Prelude
Early morning, on the 8th of October, as I ambled out into the dining room for my customary wake-up morning cup of tea, I beheld what was probably the greatest first-sight I could imagine for my birthday. The two people I love the most dearly and with the deepest depth of my heart seated before me, smiling radiantly with all their love and affection for me! It is not often that you wake up to a surreal experience: and I was positively in another world just then? the world went mute and time stopped? as my sister and my girlfriend flung their arms around me to wish me happy birthday.
It does pay to be me!
And the evening came, and the sun hung low on the horizon and as the evening crowd of bustling men trying to sweat their churby out in the park began to come in and go out. Once more, time had frozen and the evening world had turned mute to me; for this time I was dwelling in the heart of Tina, who had opened those doors for me, to behold for myself the beauty that lies within that heart. And as I emerged from the most superlative surreal experience of my life ever, I looked at the world like I had never looked at it before.
Why was the dark evening, the cloudy sky and the lamp-less road so bright?
The Review
?Tell me, Tina, ? I said, admiring the really pretty watch-strap she?d gifted me?mine was ancient and probably only a fourth of what it was supposed to be?why do I think this is more special than just a watch-strap? Why do I enjoy this more than the songs Harshad compiled for me?
I can not describe how she looked at me at the moment, but her eyes arrested mine.
?Harshad gave you songs?I gave you my heart.?
I sat transfixed. Why do we men ask such questions? How is it that Tina can understand my feelings so perfectly well, however mild they are, and I not understand her feelings when they are so strong? I probably will never know why?
I came to the final question after a long time, when we just sat, hand in hand, watching people come in and go out of the darkening park.
?What were you thinking when you were shopping for me?
Oh, Tina, I thought, let me listen to you over and over again telling me you love me?what better and more precious gift can you ever give me?
And from her comes this review?
When a woman loves?
?I am not rich, ? she said, ?that I can buy you something eloquent that you will remember forever, like a watch. And even if I were?my father would always have been generous to me had I implored him to?even then I should probably not have presented you something like that. For you and I don?t need to display extravagance and eloquence to express what we feel for each other, I pray, for I believe you and I are too close to even enjoy something that is rude to the purse? don?t you value what I say and who I am more than what I give you? I knew if I were to please you, I should present you something that will touch your heart, something that will spread a warmth in it that can never wan?
True. So true.
My dear lady, your admirer does not want anything material from this world from you to remember you. He wants your heart, your love: he wants to hear again and again you are his and he yours. He wants you with him and wants to be with you forever. So don?t bother yourself with scanning large stores and shops and browse through myriad things over and over again? if you can think of nothing, you still have not lost your chance to please him.
Take his hand in yours warmly and look into his eyes. He has everything he wants!
?Yet, ? she continued, ?there is something special and something sweet in the give and take: I can never enjoy the moment when I present someone with something that they like: and every moment I spend with you I want you and I to enjoy! I know you love your watch and that it?s the one possession you are so proud and possessive about? I knew something to decorate your watch would make you happy?
My fair friend, your admirer will never forget the moment when you present him something that is special to him: he will never forget the moment you say to him how involved you are in the things he likes to do. Like you, he wants to come closer to you every moment, he wants you to be a part of him, and to be a part of you. And every time you do something and say something that conveys that message, you?ve taken him to a world of happiness where nobody has tread before?
Barring me?
She spoke more to me about why she chose the watch-strap and what brought her to that:?Oh, Laxman, why are you so myriad minded? You love music, you loose yourself in your studies, you freak out on writing to me and to yourself and to those many people who read you on* MouthHit.com*?(she never mastered the word MouthShut)?and you entrance yourself in those sweet, soft, slow songs that you listen too? you love to read things that make you think? and a million things more! I never knew it?s so difficult to choose the thing you like to do the most! I could have brought you Maugham?s work that I love so much for you to read?but I would have been guilty of distracting you from studies. I could have compiled masterpieces of Elton John, but then I would have probably given you something far inferior to the music you are a enthusiast of?
?So I chose this strap above all? for you can not alter it yourself, for you can not loose yourself in it not can you distract yourself to it? yet, every time you look at it, you will remember me, find me next to you, my hand in yours? yes, J, that?s what I loved about this? that watch is always strapped to your hand, and so my hand would be, through that strap, in yours? I am so selfish! I gave you something so my hand would be in yours! But isn?t that what you want?
And it was then that I realized how completely she had won my heart? how completely hers she had made me just then?
My father had once said to me, when we discussed my relations with Tina with each other:
*A pretty woman who holds nothing back from her man, will indeed seduce him?
But the woman who listens to him and who gives him all the sympathy she can, will be the one who shall win him!*
As we bid goodbye(she lives right opposite to my own house), I looked at her as she entered her warm and inviting home, I thought:
This is your birthday, Laxman. Yet you have done nothing special. On this day, seventeen years ago, it was your mother who had brought you here. This day ought to have been in her honor?
But still she showers you with every bit of love she has for you? She will, forever, throw away all her pleasures for you, crush all her dreams for you, weep and pray for you even if you make her weep?
And here you are, standing before the door of your love! You pride your power over words, and you are admired for it by so many? yet can you ever say things the way Tina does?
Thank you, God, for making the woman, for if there had you not, I would probably not have been a man.
