We are redoing the house; getting it repainted, refurnished & building space, after 12 years of living here. 12 years of moss, chipped paint, and unavailability of sleeping space did not move us, 1 month of calm & stability did. NP, my therapist calls it ‘replenishing the repository’ of our shared lives with fresh experiences.
We’ve only lived here temporarily. Actually, where ever we live, we live temporarily. We do not invest much economically or mentally in that space. So, for 12 years we lived in this house temporarily. Till I came back & demanded we get a nameplate, so the Amazon guy knows where to deliver the dog biscuits, get a new cupboard because I have 8 years of additional books and organizers. This time R & I demanded separate rooms. I said I want my room to be yellow, like the one that Van Gogh ate hoping it would make him happy. My yellow, I hope would just help me keep mine. I have been so happy for the past few weeks, it’s unreal. I sit on my bed, palms tucked under me, look out the window & tell myself this truly is. It is such a normally happy, coming out of nothing, but normalcy, the oh-so-coveted, the the-never-will-be, the but-it-wont-last normalcy of my life, that I thought I would never write. Nothing made me feel so low or so high that it would move me to words.
May it’s the vitamins or the sunshine, or the bird that entered my room, spun around my head & went back into the park, that BabyR learned sizes, shapes & rhymes at school that she draws on my wall, Papa entering the papa joke phase of his sense of humor “what will you have for breakfast? just cereal, papa. Nai abhi news dekhte hai.”, mummy telling me she loves me so much that if she were to show it by hands, her hands would meet at her back, the long video chat with M, watching a movie with my friends on Netflix Party, from across 2 different countries that caused it.
And now, I text people first. I found my laughter back. In the last month, I have laughed more than I have in my whole life. Sometimes I laughed so hard my eyes watered. We are redoing OUR house. I am getting my room painted yellow, the shade is called ‘Morning sunshine’ & it will hold all my happiness.