Thursday, October 16, 2014

Am I too happy?

A house in Parmawala, Bijnor district


Razia's husband died a few years ago. Her father-in-law is blind, her eldest daughter still a teenager. She also has a grandmother and two young children. Razia has had to learn how to maximise her resources to keep her family going. She rents land at Rs.10,000 a year, but stays away from planting high-risk, high-investment vegetables like the rest of the village. Instead, she went to the block agricultural office and got some eucalyptus seeds for free. She has now started a nursery of these and will sell them in a year's time to the other farmers in the village. Razia applies her brains as well as her strength to her work. If the dam authorities do not release water till her saplings are sturdy enough,if the rains come in time, next year might just see them not having to borrow food. That seems to be poor reward for all her effort and ingenuity.

She was the strongest person I met last week. The others seemed utterly  beaten down by all the challenges they faced. And who can blame them? An unimaginable lack of options and resources, all their  efforts laid waste by god-like dam authorities, and the burden of generations of malnutrition and illiteracy.

I came home tired yesterday and crept into Mian's arms. There I usually find comfort, but not last night. I lay for a long time listening to his breathing, with the reassuring weight of his arm across me, and I was terrified.

Mian and I, we are truly blessed. Our home, our family, our friends, our work, each other. I come back from visits like these and am scared that this is  too much to have. Is there something like being too happy? too rich? And I know this is silly of me, but last night all the old tales of the jealousy of gods kept coming into my head.
I am scared.

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

Those of us who know you, know how hard you work to make your life as beautiful as it is now.

Your happiness seems 'too much' because it takes so little
to make you happy.

Others' happiness makes you happy - always.

You see other people's struggles, appreciate people and what they do.

You see good in everything.

You emphasise the good, the beautiful parts of your life, and do not speak of the hardships, some bad incidents, difficulties.

Stay happy. You deserve to

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