Thankful Tuesdays #5 – For a Thread

Written as part of 52 Weeks of Gratitude Challenge which I’m attempting this year. Image of the Rakhi used as-is from Wikimedia Commons (here)

Something Given to Me

Week 5 – Thankful Tuesdays

“The most valuable lesson I’ve ever learned in my life is that life is about family and friends, not about material things or any of that. It’s about enjoying your life. If you have no family, no friends to enjoy it with, it don’t matter how much you have, how much success you have, how much fame you have, how much money you have, it doesn’t matter.” – Vanilla Ice

It is my belief that the above words are absolutely true, and I have not looked at any one thing given to me as the most important to be thanked. If I were to look for one thing in particular, then the first and perhaps only thing that absolutely matters a lot to me is a thread. But not just any thread, it is a rakhi that my sister ties me on the occasion of Rakshabandhan, a festival that celebrates our bond as siblings. It is one that I have always cherished and I know will continue to cherish for years to come. You know, on the days near the festival, I see these messages on social networking sites asking why such a day is needed and why a sister should do such and such. Do I need a day to express or celebrate the bond between us siblings? Not at all; she knows I care for her, and I know that she does too. But still, when there’s a day for every relationship – Mothers’ Day, Fathers’ Day, Valentine’s Day etc. – why not one for celebrating a bond that means much to me, and I’m sure, to many other siblings.

Sister Dearest,

I’m thankful for that rakhi you tied to me twenty years back, when we had no idea what it meant and why we did it. I’m thankful that each year after that, on the day that celebrates the relationship between us, you continued to tie it. I’m thankful that I could, with that thread, show off in front of my friends that I had a sister who loves me, and that I love her too. I’m glad that, ever since I came to know that a brother gifts something to his sister, I could gift you something; from that first 5 rupee coin, to last year, when I gave you the Nicholas Sparks’ novels that I knew you would love, and thankful for that smile which came on your face, seeing the books. It matters to me that you are happy on that day, and every day. Nineteen times you have given me a rakhi, and I know you know this, but I still have most of them (more than ten). And I cherish them. If there was a “something gifted to me” mattered the most, it is that rakhi, for it shows that you matter to me; and I am waiting for the twentieth on the 29th of August 2015.

(© 3^rd February 2015)

Vinay Leo R.

Poetry & writing to me are to me, a breath of fresh air in a life that is sometimes covered by the smoke of sorrow or self doubt. They also become the sweets I share to celebrate when life offers me a reason to. But most of all, they are to me, my life. For each word I write is a piece of my heart, a thought that just had to find its way into the world.