The First Steps - The sound, the sight, the smell and the thoughts......

The first steps to any ascent is full of falters, excitement, careful calculations and doubts…questions about whether the direction is right, whether it’s the right thing to do and sorts keep popping up in one’s mind. Well, the point is – that is what is going on in my mind right now..I’m excited and I want to do this right, to write something, anything ….keeping with the compliment that many have given me that I have a good hand at writing- Naah, I believe them not, never did. Nonetheless, I find myself at this crossroad- to write or not to write and “ what to write ? “ Because there’s always this lingering fear that someone else ( and I do hope sincerely that there will be lot of someone elses ) is going to read the blog.

After careful thinking for days together, I figured out it would be best to write about something which has real meaning to and connection with my soul, my whole being…I have been trying to be a jack of all trades and failed horribly to become the master of any …I love to cook, I read a lot, I listen to music and sing, I tried my hands at some crochet, Well…I keep doing a lot of things from time to time with a few passions remaining constant..And this I do because for me that’s the SPICE of life …
And I decided to name my writing space “ E-sense ( A sense of as well as Essence of ) SPICE n FRAGRANCE “ – where there is spice , there’s bound to be fragrance and then fragrance is connected to so many things- beauty, sweetness, memories etc etc.

Anybody who comes across this blog, will find it too feminine and I don’t think that is a problem- the last thing I would want to do is try to sound masculine and land up with something which has no real meaning to myself…
Living in a foreign land, far away from my country, my parents ..it seems I’ve left behind a lot of things- a lot of memories, my childhood, many of my dreams , desires.. Yes, many of you might think- here she goes ,blah blah blah…What I’m trying to do is make it easier for others to relate to fragrance and spices..When all you have left is the memories and a few festivals, potlucks , grocery stores to connect to your homeland – you have to hold on tightly to your other senses …The sense of smell,sight,sound which all connects to your mind …

The SOUND- of falling rain , of water dripping down the leaves and creating ripples in the pond, of someone talking in a way which sounds familiar to you, a long-lost song, the swishing of the trees – you hear this and in an instant you are transported back , to times long gone, to memories you hold dearly, to someone whom you haven’t met in a while …Listen to those sounds and close your eyes …

The SIGHT- of imminent fruiting of the palm tree just outside your balcony , of “ kaash fuul and cottony clouds “ , of the yellow butterfly which you were so fond of chasing as a kid, of a familiar flower or a tree , of tree-lined bungalows which so resembles your neighbourhood where you grew up, of Royal Poinciana trees which reminds you of the road you took everyday to catch the school bus…Ohh ….so many memories keep flooding back to you that you get overwhelmed !!

The SMELL- of an incense burning, on your visit to the nearby Hindu temple which reminds you so much of the incense used at home or at your grandma's place, of a face cream which reminds you so much of mom or grandmom, of wet grass and soil after rain- reminding you of so many days when you used to watch and romanticize the rain in your young mind, of freshly cut Christmas trees lined up for sale outside the departmental stores which might remind you of oranges and holidays- the afternoons of all those winter vacations, spent eating oranges in the sun with a little black salt ( using the peels as a bowl ).

The THOUGHTS- And so the thoughts of the vagabond mind lingers on, shuffling back and forth between the past and the present, the pleasant memories and the harshnesses of real life ...as one assimilates the spices and fragrances of one's life.