Holding the drop

life my friends is never easy for anyone sometimes because people hate you and sometimes because they love you.The twist is contrary to the belief,its mostly because they love you, because they care too much about you ,and this unfortunately is because they assume they know you and take your voice for granted.
 A few years back ,some how i felt like dusting a few things i forgot existed,high above the shelf that we forgot to clean for years, in a paper warped in dust and a few drops of paint those memories that were once filed to capture the best moments were now lying lifelessly as just piled dust.Dusting off the cover of ignorance and unwrapping stories that existed and faded even before i was born ,i flipped through the photographs with a hope that i could find the kid in my mom ,in search for clues to confirm the innocent version of my carefully constructed mother.flipping through them i found a lot ,but somehow all i could conclude was she was  always too matured to be kids.all through those pictures i saw her help, i saw her work,i saw her study and i also saw her win, but none of those pictures showed me how she looked like when she was alone , when she was smiling ,when she was crying, when she was a kid.I wanted to believe what those pictures narrated, but somehow again i was convinced that there must have been tears that she shed and smiles that she lived ,because there at least should be ashes of childhood if she ever lived as  a human.i believed that there must be at least one picture that could narrate the story behind her silence .my mind as usual flashed to me an image ,it must be a glance of what happened in my presence in the past ,may be some ignored moments that had a hidden story. It was a memory of a half burnt crumbled termite bit paper book i once saw  in her  hands with a never before expression ,i remember the current location gladly so i rushed to the drawer of the study room,in the dead bottom of the last drawer beneath the shadows of piled certificates and gold medals an old album with a leather coat."sweet memories" were hand written in gold ink on the first page, with sure confidence i flipped trough ,empty handed again i shut the book ,it was just as normal as the others of its kind.disappointed and tired i banged the book on to the floor and then fell out a picture .a large white wooden window probably carved out of rose wood and painted white , an attached study table to the frame work,a dull iron office chair that is a part of my home even now and the view of the muddy cartwheel road with kids playing in rain and probably a seven or eight year old mum  ,dressed in a typical school uniform, hair plated and tied up in buns and pen in hand and book on desk ,who else could it even be except my mum,she was leaning her head on the side wall of the study table stretching an open palm to the drop that was half way to touch the ground from the sealing ,it was such a good picture but yet narrated only half the story .curious about the complete story i peeped into the details and then i witnessed the answer that i was searching for, the drop of tear on my mom's cheek ,shining slightly in the dim black and white photo and the words"hope you can feel the drops" written behind the photo in a font that is nearly illegible to human eye, i suspect that the words were written by  mom ,but i am not sure.that picture in  a whole told me the secret that i have always guessed, it proved that my mother was a human, again being my practical mother's daughter is very hard and not getting influenced is even more impossible so out of habit i wanted to test the answer that my brain has weaved .slowing entering my mother's study i put the photograph on her table and looked up .sitting in the chair as royal as ever , with a cold face that had no sign of any humanly emotion ,she looked at  the photograph on the table once and looked at me after a while."why did you study so much that you never played?"i asked in a low tone ,rising up on her two feet ,pushing her chair a little she stood up before me .putting a hand on my head she said"because i am a girl who's life was always about do or die,and the only sword i had in hand for either choices  was knowledge".her sentence was enough for me to understand a lot of things that she never waned to explain or more precisely what she could not comprehend,so i asked no more ,but for the first time my mother asked me a question"why did you search ?".walking out of the room i turned back to her to say the only words i had to explain myself," because i felt the drop". "did you ?how?i never allowed you to ,did i?"she said with a dull smile , "i dared to " i answered her involuntarily, and as far as i remember that was the first time i saw her smile.i still remember the the little curve formed when her lips extended its edges to the extreme ends of her cheeks and her teeth showing their shine from the slight gap of her busy lips and the satisfaction in her eyes.I expected her to say something but she never did.
lying on her death bed a few days back ,just before she closed her eyes for eternal sleep she stretched her palm to my face and held a tear in her hand and said "finally i dared to feel it" .
i wanted to cry my heart out ,but the moment she uttered these words i smiled ,i smiled exactly like she did that day, and then i knew for once that i did dare to feel the drop but only now i learnt to hold the drop.
-Amulya

dedicated to all those who not just dared to touch the drop but also hold them in their hands so that they can make others have a view of the oceans in their fists.