Category: Articles

Cling

Published on by Harpreet ChhachhiaLeave a comment

As time passes and love grows older, our vision expands. It’s like taking a step back and not seeing just the eyes but the whole face. The kiss is done and you see his nose, his lips, his throat. You see the pulse beating there. There is another person in front of you.

You realise you are clingy. You want to be kissed often. You want to be annoyed with a constant barrage of cuddles. You wish for the hands to keep holding yours.

But you look downward and see that the hands that were holding yours are now busy on the phone. The eyes are forming texts. The mind is elsewhere. Differences in religion revolve around your atmosphere. Family matters rise to the surface. The kisses are temporarily forgotten. The life you have lived comes back in heavy memory.

You see the meme in your own phone and you wonder. If you forward it to him will he come close to you again? Will your vision only have his eyes in it again? Will you stop seeing all of his pulsations? Will he be content in your eyes too? How long will the language spoken by the eyes keep you both content?

I have no answers. So I search for a meme.

Trust

Published on by Harpreet ChhachhiaLeave a comment

I never had a problem trusting people. Probably because I always thought that I was a good judge of character. When you get to know a person you understand their positive and negative traits, in relation to your own self. As you grow, too, you understand that people put themselves first. They may not do so deliberately; many times selfish acts are done involuntarily. Even murders have degrees.

But when trusting someone becomes imperative – when you fall in love for example – it takes a certain amount of time and understanding. But when do you stop trusting? When you stop loving, I suppose. Love is blind. Shakespeare understood this, and he wasn’t only talking about subjective beauty. He was talking about how emotions alter our perspective of people.

Maybe that is why I have always been very cautious of falling in love. I have taken time to understand a person before I commit. Over the years though, I have also understood another thing. People don’t show you all the facets of their personality – all at once. They unfold. Like blooming flowers. It takes time to understand another person. In the interim, then love evolves too.

If you just love a person, you may not understand the growth. You understand the different facets, only when you are attuned to the idea of development. You have not seen the person in his or her or their entirety. Circumstances change. The personality reacts to the circumstance it falls into. Therefore, you must understand this. You have not been in all circumstances; therefore you will not see all the facets of their personalities – at least not until the circumstance happens.

Ergo, your love can grow, too. The love I have for a man stays constant in the circumstances I have seen him in. In newer or older circumstances, I may not like certain traits. In a minute example, I could say, I love him for the way he has always held me at night. In time, the holding remains a constant, and so my love stabilizes. In a new circumstance, I may have to get used to the idea that he is prejudiced against people with coloured eyes. It will be an idea that I have to get used to. In another new circumstance, I will love him for standing up to his family when it is required. Love can grow and it can take a pause. But if it starts diminishing, then that is a problem.

It is the same with trust. Love can exist without trust. Yes. But it is difficult to keep loving with pain. When you are in pain all the time, it is difficult for love to keep finding a foot hold. Then like physical pain, one needs a pain killer – and that becomes dangerous for a love relationship.

Family

Published on by Harpreet ChhachhiaLeave a comment

The other day I went to my partner’s mom’s home. She had invited me for Diwali, after 22 years of my being with her son. I sat with her over the season’s greetings and made small talk. After all these years, her acceptance should not have mattered much but it did. And today, after thought, I realized why it mattered.

I am a family guy. Always have been. Apart from not having a father in the real sense of the word, I have had a marvellous family. I grew up knowing freedoms. The right to choose, the right to be, the right to love. I was taught this by fierce women, in both my maternal and paternal families.

My grandmothers were Naseeb and Gai. The former a widow at 26, who raised four children on her own in the ‘50’s. The latter a Gemini who showed me what it was to love another man. My grandfather, Firoz, taught me what it was to be liberal, kind and loving. My aunts, Rajinder and Harwant and Zarine, were independent, free-thinking, caring women. The former two took the place of the father I never had.

My mother, Gaver, who single-handedly raised two children and made a home in the city of Mumbai. Something no one in the family has or since done. She educated us and molded Geeta and me into the people we are today. Free-thinking, free-willed people, who I like to think also have the compassion and the empathy shown to us by the earlier generations.

I will not forget Behram Maama, who taught me what it was to be a good father. Amarjeet, my chachu, who taught me resilience; because of his constant battle with schizophrenia and the final one he lost to throat cancer. He was a brilliant painter, despite being colour-blind.

I think back on my family and I am filled with separation anxiety. I had a full family, but in my generation I have a mere handful of siblings. I have gone through more than my share of loss. Since the age of 19, I have faced death and continue to face him – almost like a friend who comes calling after short intervals. For company, he has taken Mervin, Nana, Chacha, Bonzo, Dadan, Rolfe, Diana, Zoe, Maasi, Munni Pua, Goodie Pua…

My family has literally and metaphorically given me lessons about death and life. It has taught me how to be honest in order to live without added complications. It has taught me how to love – fully and completely – and what sin actually means. In truth, it would mean breaking a heart that loves you.

As I looked at my partner’s mother, someone who accepted our relationship after decades, I realized how lucky I have been to be a part of the family that makes me belong. In my family, acceptance was never a problem. Loving meant accepting. There may not have been complete understanding, in the truest sense of the word, but, despite that, there was never rejection. I was assured there was never any chance of it. My family taught me love. I am me because of them.