters and am actually using the occasion of a highly bollywoodised festival to let you know this, and publicly at that (but does two count as public?). But I think you know it comes from the heart. I also know that while the title seems like corny gibberish to the rest of the world, you know exactly what I'm saying.
Love,
Your proud sister.
P.S - did you notice how I'm not trying to get you married off to a nice girl here as I always threaten to?
P.P.S - My brother's a gentleman, he's funny, wise, smart and humble. And oh, he owns two BMWs.
oops.
4 comments:
Thank you! It was because of you that even I never felt being alone. The records we have done, the ads you have created and voice we have shared, the ice balls we've thrown at each other and the innocent smile we have shared on the snow :). Thanks for always being there for me. For being an elder sister and inspiration through out. Though we've not kept in touch, we share the same feeling even today... Even till date we know that we are there for each other at any moment. Geographically we may be far which never matters to us...
Your Loving Bro...
Nice to know the good memories.....
let the future be a chain of good memories.
Nice one.
When I come across someone using the native expression 'cousin-brother', I am conscious about not 'correcting' their English.
// I don't come across like an 'only child'//
Interesting. I don't even know what it is to come across as one.
First day in UKG in a new school where teachers get paly with parents, my mother gets all worked up by the "personalized attention" and makes a big deal to the teachers about of me being an only child.
Second day. In the regular 'My family' intro, I list more 'brothers and sisters' than I knew to count perplexing the teacher.
Next time do check the Limca book for the 'Youngest ever to have an id check run on'.
Ghana: Thank you!!!Lovely to read this! I WILL call you.
Ma: Thank you mommy!!!!
Prabhu: Yea, looks like we 'only child' types who've grown up with cousins have had the best of both worlds.
Post a Comment