Vocal Mama

I like watching Bollywood movies and the typical rom-com which depicts that you find just the perfect guy/girl, get married, and then live happily ever after. But well, is that true? I guess not. Based on my experience, finding the seemingly perfect guy/girl is only the first step of the relationship, dating and getting married would be second and third but the saga does not end here, the happily ever after takes a LOT of efforts from both sides. When I met my husband for the first time, I loved everything about him. When I started dating him, I still loved most things about him and then when we got married and were on our own, I realized that I like some things about him, and I hate some of his habits to the core but knowing the things that I did not like about him did not really affect my love for him. Love is and should be irrational, crazy, and unconditional otherwise its whole idea is defeated. The maximum arguments that we had in our marriage were within the first year. Even thou...

Birthdays have always been a huge deal to me. I will tell you why. As far as I remember, starting from my third or fourth birthday, in the morning, I used to get up to birthday music getting played in the background. My papa had made a customized audio tape to play on my birthdays. I remember that tape being played each year on my birthday till I turned around 15 and moved out of the home. Later I used to get dressed in brand new clothes to go to school and in the evening, we used to have a party at home. My mom used to cook all the delicious food and my papa used to decorate the room for party. He even used to craft a crown for me to wear sometimes. My parents raised me to treat birthday like festivals. I remember asking papa why we celebrate birthdays with such zest; he said, “it’s a way to be thankful for all you have achieved last year and to enthusiastically welcome the next year of your life.” Once I grew up, the method of celebration changed but celebrating birthday in full swin...