From The Quill of Suranya

I am the daughter who brought bad grades home. And every time I did, I saw a look of disappointment in my parents' eyes. I am the daughter who made my parents worry about my future. To the world that counts the intelligence of a child by their maths number, I was the stupid, head-in-the-clouds, immature person who cried at the slightest inconvenience. I matured later than my parents expected me to, and I was pretty sure at some point in my clueless life that I could perhaps never make anyone feel proud of me. The complaints were piling up. But I did, I made myself proud of who I am the most. Everyone else comes after that. I found my way, I stick to my dreams and believe in my ability to fulfil them, maybe not all at once but slowly, gradually and finally. I became independent not by choice but by the way life experiences taught me to be self-reliant, which is the best way to keep me from expectations and hurt. I go through existential crises, knowing so does everyone else at all a...

It is weird how selectively our memories work, almost like we remember only impactful parts of dreams. Sometimes, when we remember someone or something, what pops up in our mind as a memory is a fabrication of reality with our imagination or interpretation of the person or event. Retelling of these same stories makes them as real as the present, yet they are not. Most parts are our perspective of a person or place, or event, and if you start sharing, you realise their memories of the same can be different from yours. Perhaps that is why happiness is rare, because when we look back, we only remember the profound moments. We don't try to recollect the unpleasant, the worst days and nightmares, yet they haunt us at our lowest points. But what about the mundane, peaceful days? We fail to appreciate them while they last, because they cause no emotional surge. Yet we crave normalcy and define it as happiness. Imagine if all our days were mundane, we would perhaps be devoid of nostalgia o...

Looking through your journals can be therapeutic. You understand what you did wrong and learnt from experience. I was going through my teenage journal and came across this one page where I admit to having a crush on someone when I was 13. I was a self-aware teen, hitting puberty and questioning my looks like any other. When I read what followed after I befriended him, today I would say he was aware of my feelings, exploited and manipulated me into believing he was a friend and made me do his work for him. I was a fool to think all that would get me into his good books and let him. It may look all naive and silly now, but I continued this one-way friendship for years till I could finally let it go and accept that he was not a decent human being. It was okay to stop being friends by choice. Why am I sharing this? Because most of my readers are teens who are going through their first crushes, puberty, heartbreak and everything else. It's important to know and realise that the portraya...

Recently, someone asked me about Book Recommendations, and I realised the kind of books I read is very different from the kind of stories I write. It's a conscious decision not to read the same genre of fiction because often your favourite writer's style and words effortlessly and subconsciously creep into your writing and ideas, and you lose your individuality. But more than that, I honestly enjoy writing the genres I write, especially Romance, more than reading them. Perhaps because through the process I also discover their stories and journey. I never plan a story or its theme and let the words flow. Often, the story ends up being utterly different from what I intend it to be. But it's their journey, I let the characters speak to me. This December, when the deadly combination of Writer's Block and sickness attacked me between two long-pending drafts, I found it hard to relax. It felt like the characters were waiting for their Stories to be told, and they were just st...

Some days you don't feel like getting out of bed, you want sickness to engulf you, finding comfort in the fact that it will help you rest, yet it doesn't. A sore throat makes you restless, and everything you planned goes haywire. You don't like the music you otherwise groove to, you can't write a sentence without hating yourself, you can't look at the mirror without self-criticism, watching anything feels irking, and you have no idea what will make you feel better. You try everything from self-pampering to pep-talk and often try to find some comfort in people who you think understand you. Yet, you oddly find them irking too. On these days, take a step back, stop being harsh on yourself and be grateful you got through yet another bad day, keeping your darkest thoughts at bay. © Suranya

Remember when we were kids and we thought that 20s were grown-up years, to be moms and wives, because we saw that around us, and we thought people in their 30s had things sorted. They worked, had enough savings to start families and thought about investments, cars and homes. Today, in my 30s, I realise I am as clueless about life as I was when I was 15. Yes, I have been forced to "adult" by experiences I never chose to have, traumas I never imagined and mental and physical health issues I once attributed to old people, but am I truly ready to be responsible if I had a choice? We are all forced into our paths of career, choices and decisions as adults more than we ever intend to. The sleepless nights we once spent thinking about our life goals are now stressed with investment issues, parents getting older, people around us leaving all the time for various reasons and our innermost insecurities. We realise that life is not as meaningful or purposeful as we thought it to be. We ...

It's 1.30AM on 5th September, 2024. The city of Kolkata is awake as it awaits justice. We have placards, slogans, and protest marches. Thousands are on the streets, young and old. We are singing, dancing, organising street plays, writing poems, and painting streets. Art as a form of protest runs in our veins. I wrote bits and pieces of these writings through the past 27 sleepless nights and sudden feelings of overwhelm. I thought they were too personal to share. Seeing my city in protest today, knowing I have to do my bit, however small, so that tomorrow I can live with self-respect, here's what I do best. Write it all down. It may resonate with some. It may not work with others. But this is for hope. This is for justice. For her who united us in this unbelievable strength to carry on, but had to lose her life for it. I have always been an opinionated woman. Not sure if I was "raised" that way, or the habit of questioning came naturally to me (My parents still warn me...

Today, someone asked me, "How are you?" I felt like crying, lamenting, and sharing. Telling them I can't tell why I feel this way. But I do. I struggle to sleep. I fear happiness. I don't laugh the way I cry anymore. But they won't understand our story, they won't realise how important each night becomes coz I see you there in the darkness of the corner of my room. I can't explain how a simple hug, an unlocked door, an argument, A criticism triggers me the way no person could. So I smile and say, "I am fine," and spend the next hour hearing their problems because I feel guilty of mine being unsolvable. © Suranya

The rain reminds me of letting go. There is something beautiful yet melancholy about letting go. Cleaning your room often feels like therapy. But it also takes you down nostalgia lanes to places you may not want to visit. Like that pair of earrings someone once gifted me. We don't talk anymore. I have no idea what she is doing. The colour of the earrings has faded, just as our friendship has. That one pendant I wore to a memorable date once. The stones have come off, yet a part of me wanted to keep that as a memory of a person who never was anything. Just because I had a good day. I discarded that with longing. I know now that every time I open my jewellery box and do not see it, perhaps I will not remember that day anymore, and I am okay with it. Then come the most precious possessions. Scrapbooks, handwritten letters, artwork. People you never met often leave a mark on your life. You keep things to remember them by. There is no harm in holding on to attachments. But I realised we...

Sometimes there are days you feel like not getting out of bed, not being productive and staring at the empty Google Doc document with the cursor blinking for hours. Even if the words come, they are forced and not flowing, and backspaces do most of the job. Shutting off the laptop, going for a motivational walk, having a coffee to wake your brain up or even watching something doesn't help. But why are unproductive days not normalised? We are humans, not machines. There are days I sleep four hours and write so much that I forget my lunch time, and there are days I feel like doing nothing. Then why do I feel guilty about the unproductive days? Like I "wasted" a day rather than taking time off. Especially if I am writing a story nowadays, I usually write one chapter and go through the previous few per day. That way, the draft and correction go hand in hand, and I know if the chapters are syncing. But on days I can't write, or I feel the plot or sentences are off-putting b...

They say when something ends, something else starts. Usually, it's better than what ended. But nobody tells you that between an end and a beginning, there is a period of void. Uncertainty and self-doubt exist and often drown you in darkness. Don't let the void consume you. It is the blank page between two chapters of life. A time of self-discovery and rest before you embark on another adventure in life. © Suranya

Remember that girl who boards the same bus at the same stop at the same time daily? You know her face but not what she does. So you weave a story around her. That book she likes, the jacket she wears, the bag she carries in the commute or how she lip-syncs to music on her earphones. You read about girls like her. Remember that woman who begs on the street? What is her story? Is she poor or abandoned? Betrayed by her own? In your head, she has a family who refuses to look after her. She becomes that random character namelessly existing in the corner of your story. Remember how every missing piece of an unsolved puzzle in the world has conspiracy theories? How someone is not dead because we found no body. How someone spotted an unknown creature in a desert. Theories become our closure stories to things we can't answer with science yet. Remember that book where you pictured a rebellion? The author had penned a slogan or purpose. Made up stories to highlight atrocities. Little did he k...

Today I was going through an old box of memories. Cassettes, scrapbooks, slam books, Mills & Boons, Tintin comics, Meg Cabot's Princess Diaries series... And I chanced upon a journal I used to keep back in college. I had no idea how it got mixed up with the school notebooks and teenage hobbies. I fondly remember keeping a diary every day back then, since my early teens, well into college. Even if the day was uneventful, I would still end it by writing down what happened. The random page turned to 23rd March, 2013. I don't remember what happened that day. But I wrote that I was crying alone in my room. I don't remember what the argument was about, but I had blamed myself for everything bad around me. Back then, I was neither aware of my mental health nor could I recognise toxic relationships. Perhaps because I was in one. I had quoted every word he said that day. I had even asked myself why I was with a person so self-absorbed (I perhaps couldn't use the word selfish...

Sometimes the smallest actions speak more than big gestures. Like you are walking down a road and you see their favourite flower, you send them a picture as a reminder that you remember their favourite flower. Or when you walk into a departmental store and see something in their favourite colour and decide to surprise them by wearing it the next time they see you. You care enough to share a picture of yourself every day, even at your worst, because they can't see you soon. Or write them a letter to keep and read whenever they miss you. You often try to read their favourite books or hear their favourite kind of music to understand a person better. Try their favourite drinks or meal to see if you can share one on the next date. Or simply ask, How was your day? And hear them rant. No judgment, no advice. No amount of gifts, big surprise gestures or anything else can replace genuine efforts. © Suranya

Remember that rock upon the valley where we sat? Watching the day turn into dusk, the sun disappearing behind the horizon. Little by little, the stars came out, veiling the night sky like glitter on a dress. You sat half an inch away from me, carefully avoiding contact, of body and eyes. The wind whispered in silence. If not for the flow of the stream that gushed against the rocks on its bed, I would have felt my Sown breath and heart beat. Somehow, this silence was a comforting bliss. A feeling of peace. Like I belonged there, in that moment, with you. Then we walked away, back to our mundane lives, where we belong. Miles away from each other. Just a picture in the heart. The rock still sits there, however, hoping for our reunion. © Suranya

Since the COVID-19 days, I have limited my bus journeys unless necessary. After almost two years, I started regularly using the commute again, especially for long-distance journeys. It's on one such journey that I looked up to check the rain clouds and discovered that the journey looks so different if you keep looking up. The sun, moon, stars and clouds seem to travel with you, and as the branches in their geometric designs pass by, one can imagine oneself lying on a haystack on top of an open caravan or horse-drawn carriage being transported back in time. Come the tall old buildings of central Calcutta, and you can see their exquisite designs standing the test of time, a small, detailed motif or simply a name plate, almost faded into oblivion. The verandahs overlooking the busy streets full of traffic (which by the way I suddenly realised looks the same everywhere) are often filled with potted plants, discarded things or a broken railing, and sometimes an old man in his dhuti sitt...

Having grown up hearing the stories of Agomoni from our grandparents' generation, how Maa Durga is but a daughter returning home to us, for five days, and the blue sky and white clouds being a reflection of her happiness on her impending homecoming. Then suddenly clouds begin to gather, and my grandmother would often say, Oh look, there it is, Shiva seems angry. Why, I would ask, the eager child in me, always having a love for stories. And love stories. The clear blue sky and the fluffy white clouds are another natural thing that preludes the Dhak of Durga Pujo. Every time I see it, no matter when and where, it reminds me of her. Having grown up hearing the stories of Agomoni from our grandparents' generation, how Maa Durga is but a daughter returning home to us, for five days, and the blue sky and white clouds being a reflection of her happiness on her impending homecoming. Then suddenly clouds begin to gather, and my grandmother would often say, Oh look, there it is, Shiva se...

And yet another day passes by, and I realise that I feel less and less. For everything around me. My existence is at stake. My humanity is in question. I can't come to terms with the fact that I can't be understood, I can't be heard. My silences are killing me, as a part of my heart learns to unlearn everything it once learned and detach from what hurts and a part of my mind feeds it with logic. Why is it the right thing to do? And then there is my soul. It eats away dreams, piece by piece, trying hard not to think of all the things it once deemed true. © Suranya

Have you ever heard the music each place creates at night? The winter night is long and silent. From behind the closed doors and windows, we can occasionally hear the otherwise inaudible trains chugging by the station a few kilometres away, or the hooting of the owl that flies by close in a chaotic rhythm. Once or twice, a puppy squeaks in the chill or two cats sound like a baby wailing, like a musical background score of a haunting movie. If you listen carefully, you can hear the sound of the breeze against the windowpanes. And breaking the otherwise quiet that the night wears is the sound of an ambulance winding through the road at a distance. You figure out from which direction it comes and where it travels. Then there is the sound of dry leaves rustling and the occasional footsteps of people walking on them. Does this city ever fall silent? Probably not. Because even silence has a sound. Perhaps of your own breath or heartbeat. All making music, all that can be heard in separate mu...

The older we grow, our expectations of love change. It's something that happens naturally. We tend to prioritise our needs and wants and call it love. Our mushy teen selves that once believed in the purity of such feelings are often overshadowed by socially set standards and judgements on how one's partner should work right, be settled, and have certain materialistic offerings rather than the emotional capabilities we once sought. But then, once in a while, all of us wish to go back to that unscarred pure self of ours that wanted a love very rarely found beyond stories of romance. But deep down, you know you would give anything to have it. Then there are days, fleeting moments, words said and unsaid and perhaps one single incident that makes you momentarily feel that love you wanted to feel. The expectations you once had from this feeling. Of finding peace, solace, and a home. In that moment, you feel like you have been waiting all your life for that one single moment of bliss....