“Remember Red, hope is a good thing, maybe the best of things, and no good thing ever dies"
Hi Loves!
I’d have loved to use the word ‘dolls’ in my greetings but for the sake of keeping my newsletter a semi-formal method of communication, I’ll go with a more neutral and endearing word – ‘Loves’ (inclusive and definitive). All of you, who are part of this first newsletter are in many ways admired by me and I am truly grateful for your existence.
I am starting this newsletter as a way to lucidly narrate my thoughts and wanderings about life. This past year has been unprecedented in history, a year that feels like an unending winter’s night. There are days when I stare strong and hard at the reflection in the mirror at the lost, helpless eyes staring back at me. On days like this, I gather some strength from within and smile bleakly at her.
Surprisingly enough it does the trick, in that moment, both of us are smiling despite the incredulity of the situation, challenging the helplessness that overwhelms us. Smiling heals, not completely, but certainly in parts.
The past year also made me realise that it’s simply not enough to be friendly, we have to be a friend first, and that we have to rely on one another unapologetically and consistently. A smile, a call, a text from friends on most days have ensured that insanity doesn’t engulf me, that it was just not my day, nothing too profound about a bad day, it simply was a bad day.
And for each of you who is reading this right now, I’d like to dedicate this phrase from Taylor Swift’s song - New Romantics - ‘the best people in life are free!’ I am grateful to have met some of the best ones along the way!
A small topic I would like to talk about in this newsletter is -
Hope!
We all are in our own ways clinging on to the bleakest rays of ‘hope’ these days. Our youth seems to wither away right in front of our eyes and there seems to be nothing that we can do about it. We are constantly trying to be positive and on some days we are, but on most days we are resigned, which is where ‘hope’ becomes crucial.
Hope need not always be aggressively positive, but hope can be in its own right a small blinking light on the darkest night. Something that orients us, something that guides us and something that allows us to accept where we are with a tiny conviction from within that we will arrive where we so desperately want to go.
‘Hope’ was the last thing that remained in Pandora’s Box. Some Latin to English translations of the story also translate the last thing as ‘deceptive expectation’. A pessimistic connotation for the word ‘Hope’. But deceptive or not, an expectation of a future is necessary, to live today. Hope these days is as elusive as the butterfly, but we forget that hope just like the butterfly is free-spirited and it thrives when we simply let it be. Something’s just cannot be captured.
Here’s hoping that this week we all find the strength to hope against odds to dream of our own alternate realities we wish to realise.
“Remember Red, hope is a good thing, maybe the best of things, and no good thing ever dies”
Shawshank Redemption
A few weeks from now, I am certain I will forget why I started this newsletter? What was the mere purpose of it? Fractions of distractions will snowball into months of distraction and there will be nothing left, a mere void. Days of exuberant happiness will be followed by days of relentless despair. But against these odds, I hope that my words and thoughts will flow just as easily and that this newsletter will be a source of comfort for you and me!
Hope you liked this newsletter, hope you are kind to yourself and hope you find some hope just when you truly need it.
If you think someone will enjoy this newsletter then feel free to send it to them (a friend, an acquaintance, a parent or a pet). I will be sending a newsletter every week!
Sending love, hugs and a warm comforting cup of chai,
Krupa
Until next week, here’s a song that I’d like to recommend – Mikrokosmos by Bangtan Sonyeondan. A song that provides me with solace on days when loneliness is hard to bear!
PS - Attaching an illustration I made back in October'20 when I was deceptively expecting Corona to just disappear by May'2021, Alas! :)
Nevertheless, enjoy the artwork!
Titled - A neverending summer!
