Chapter -15:
...Smooth Sailors...
It’s November 5th,
Urmi’s eighteenth birthday. I’m mixing the batter for her cake when the pressure
cooker whistles. I set the batter aside and turned off the gas stove. This
birthday of Urmi’s is a little different. Mainly because she’s been dating
Diego for two months this time. Diego took her to the festival today. The same
festival Theo took me to over twenty years ago. Urmi told me last week that she
had kissed someone for the very first time and she wanted some advice regarding
the unsettling feeling she was having. She asks me for advice all the time. And
I find myself reliving all of my most adored memories as I narrate them to her.
Diego
and Urmi walk through the door, holding hands. It warms my heart to see them
together, it reminds me of all the times Sawyer and I dated. Diego sits down
next to Aksh, who is here with his parents and little sister, Amelia. Amelia is
two years younger than Urmi, which makes her the youngest child in the family. Urmi
walks into the kitchen and sits on the counter. She swings her feet in the air
and says, “Hey Maa, they say turning eighteen is quite a big deal and that you
enter a whole new phase in your life after eighteen. I don’t think I’m prepared
for that. Do you have some advice for this? Like advice for the general topic
of life? Anything that could make it easier?” I smile at her insecurity. She
wants advice that will make life easier, but nothing makes life easy. I give
her some anyway, “Life can’t be made easier. The easier you try to make it, the
harder it will get. I had my blows of shock in life and hiccups in my marriage. But I
could say that my life was easy once I had hit rock bottom; moving away from
Thiruvananthapuram and to Southwark. That was my rock bottom. But there has
always been one piece of advice that stuck with me throughout those years, it
might help you too. I had asked my mother for advice just like you at
one time when I was, I guess fourteen, and she had said to me that ‘A smooth
sea never made a good sailor’. It is the storms and whirlpools that make
a good sailor, and that a good sailor makes the raging sea seem smooth. It is the
smooth sailors that navigate to far-off lands of accomplishment.” I see Sawyer
walk into the kitchen but he then sees me and Urmi talking. He stops and leans
on the fridge, listening to us. Urmi hasn’t noticed him so I ignore his
presence and continue, “You aim to become one of those smooth sailors, no
matter how things change or which sea you sail into, always steer your ship to
the shore.” Urmi smiles and gives me a hug. Sawyer pulls in as well. It is when
Sawyer does so that Urmi notices him. He smiles down at her and says, “Looks like
Indrakshi’s teaching you how to sail. Well, you’re learning from the best. Your
mother is the smooth sailor who sailed through a cyclone.” Urmi smiles and
walks out of the kitchen, waving at us before she does. Now Sawyer and I are
alone in the kitchen. He leans in and pulls me towards him. He puts his
forehead on mine, “I’m so proud of her. I’m proud of you.” I laugh slightly,
“What for?” He tugs at my waist and I put my hands on his chest, “For making
and raising such a wonderful child, for being the love of my life.” I can’t
help but smile. He catches my smile in his kiss. This kiss was the last bit of
reassurance I needed to know that moving from Kerala actually wasn’t to ruin my
life but to show me a new way. I smile, but not because I’m in love with the
man kissing me, but because I have finally found closure.
I am a good sailor
because I sailed through the storm.
THE END.
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