The Wizard called Life -1

I offer my obeisance to you Rev. Sri. Sri. Om Swamiji🙏🕉 wishing you much love, peace and good health🙏🕉Thank you for your latest post “Lies” which inspired me to pen down this post. Undoubtedly knowingly, unknowingly we do end up using  subtle lies which does become part of our existence. 

Searching through the cupboards, the bags , tossing every stuff out Shubha was getting worked up and vexed with her own self , the very thought of how careless she has been in placing the bag containing all the jewellery pieces. A precious collection of gestures that carried with it sweet memories in its form for the past 18 years gifted to her daughter , be it her first to the present birthday , every Diwali and New Year and on any special occasion.

Like any other Mother Shubha too dreamt of the day when her little angel Megha would grow up and she shall proudly gift it to her as the cherished moments something her daughter would carry with her even when she gets married . Emotions run beautifully, and one truly finds joy in these sweet little  form of gestures be it big of small that complete us with such small moments of care and Shubha had very fondly taken extra efforts to keep them aside safely. For there were times esp. the initial years of her life after marriage where she could barely afford it but still managed to gift her with her little little savings. And in no time it was all gone today.

With a gloomy face Shubha looked at her daughter, and said “ I have no idea where the jewellery bag is. I had kept it so securely and there is hardly anytime left as we have to reach Heathrow airport early morning, and I don’t even have the patience anymore to open these huge suitcases packed and ready to be booked.

The shift was happening for good after four years of stay in London.

“ Mom don’t worry , you will find it”, her daughter cuddled her warmly . She knew her mother was sensitive to certain things esp. good memories.

From a distance Shubha’s husband who was all this while preoccupied with a deep conversation with his friend was quietly watching her movements and gestures. After he finished talking, he came closer to her, “ what’s wrong, why are you so tensed? Is everything alright?

Shubha sat down on the foot stool with a heavy feeling, though she felt a deep relief when her husband patted her back.  “ I can’t find the jewellery bag, I am sorry but I did keep it securely with my long coat that I was supposed to wear tomorrow to the airport, I am so sure that bag was with the coat”, she broke down narrating it all in one breath.

“Which jewellery bag are you talking about? You never ever told me that you had jewellery on you, except the bits and bobs that you normally wear”.

“Oh! It was all of Megha’s collection, remember we bought a set of gold earrings when she was born and celebrated the cherished moments, and all of her birthday gifts every year that we gifted . Remember the diamond and ruby bracelet, the sapphire ring we kept aside on her first Diwali, and the aquamarine gold studded bracelet and those tiny….” she suddenly  kept her palm on her forehead which was all quizzed and her eyes kept running through every nook of the room while narrating.

“Hey, you never ever told me you had this big collection of jewellery with you, nor did you ever use it”.

“ Oh you knew about it, infact we did shop for some of it together. It was solely her collection, I kept it secure all these years as her pride possession, something from her parents home she would carry when she gets married. How could I misplace it!”

He hugged Shubha warmly, “ she has a beautiful mother like you, what more could she ask for! Your prayers would make everything fine.  Stop overthinking now please, you will become unwell otherwise, and we are travelling early morning , please keep count of the stuff that needs to be booked, the guy would be coming anytime soon”.

Looking at Megha, he smiled, “see to it that Mom does not worry too much , you know how she cares so much for you and your brother’s feelings”.

“Don’t worry Papa, I shall take care, and you too seem stressed now, please take rest”, Megha replied with a thoughtful expression. She knew her Mom was very upset in loosing the stuff and so tried to cheer her with a different conversation.

Shubha had mixed feelings, leaving the country, packing much of the artefacts as give away to 4-5 of her friends, couple of friends were dropping by to take the furniture , as she was just carrying  her basic stuff back to India, but what was bothering her the most was leaving her son Karan behind who was studying medicine . It was a mutual understanding that he would keep pursuing what he was passionate and serious about, as he had toiled hard and managed to come such a long way in his academics with his sheer grit and determination, amidst all the  immense emotional and financial hurdles of the family.  For his father could barely cater to pay up his basic fee. Karan took up the responsibility of his academics solely on his own shoulders at a very young age when he was barely sixteen.

Shubha already was experiencing this big void as she loved her son dearly , but there was not much of a choice she had, did she? Amidst all this emotional turmoil and struggle the last thing that could happen was loosing the jewellery bag. How much one has to go through in life unexpectedly.

She prayed to God for peace, for love and strength in that moment of all that was happening. Perhaps it’s a testing phase by His Grace and she knew that in such times her priority would always be her kids and husband’s smile and peace.

The Mother and son parting was the heavy bit at the airport, and Shubha hugging her son tight and being hugged back equally tight she could feel his heart beating fast, both knew that life was now going to miss many cherished moments of laughter and fun together.That’s the bond the mother and son shared together.  Karan was just in his early twenties. Life moved on…

Back to India renovation of the apartment that was shut for good four years started. After a week the bags were delivered . Shubha with the help of her daughter Megha and her domestic helper opened them and started sorting everything in the cupboard. But before that she made it a point to check every garment thoroughly for she wanted to clear her doubt of the possibilities that maybe she might have stacked the jewellery bag accidentally in the clothes.

It took her a whole day, but as luck would have it she could not find it in the heap of those clothes. All this while her  husband would walk around stressed watching how hard she was toiling to search for it .

“You have this habit of overthinking, take some rest. What’s happened is happened. You should have been careful in the first place, or best handed it over to me, I know you can be careless. Previously too you have lost few things but that never bothered you, but this time it’s taking you months to overcome. What’s wrong with you?”

“It was for my Mega dear”and tears rolled down on Shubha’s cheeks. “I kept all her things safe bit by bit, all these years and I know I kept it securely even while coming back”, she sighed. “ Its all lost!”

“I shall soon buy for her, once I have enough money in my hand, don’t you worry over this now” her husband pacified her.

Couple of years rolled by, life as they say is always a mix of light and grey.

Shubha had a long day as her pet was taken seriously ill and she wanted to have a quick dinner and rest. Her husband as usual was enjoying his drinks ( which was quite a habit but he never admitted he was an alcoholic, or went out of control ). Something peculiar happened.

He called Subha aloud while she was having dinner.

“Hey, have you got over the incident of the bag that you lost?” he asked her rather sarcastically.

“Gosh this man never tires of repeating past stories, does he?”Shubha thought in her head, and did not bother to reply.

“Err, I wanted to tell you about the jewellery bag and how it went missing , you really made yourself so miserable …”, he fumbled.

“I know it was a sad incident that should not have happened, let’s not discuss it”, Shubha got up from the dining table almost done with her dinner.

“You see, I took that Jewelry bag and went and sold it to get some pounds as I needed money ”, he smiled slyly at her.

Shubha gulped down her emotions. What…..!! 

“You knew what mental stress I went through loosing her stuff for weeks at a go, along with all the pressure of dealing with other things and all the while you pretended to know nothing about the jewelry, on top of that you later on loaded and kept remarking me with the pressure of  being careless. How could you be so insensitive and it’s taken  almost two years to declare what you did”, she felt disgusted with his behaviour.

“Hey, I am sorry, but I needed money.  And listen, now don’t create a scene , you don’t have to earn the bread and butter of the house so don’t even argue about this with me. Get my dinner in the room, I have to leave for work early tomorrow” he fumed and walked away…

Shubha could not believe that this was a man who loved her so much. Has he changed? She put up with his abusive nature , thought he was struggling to make it big and faced all the stresses of his day to day life. She further put up with physically getting tortured by him, as he kept saying that his family pressure ( of sisters , brother and mother) makes him go crazy. He isolated her from the outer world declaring each time that it was unsafe to get associated with anyone, (it’s a bad world was his all time slogan) though he himself had a great social life. But him being so hideous to the degree of even robbing his daughter’s jewelry, this truly was not normal. Was he just operating from  a pretentious participation  all these years?

For the first time she felt so trauma bonded in this relationship.  She felt she was truly in a dark pit . Is it time for her to take charge of her life seriously ?

To be continued in the next post….the story of being with a typical narcissist .

Dear OS family, this is the truth of my own life story that I have written. As  my earlier posts cover much of my life incidents  and that my OS family is aware of . I simply kept the names anonymous just for this post so that I could give you a glimpse of the major part of that dark life I spent with a typical  narcissist and how it can leave a deep impression on  your sanity and psyche .

For anyone who is in such a relationship you are not only risking you mental and physical well being but also your life…

Regarding my health, I am recovering without medical help though, which is a miracle and I am thankful to each one of you for your love and prayers🙏

(Siddhika named Shubha, Karan .. my son, Kritika .. my daughter named Megha here) 

Much love and Peace to all

Siddhika Umesh