Writing
set me free after I turned 40. Till that time, my imagination used to always
work. But I couldn’t write. Why?
Looking
back, I realised that it was the shame of wearing my heart on my sleeve;
sharing my inner most thoughts with strangers; fear of criticism.
God
has his own way of working, moving us towards the goals we are born for. No, I
don’t believe that He’s a puppeteer who’s pulling the strings. That’s the
dumbest theory brought about by Mr. Failure.
I worked
in a school office (no, I am not rambling, please bear with me till the end of
this blog) for a few years. I was secretary-cum-admin-cum-typist-cum-general
dogsbody. It was up to me to type out the hand-written articles submitted by
kids for the school magazine.
The
guru comes to you when you are ready to learn. My guru(s) came to me in the
form of tiny kids from Std. I, II & III along with the school Principal.
The kids were given free rein – to write any damn thing that came to their
minds. My mind boggled at their imagination; even more so with their freedom of
expression. I was under the impression that most of the articles/stories would
have to be re-written. I was astonished when Princy told me to just check for
spelling and grammar and leave the content alone.
Voilà, the writer in me was born at that point
– or so I believe – even if it took me a few more months to pen my first
bestseller.
My
jaw was hanging throughout the time I typed out the articles. Yeah, there were
many from the older children too. But the ones from these small kids were the
ones that were truly fascinating. I think that they unlocked something in me. All
these years, I had been imagining the stories that I wanted to tell. But I
never had the guts to bare my thoughts to others. When I saw the way these tiny
tots told their tales fearlessly, it struck me that I could do it too.
And the writer in me was born a few
months after I quit my job.
Today,
I am known as a romance author who writes about women’s issues. Yes, some kind
of an issue does seem to spring up in my books – except for Meghna and MatchesMade in Heaven (an anthology of 13 short stories).
These
two books are for pure entertainment. People who read these books first and my
others later, are convinced that these books are excellent. But, if they read
them in the reverse order, they think that these two are not up to my standard.
Do
I have a standard? Please don’t place me
in a Golden Cage!
A
request to my readers:
I
have acquired my freedom after 40, to express myself through writing. Let me
be! Don’t put my writing on a pedestal. It doesn’t belong there. I write for
fun, for entertainment. I write pure fiction. I write for the joy of it. I hope
to bring a few hours of fun and joy to my reader. I don’t plan to preach. I don’t
want to preach.
Life
in this world of illusion is both positive and negative. A hero cannot be
identified without the villain. So, I thank both of them for being what they
are.
In
the words of William Shakespeare:
“All
the world's a stage,
And
all the men and women merely players;
They
have their exits and their entrances...”
