Three Good Things

I have been asked to write about three good things today.

I don’t really know, what context they mean here, but as always, I’d like to write about the top three good things in my life.

# 1 – The Perfect Support System - FAMILY

I know I have talked plenty about my family over posts in the blog, but I don’t really know if I have said this. My parents have always been more my friends than parents. When me and Achu crossed our teenage years, Appa and Amma took a step back from being parents and started gelling with us more as friends. So, until this day, our dining table conversations are peppered with an all-inclusive set of topics, sometimes bordering on the inappropriate for the dinner table. :P Of course, they still do wring their hands in exasperation over the things their offspring end up doing, not listening to them. The parental force kicks on in full swing on and off during those times. ;) We have stuck by each other, all through the ups and downs and anything important I embark upon, like interviews, fresh starts, and new beginnings, I ensure that they are the last people I speak to. :)

# 2 – F.R.I.E.N.D.S.

Enough has been written on this blog about the circle of friends I have as well. They say friends are the family you can choose and in that sense, while I have had a few hits and misses here and there, mostly, I have found the ones that will stick by me through apocalypses and ends of the world and it definitely is vice versa as well. When friendships span over years, you learn the minutest of things about each other, deal breakers, things that you don’t agree on, distances that exist only in time and not in mind. If you have surpassed all that and your friendship still has the same intensity as it always has been, pat yourselves on the back. It is extremely difficult to cross all bridges and get to where you are and still pick up from where you left the last time, with no awkwardness hanging in the air. The closest friends that I have in my life, I can probably count on one hand. These are the people who will take a bullet for me. And I’d gladly do so for them as well.

# 3 – Reading and Dancing.

I have my parents to be grateful for both of those, for inculcating in me these things that makes me, ME.

Some of my best memories are those of reading -  those wondrous afternoons of lying down on the huge cool floor in Kalam, turning pages and looking at pictures in those big hardbound books, smuggling the comic books inside textbooks and pretending to be studying, train journeys that start with pestering Appa to buy me a Champak or a Gokulam, Amma lugging big bags of second-hand books, Enid Blytons, Nancy Drews, Hardy Boys, from the old books shops in Coimbatore, my Manni’s library card that I appropriated and ended up not letting her pick up books, the second hand sales at Hyderabad, discovering flipkart and cash on delivery options and now the Kindle. So many books, so little time to read.  

I have my mom to be thankful for the passion I have for dance. She is the one who pushed me those early rainy mornings, to wake up and be ready for the thrice a week classes before school, for those endless waits during my practice sessions for performances, for encouraging me to choreograph on my own, for pushing me to limits, that I would never ever have imagined doing all alone. And you know what, all that cheering and trudging on, have paid off. Today whatever stamina that I have or that I endure is because of those years of training. Today, even if you ask me to go on dancing non-stop, I’d find conviction in myself to do that.

Dancing is my escape route - from the world, from sadness, from frustrations, from stress, from ‘when everything gets too much to handle’. Muscle memory they say, the way your feet start tapping when you hear familiar rhythms, the way your hands move and your eyes express themselves. In my head, I am always dancing, always choreographing. It’s my go-to option when I have tune out during those endless meetings, travel journeys with only music for company.

It’s like how Rumi said –

“Dance, when you're broken open. Dance, if you've torn the bandage off. Dance in the middle of the fighting. Dance in your blood. Dance when you're perfectly free.”,

There! Those are my top 3 good things - What are yours? :)