Women whom I read

Q: How do I pay tribute to women whom I read?

A: Write to them; write about them, one and the best way

to pay gratitude to women whom you read.

They write endlessly, even when they are caught in the busiest schedules they manage to write and survive. They travel so far, get jet lag, their brain gets tired but they write. They work so much and still remain humble, thus I sat tonight to write about women whom I read.

One day I want to write long hand letters to all those women whom I grew up reading. Earlier I read Simone de beauvoir and Virginia Woolf, but ever since I started reading Indian women, my life has become sane and insane in parts; both parts complement each other very well. Maybe I connect to them more .They are home grown crops, came from small towns and made choices and stood firm on those choices. They inspire to write. As I sit in classroom, walk on roads their words keep echoing in the mind. Their work tells you to look beyond the problems, petty issues that I surround myself with. I should stop complaining and wasting time.

When I get that crossroads (it’s not something new, most of the days I am at crossroads, confused). Every now and then my life stops making sense and I lose the purpose of life, they come here as rescue; they help me survive and write. Subconsciously their words keep echoing in my head and ears no matter how lost I feel.

I visit their timelines to read their posts and what they shared. These are the very stagnant times of my life, the anger is missing and I am devoid of any sort of feeling. But their words strike hard at times to stir my slumbering soul. Those are the moments I want to pull their cheeks and kiss them and hug them tight.

I was not born with books around me or people who would take me around them, thus trial and error method taught me what I should read and not .

One great thing about the words of women whom I read is that they don’t bind me; they are not didactic. They set me free and set me wild. Though I remain as directionless after reading them, as I was before reading them, but their words give me confidence, no matter how directionless I am right now, but I am on the right path. This Wandering is not in vain. The important thing is that I am not walking on the trail left by someone, instead striving to make my own.(I am again sounding moron). Follies are okay. They are step towards better tomorrow.

When I read them, they feel so much like me. Their fears, struggles are same, yet we are different people. I don’t want to ape them, may be their writing too echoes the same faith-be one of a kind, because everyone is unique. Their words tell me ‘don’t carry the burden of our words, these words are meant to liberate, not bind you.’ Their words are so deep that rest everything else sounds frothy to me.

Their words tell to write my heart out, because no one else would write it for me, no one else would write better than me.

Live .write .survive.

Before social media, I just read the books-perfect pieces of art, but going through their daily dairies tell me every woman is same inside. Relationship with tears and laughter never leaves woman aside. I read them for umpteenth time, they never bore, and they never go out of fashion. The same delight –today and tomorrow.

I wonder whether I could ever write for fourteen long hours as Simone de beauvoir did, whether my work could help society become a better place, whether I could make room for myself.

When everything fails to ignite me, I rush to women whom I read. The solace they give. Where they put full stop to their work, I try to thinking beyond that. I keep thinking them endlessly, how do they manage to write so much.

I am not here to erase men whom I read; I equally love and respect them. They too have made immense contribution to my life, but there is strange magnificence about women whom I read.