14th August 2020

Dear Anand,

Sometimes I feel like I’m on a small boat in the middle of a calm, sparkling ocean. For miles in every direction all I can see is light; caroming on the water. Because it’s so still, my boat hardly moves, it just lulls away most days in the sun.

I can no longer see the shores where I had left from and while I’ve never been very good at a calculations, I think I must be somewhere halfway to another shore. I made two mistakes before I left. One, I didn’t know exactly where I was going to go and Two, I was sure I was going to turn back before I got too far.

The light at night moves to the skies; caroming in between the stars. Most nights I stay up finalising strategies on where I must sail off at first light. But come mornings, I find that I have usually fallen asleep.

It is the only time I dread on this boat; when I find myself waking up late in the evenings, when the light is caroming everywhere; lazy ones still on the water, nimble ones already up in the skies, the flighty fairy ones floating in-between sea and the heavens. It is the only time I am afraid that this boat will sink; that the heaviness in the pit of my stomach might actually pull us under.

It is at this brightest time of the day, when I can see my darkest fears.

If I’d decided the night before to turn around and go back, I’m afraid there would be nobody there who’ll remember who I am. And if I had decided to sail forward, I’d dread that I’ll come to a land where nobody will know who I was.

I’m afraid if I go back, I won’t remember who I was and if I go forward, I won’t know who am I anymore.

It is at dusk when I loathe being on this boat the most. And because I know there is no dinner place set for me at neither of the shores, at dawn I pray for storms.

Love,
Shyamni.