About Nothing

This is my 1001th post. It must be for a reason that I have been listening to Ron Goodwin's Music for and Arabian Night lately - that used to my childhood favorite album. Talking of childhood, I was recently surprised by two emails that came within a few days of each other. One from a boy who had a crush on me when we were fourteen and another from my best friend who had moved out of town in our eight grade. They are not mutually acquainted.

She and I have been in touch episodically since then but I had not heard from her for several years until last month. The boy is now a married man with a daughter slightly younger than mine. I deleted his mail without replying and could not help remembering those far away days when I may have read, re-read, bisected and dissected every word he had written, injected the serum of meaning into the most innocuous remark or gesture until it turned into a thing of incredible significance. The passage of time is a powerful thing.

My childhood best friend has a two year old son. He was sick on his second birthday and that prompted her to write this to me :

I feel empty right now and I know that's not good. I have this compelling urge to mend this and make it up to myself, my husband, my parents and my in-laws. Gosh I want to relive this day and do it all differently. So trivial you might think as compared to the battles most others fight every day. I am not proud of it but I still feel it and I am writing about it. So please bear with it till I find better causes to fight for, dear friend. God, its good to have you back.

Our life's circumstances once very similar are far apart now and yet I feel her pain and hope my note in response helped :

Yes, there is world hunger to solve and more pressing concerns but for you as a mother, your son is your world; the center of your universe and you want everything in it to be perfect. There is nothing wrong about that - it just shows you are wonderful mom and he is very lucky child. Always stay this way :)