A question to all the men - How many of you
get up every morning to the smell of breakfast being prepared in the
kitchen by someone, whom you used to think of as the most beautiful
person in the world a couple of years back, before you exchanged those
rings or vows .
A question to all the women – How many of you reach home every day after work to see wet towels on the sofa and dirty socks on the floor, courtesy someone, whose these very acts seemed very funny and behavior cute sometime back?
In short, how many of those present in the room are married?
How many of you
have to face – ‘Mummy, Daddy, You have to come to the Parents Teachers
Meet this Friday’ or hear -‘Mrs. X, your son again broke my glass
window/ dirtied my lawn’; which makes you swell with proud, thinking of
your son or daughter as future Sachin or Sania?
In other words, how many of you have cute little adorable kids I can play with sometimes?
How many of you love to cuddle your lovely pup or admire the shiny whiskers of those furry little cats? Those Hespers and kitties you love to take for a walk, groom in beauty parlors and feed with pedigree?
How many of you have
watering mouths thinking of delicacies on dining table courtesy your
mother or that sigh of relief at the mere touch of that firm yet soft
hand of your father on your shoulder?
How
many of you have fought with your sister or brother in your childhood
over an extra piece of pizza or every single point in that game of
badminton or carom?
Wondering why am I asking all these questions? What is the link? What is common to all you people who raised their hand for one question or the other?
It is – the feeling called –‘Love’; A strange and beautiful feeling,
that you get when you are with your spouse, your children, your
parents, your favorite dog, your sister, your friend or your lover.
Love – What is it? Wikipedia defines Love as
a number of emotions related to a sense of strong affection and
attachment. The word love can refer to a variety of feelings, states,
and attitudes, ranging from generic pleasure to intense interpersonal
attraction. This diversity of uses and meanings, combined with the
complexity of the feelings involved, makes love unusually difficult to
consistently define, even compared to other emotional states.
Love exists in various forms, loving your friends, loving your country, loving your job, loving a particular thing and so on and so forth. Yes even preparation for an exam :P
All of us experience this feeling at one or the other time in life. Except perhaps those, who were sleeping in the beginning and did not answer yes to any of the question.
Patriotism – Remember the Kargil war, when everyone was seen with the tricolor in hand and fervor in heart – Saying ‘I Love my India’.
Seen
those advertisements on the Madhapur – jubilee hills road asking you
straight in the face – ‘We love coming for work, do you?’
Watched
– Rang de Basanti – another example of patriotism at one hand and the
love for a friend at other, love for justice in the larger picture?
How many of you have been to pizza hut saying – I love that ebony & Ivory ice-cream?
Experienced those cute little moments of puppy love when that humble guy or radiant gal were the ones you went to school for?
The most common form of love people think of when they hear this word,
would be that of lovers, of two people committed to take care of each
other, to be with each other in moments of happiness and strife –
sounds similar to the vows of wedding? Well wedding it-self is based on
that feeling of mutual respect & Love. Without these, it’s but a
baseless arrangement between two human beings to spend their lives
together as per the social custom. Love is the feeling which keeps that
relationship alive.
Let me share with you a story.
A
girl was talking to her mother about the changes to expect in her life
after her fast approaching wedding date. She was worried about the
love she may or may not get from her would be husband. As a wedding
gift, her mother gave her a joint account. She told her daughter to
deposit some money, let’s say 100 bucks, every time she felt good about
her new life or experienced something nice. She also asked her to
record the event in the passbook. Daughter did as told. A couple of
years later – she had a huge row with her husband, it went to such an
extent that she called up her mother and said – I want to get divorced.
Her mother assuaged her heretic beliefs and told her, it is fine, but
how will you manage? The girl too, didn’t want to ask for monetary help
from her parents. It was then that the mother reminded her of that
joint account. She asked her to go check that balance. Daughter took
out the passbook and leafed through the pages. Lo! There were the most
beautiful moments of her married life etched in paper in front of her.
Tears swarmed her eyes; she understood the lesson, thanked her mother
and got back to sewing up the pieces of life on the threshold of that
irreparable damage divorce might have caused.
What is it that I want you to take from these 5-7 minutes? The fact that Love, indeed is one of the most important requisite of our lives, that giving somebody the gift of love is one of the most precious gifts you can give or get;
that the next time you see a soul in need of affection, don’t
hesitate, go ahead and give that jadu ki jhappi; when you see a broken
heart, go ahead and console, shower them with love and affection, teach
them to get back to faith in Love.
I would like to conclude with these two lines I read somewhere some time back which got me thinking and writing about Love:
I look in to your eyes and this is when,
I thank you for teaching me to love again!
