Saturday, March 14, 2015

The Power of Togetherness

(We three)



Home is always where happiness is. Even if we are wallowing in darkness due to our personal problems or work tensions, the moment one reaches home and sees the smiling faces of our loved ones, we attain peace. Days filled with tension becomes cheerful and happy. 

Two years ago, I had my MA literature exams. I had joined a correspondence course to fulfil my long cherished dream of learning literature. I was a Civil Engineering graduate and hence studying for literature was as different as chalk is from cheese, for me.

All that helped me was my reading habit. I had read half of the novels prescribed in the syllabus. But poetry, drama, early English, criticism and linguistics were strange fields for me. I had begun studying for it earnestly months before the exams was to begin, but I had a toddler to look after and a house to manage. It was tough. Free hours were rare. But I squeezed in a few hours of studies every day after my husband and son slept.

With hardly a month to go before the exams, I panicked one afternoon and broke down in tears. I had applied to write for both years of MA simultaneously and that meant ten days of continuous examinations. Naturally, I felt I would never be able to complete studying the portions or pass.

When my husband returned from office that evening, he understood something was wrong from my moody silence. He made me sit with him and I wept uncontrollably. I told him I was a fool to have applied for it, as it was so different from what I had studied. My ardent love for literature was probably not enough.

Initially he let me blabber all the things that I wanted to let out. Then he began to talk. He told me how passion was all I needed for anything. It didn’t matter if I scored well. All that mattered was that I wanted to learn literature as it was close to my heart.

“If you can’t manage to attend all the examinations at a stretch, skip a few. You can attend it next time. Concentrate on what you find easy and leave the rest. And yes, there is no compulsion. Don’t worry about the money you paid. It is all for your happiness. If it is making you miserable, leave it. You don’t need an MA to prove that you love literature or to pursue your writing dreams,” he said.
It was as though a burden had been offloaded. I began to see the exams pragmatically and not with dread. With my tension gone, I was able to concentrate on my studies better. He started to come home early and would take care of our son and help me with cooking.

He took fifteen days leave during exams from office and arranged a taxi to drop me and pick me back as the exam centre was at a distance of one-hour travel by car. My toddler who would not leave me alone for a minute spent hours in company of my husband alone. When he missed me, he would come into the room where I was studying behind closed doors to hug me and say he loved me.

With all this love, I looked up with optimism and I attended all the exams and the ten days changed me in more ways than one.Together we passed MA English literature with flying colours




This post is written for the #together, #LookUp campaign by https://housing.com/



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