#109 A window into my childhood

A part of us always stays behind in our childhood bedroom

Oct 23, 2022

Dearest,

This week, I have been thinking about my childhood bedroom, a room I recently left forever after 28 years of calling it mine.

ode to the bedrooms of studio ghibli 🛏🌱 — Studio Ghibli

Here’s a glimpse of my room for you:

* My grandma’s Shalimar coconut oil tin container on the window sill, the container’s gone but the round stains still hold her in the here and now.

* Cardboard boxes cut and saved to make something someday.

* Parent’s wardrobe because even if brown parents want to give you freedom, they are sure not to give you too much of it.

* Bubble gum stickers on the polished door that made dad mad for a week.

* My height marked through years 4 to 13.

* Movie posters of movies I watched with the first boyfriend that I don’t tell my current boyfriend about.

* A Godrej almirah with a spoilt lock because I tried my B-Grade lock-picking skills on it.

* A series of broken cups turned into holders for broken pencils.

* A carrom board that we abandoned after someone told us the clatter of coins brings sorrow. (We would take it out on days mom wasn’t home. Our cackle was loud enough to fool agony and make it knock on a different door, hopefully, one that opened from the outside.)

* A pair of clean woolen socks still waiting to take the shape of my feet.

* An explosion of colors on a cushion that would kiss my heart every night as I slept.

* A Van Gogh painting under the mattress because I kept waiting for the right time to frame it.

* Curtains that kept the world away without slamming the door on its face.

* Between the walls, secrets, lies, prayers, dreams, and hopes swirl in the air such that when someone walks in, they ought to say, the room still smells of her.