The privilege of being your columnist
Updated On: 19 January, 2024 04:39 AM IST | Mumbai | Rosalyn D`mello
I cannot express what it means to have fragments of my existence on record in this space and you, dear reader, witness my life through this ongoing crucial, loving pact between the two of us
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In being so intimate with you about my realities, I hoped, secretly, to motivate you to do the same with others, to find a way to articulate the contours of your own complex existence using the rough templates of my own. Representation Pic
It took me a while to recognise the excerpts from my old life re-situated within a dear friend’s apartment in Delhi. At first, there was a feeling of familiarity, a sense of a shared aesthetic. Gradually, the furniture I used to own began to occupy the foreground of my consciousness. When I first moved to my apartment in Kailash Hills, an ex-colleague from my days at Zubaan Books, had taken me to Amar Colony Market, the best haunt for new and second-hand furniture in South Delhi. She drew my attention to a turquoise-painted wooden bench with tiles bearing a flower motif. We bought the piece and then picked a few other choice pieces in relation to it. Last evening, I saw this bench sitting in the basement of my friend Valay’s home. In case you don’t know, Valay Singh is the author of the book Ayodhya: City of Faith, City of Discord, which I highly recommend. And as fate would have it, he married the niece of the friend who picked the bench for me. In its immediate vicinity was the wooden table I had bought from my upstairs’ neighbour for Rs 1,000 that is still going strong. In a room above, next to a wall filled with red-framed Frida Kahlo prints stood my red bookshelf. Diagonally opposite was the aquamarine desk my partner bought me because he wanted me to have something more ergonomic, and that worked in conjunction with the fabulous swivel chair he had also bought me that now lies with my best friend.
At my sister’s home in Mumbai, I got my tender coconut ice cream fix dished out to me in the delicate bowls I had brought back with me from my two-day trip to Singapore, when I was on the jury of a major art award. In my friend Simar’s apartment in Goa, I saw the paper umbrella I had gotten back from my trip to Tokyo that had been sponsored by the Japan Foundation. I also noticed the bookshelves in Valay’s basement were the same one I had given to my friend Supreet, who gave them to Valay after he migrated to Canada.
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