‘The spirit of a WOMAN’

On Sunday, my OCD kicked in and I decided to clean the house. To make cleaning a bit interesting I selected some old classics of Nayyara Noor. I played my favorite song Kabhi Hum bhie khoobsurat theye…… and held on to the magic mop with dear life. Nayyara’s with her soul searching voice sang the beautiful lyrics written by Ahmed Shamim, I could not help ponder upon the simplicity of emotions and the deep sadness embedded  in the lyrics of this song. I have listen to it a 100 times before, but somehow with age, the meaning of many things have changed so drastically that even I am surprised myself. The song talks about the beauty of emotions more than the physicality of the beauty itself, it emphasizes on the spirit and the joy found in that jubilant spirit. Somehow beauty and age is such an important thing for women, I am not sure if it is a big issue for men also, as their age or beauty is never discussed. But for women it’s a stark reality, we often have to tilt our faces in various direction when looking in the mirror trying to get an image of what we were like when we started our journey of womanhood. Everything seems to be wearing out, or being pulled down by the force of gravity, F=G*, F is the force of attraction and G the gravitational Constant. This gravitational force for women is surly a constant that pulls everything down.

As I walked towards the console table in the room to clean the family pictures, I picked up an old picture of myself sitting by a water fountain, I noticed how our lives as women are a lot like a fountain; bubbling and oozing with force at the top and as the water is pulled down by gravity it becomes calm and settles in the pond, that same pond is where many people soak their feet and find solace.  If the fountain didn’t have the oozing power it would not attract attention and if it didn’t have the cold pond it would not give a resting place to many. The sum of both the components complete the beautiful experience of sitting by the fountain and admiring its wholeness, so similar to what most women like me experience in our lives, the power and beauty of youth and soon crows feet, and wrinkles along with the highlights of grey and the inevitable sagging of many parts. Our body tells us something else where our mind most of the time refuses to accept the process of aging. One thing is so common between a woman and a fountain; that is, they both have the same spirit; the spirit that lifts the mood of many in distress. Women are blessed with the power of self healing; they find comfort in the simplest experiences. Why? Because their spirit doesn’t allow them to stay low for a long time.  A simple hair cut, a call from a dear friend, chaat and pani pouri session with sisters are the things we women do to self heal and forget the worries and stresses that boggle our mind day in and out. There is nothing like the ‘spirit of a woman’, it has the power to heal, the power to brighten, the power to do wonders.