An Autobiography

Suddenly I could feel the gentle-warm touch of another lady’s hand on me. She did a careful inspection from her soft nimble fingers and tried to feel me on her palms and hands. Her skin was soft and effused plentiful brightness of an afternoon sun. She looked into my body, and praised my beauty as mine eyes met her fun filled amber eyes. I shivered and felt the frenzy of excitement of finding a new home. The cheerful mood did not last long and I soon found myself in a profound state of despair. The amber eyed lady decided to not to take me home but a yellow and blue colored neighbor of mine. How could people buy cheap colors and leave maroon behind on the shelve?

I was hanging there, and I fluttered as I felt another strong gust of the freezing winter breeze on my body. Destiny seemed to show its back upon me once more and half of the winter had already gone just with a hope of finding a new home. I kept crying on that fateful chilly winter night and with each tear that parted my distressful eyes I lost one hope until I had none in my heart.

Sunrise brought me a new world of hope when Mrs. Biyani finally decided me to take home. It was a comfort ride in a new Corolla. The Biyani’s home was a small mansion in Indore. It was much better than the place I used to be. I spent my childhood days hanging on a road side small shop. I suffered all the atrocities and hostilities that no child would ever want to go through. Rash weather, air pollution, so many unwanted touches, vandalism, and the list is endless. As soon as I reached home Ms. Biyani (Later I found that her name was Khushboo) embraced me with the warmth that I had always wanted. She carefully felt me on her face and wrapped around her shoulders. I felt rattling quivers all over my body and the quest of finding my master seemed over. I was luckier to find a young girl like her. I named her as “Little Princess”. I spent my initial days in her intricately carved, neatly made, wooden cupboard. I was kept away from the sun, in the ever lingering smell of costly perfumes from Europe, in the cozy temperature of the lavish room. And I would always wait impatiently for my turn to be wrapped around to experience and sense the gentle warmth of her body. I despised the other wrap-arounds if they were chosen instead of me.

Luck always take turns and my happy days did not last long. Soon I heard that I would be going to Mumbai with my little princess. I had heard a lot about the place where the Indian peninsula kissed the Arabian Sea. Soon I found myself in a small house with two rooms. As I was hearing from the corner of the suitcase I could figure out that there were two other female voices – Nitika and Nidhi. The new place made my heart to pound with the obscure excitement mingled with subtle apprehension. I liked the place when I was taken out from the suitcase. Nidhi and Nitika quite liked my looks and I liked theirs. I knew they were in love with me the first time they saw me. Perhaps they were jealous of the princess for possessing me. At times Nidhi or Nitika would give a wishful glance at me in the solitude of the new acquired house of mine. They would come close to me, feel me, hold me, and wrap me around over their bodies in front of the mirror. I felt elated and found my soul on cloud number nine with so much of want and love all around me.

The two bedroom apartment soon got choked with the black smoke of conflicts and tensions amongst the three. The prominent personas of the three working girls clashed, cracked, shattered, and restructured themselves each time whenever they felt interference in their individualism. The new structure of the persona was always more accommodating from its predecessor. It was a kind of social evolution where personalities and individuals abrade each other and remove the acute, sharp, and penetrating traits to make everybody sociable and livable in a social structure. The girls also learned to live peacefully, in harmony, and in symbiosis. They had to…

I was brought to the office as the princess extra sensitive body and the soft tender skin could not bear the ruthless bursts of super cooled jets by the office’s AC system. I was ripped off of my home…sweet home…and had been placed in the alien corporate world. I saw managers, employees, professionals, support staff, and what not. The whole corporate dynamics became visible to me as I spent days…weeks….and months. The office was profusely bright outside but still gloomy inside, the sweet fragrance hanged around all the while but it was deadly suffocating, there were uproar and chaos during the peak hours but deep down it was silent, stoned, and cold as a dead body. I was hanged up on the back of the princess’s chair in that uncongenial chaotic space.

On their way to the canteen or to their friend’s place people would deliberately drop me down from the chair pitilessly when the princess was not around. Either they were jealous of my irresistible impressive looks or they had cultured a strange vengeance against me for no justifiable reason. They would inflict all sorts of tortures and barbarities on my vulnerable body and I suffered all the torments of the misfortunate - cleaning their dirty hands and face, stamping on my feeble body with dirty and filthy soles, treating me like a rag, using me to clean their desks and tables, or computer screens….and what not. The corporate inferno that was filled with infernals rendered me numb of pains, emotions, and fears. Nights were scary and chilly; the loneliness in the lonely hours was killing. I somehow waited for the nights though lonesome I was but still away from the infuriating experiences of the day. My tears dried and my heart metamorphosed to stone as I was left there to live my destined life.

All the while my princess had taken her eyes off me as she had found her world and her friends. She barely used me in the office.

I am still hanging there on the back of her chair with bruises all around, still trying to cruise through my cursed life, still I find a new hope every morning like a drop of dew. But as the day goes by and as I suffer through the devil’s hands once more, the hope fades away the same way as the drop of dew disappears in the rage of unforgiving sun. Anyway what I am just another shawl.

Hope that princess will read this and embrace me with love, once again.