what if there was nothing wrong with us
Back Again, with a NEWS!
Dear Reader,
Thank you for being here. I hope your week has been fun-filled.
Apologies for my prolonged absence. No longer should I say I’ve been busy. I should say I couldn’t write the newsletter. Yes, I was busy. My Mac crashed. Then there were issues at home. The scorching weather didn’t allow me to do much. My editor was going on vacation so I had to finish a project sooner than I could. I was working non-stop. I would say I only breathed when she left on the 9th of August. I could have sent a letter then. An update on what has been happening, where I’m (now in the Himalayas in North India), what work I’ve been doing that’s keeping me so busy (about to disclose soon not because it’s a secret but I want to make sure I have it under control), and how I have been (a little good and a little bad.)
But I have also been catching my breath.
It’s been a while since I said anything here, or anywhere else. At least, that’s what it would look like. The last travel notes I made are from Ooty and Kodaikanal, mountain towns in South India we visited in March of this year. From Ooty, my partner and I made our way Northwards to my parents, as I told in the past letters. On the last day of transition, my partner drove 300 km and I drove 300 km. Though we thought we would be at their place for a week or a fortnight, we ended up staying with my parents for precisely five months. After travelling through Southern India for months, I was desperate to get back to the writing project I had put to rest. I wanted to be away from it to look at it with fresh eyes. So, at my parent’s gardened home, I wrote and edited.
In the five months, I did a lot. This is not a revision of what I achieved and did not or how much I learned about living together with family and how much more patient I can be with my old parents. No. That would take a long time. On another note, please let me know if you would like to read about any of these themes.
This is a narrative, a simple attempt to catch up with you, my readers. I have really missed sending this newsletter, so much so that the entire time I didn’t send it I felt incomplete. As if there was just this one more task that I had to do and then everything would be alright. Putting out this letter summarizing what I did, read, saw, and thought along with my photographs is also how I make sense of my own past week. It’s natural to feel incomplete without this newsletter for I have been sending it since 2017, when I launched my personal growth and travel blog On My Canvas. August’17 was the first active month of the blog, and December’17 was the first time I emailed a newsletter.
Early readers would know that I used to send a simple letter with a new article, a thought of the week, a question, a book, and something to watch. I had copied the format of the newsletter from another writer. I had begun to read many newsletters and something I read stuck with me. I thought—this worked with me, I like this, this style would also work for my readers. I started the weekly letter with less than a hundred subscribers. Sometimes I wrote it in five minutes. I always finished my work week on Saturday by emailing that newsletter. Then I went out with friends or my boyfriend, who is now my life partner. As I stayed in all week, I was out and about on Sunday in the sunshine. No writing, no work.
With time, more subscribers joined in. The letter also evolved. I now began it with a little story or an anecdote. My partner told me that the story was his favorite part. He said, “I want to read more. Write longer narratives.” Really? I was surprised. Flattered but also annoyed.
Longer? Each word of writing is an effort no matter how much I like to write. Isn’t it enough that I pen down articles every week, spend all my evenings reading, and work six days a week? This six was now seven actually. I would travel out of town alone, sometimes for months at a time. While away, I explored, learned, wrote, and freelanced. Back at home, I wrote aggressively. Apart from some daily routines, I would give up on everything else and work, my head down on my Mac. Write to publish, write to record, write to impress, write to earn, write to catch up, and write to share. While away I might miss the letter. But at home, I always sent it. How could I not when I could conveniently prepare it and email it from the comfort of my desk? Except that it wasn’t always convenient or quick. A few readers said the letter was long and they couldn’t read it. But I didn’t get enough input on a poll I once shared on long versus short so I kept it as it was, favoring the majority who responded.
My blog also grew and changed. Now I wasn’t writing personal growth and travel pieces only. I was publishing an amalgam of the two. How an old Himalayan woman unknowingly taught me about resilience or Why is getting dumped good for you, these were the usual titles. The blog was now reaching more people. The newsletter had over a thousand subscribers. That’s a lot of people, in my opinion. Even though many writers on Substack have tens of thousands of readers, I think fourteen hundred (almost) isn’t a bad number.
Almost fourteen hundred of you have voluntarily chosen to receive a letter from me in your inboxes every week. Thank you. Your trust is everything.
I haven’t been able to send a letter every week though. What happened alongside the promise of earning from writing and staying healthy and good, being a good friend and partner and daughter and human and writer and so on is that I gave up on anything I could call home and bought a car with my partner. Together we have been on the road since February 2021, all our stuff in the car and us two too. I have written extensively about this long, indefinite trip in the massive article.
Now we were driving around the length and breadth of India, with our laptops. It is as fancy but as crazy as it sounds. Anyone who say this life is easy is lying. Not because of the financial aspect or the freedom. Well, what about those two?
I know many have asked me about money and being able to balance it all, many got the answer from the post I shared above, and a lot still want to know more.
You need to keep earning to spend. Living on the go or on the road or indefinite travelers or digital nomads or nomadic, no matter what name I might be given, or as I call myself itinerant writer (a phrase I borrowed from Ruskin Bond) there is no new rule for money in this life. You pay/buy rent/tariffs, bills, petrol, insurance, food, basic services etc. On top of all this, you pay for tickets, entry charges, shared public transport, et cetera. At least that’s how it has been for us as we live simply, stay easy, and don’t book big tours. We do and plan everything ourselves.
Freedom. There’s about as much freedom as you can put to use.
At the beginning of our trip, we moved every few days or a couple of days. Or weekly. In between sometimes, we moved in six months. Someone might say six months is not really traveling. I would disagree, though what traveling might mean then becomes a debate in itself. For my part, I was visiting as I was in an unfamiliar environment. I wasn’t used to the system of the place. Every day I discovered new things, things I hadn’t known, seen, or experienced. Also, not only did I feel like an outsider, but most of the people of the place considered me external. And I don’t consider myself of a neighborhood if I haven’t seen its four seasons.
Actually, I sent the letter pretty well most of the time we were going around. I missed it a month or two but I quickly put everything aside and got back onto the ride. This year has been different. And that’s okay. I’m back to this now and promise to stay on to this now.
It’s amazing how hard it is to get back to a weekly routine that was so obvious to you a few months ago. But then you stopped that practice and now it’s like it was never yours. Funny, a learning indeed.
So why couldn’t I send the letter?
As I said, since April I have been finishing a heavy writing project. One that took all my energy. One that made me stop writing in my journal so much. At least since the day I split tea on my Mac and first it died on me and then behaved erratically all the while. That was on 24th July. Yes, I remember the date while I forget our anniversaries and all the other important dates people are supposed to remember.
Was I not trying my best? I must be because even though writing and sending the letter—behind the scenes of my life—derailed me from my other priority work for a few days, I sent the letter up until June quite regularly. Eventually, I discussed it with my partner and realized that I needed to pause the letter and completely focus on the other work. I must be trying my best right?
We are all work in progress after all. But if I tell you my biggest worries you wouldn’t believe me.
1. I always feel I am fatter than I want to be
2. I want to be an expert driver and swimmer. I am none. Sometimes for the lack of trying and sometimes just like that.
3. I want to be this successful published writer with my own writing retreat et cetera. I don’t even have a rented apartment to call my own.
These thoughts dampen my joy. I consider them so important for my happiness that they reducing my happiness today in this moment doesn’t bother me. Not that much. Until it starts bothering me and then I force myself to stop bothering. You know what I mean? I worry and look in the mirror or fast harder and walk longer and still can’t relax. Or I work and work and gain so much joy from visiting places but can’t tell myself to be thankful for the fact that even though I crave a home, a place to lay back into, I wouldn’t have all these experiences if I had one.
I would have run home given the difficulties we have faced on the road in the last four years. Rude cleaning staff? Leave this town. Loud speaker music until midnight and the host disregarding our privacy? Let’s go home. Need a place to sit and write and don’t want to breathe the outside air for six months? Let’s get home.
Well, guess what? I didn’t. We didn’t. We didn’t have a home so we didn’t leave. My partner and I said to each other, “You know we would’ve gone home if we had one.” Looking into each other’s eyes with a longing that only we know. We gaze into each other’s eyes and hear the words we are too afraid to say.
At one point my partner was dreaming and talking about home so much that I had to take charge, scold him a bit, and tell him he wasn’t being appreciative of our present experience hoping for something we don’t have and that we wish we had. What about the now? Why aren’t you happy with the present? Then all this means nothing? Then let’s get ready and let’s get a house? We can, you know, I told him. He was a bit embarrassed a bit surprised a bit understanding a bit defensive a bit upset. But he has also been calmer since then. I told him that our priorities and problems would change. For now, this is what we have chosen.
I guess what keeps me together is that at some internal core level, I know that none of these problems are real. Some deep real thing inside me, as my friend Mrin says we all have a peaceful core inside each of us, knows that I am making good progress as a driver, as a writer, as a human. That I am healthy and fit and I look good. Though I may pretend to have those magazine and modelling standards for fitness and good looks, I know there isn’t one standard for beauty. Every part of us is beautiful. That we should be happy we have bread and rice and curry and fruits. That rejecting each bite of grain isn’t the way to be. Also, yes eating less than what we feel like ensures good health and longevity and slow ageing but there is also something called eating when feeling hungry and appreciating our plate.
On some internal level, I respect those hard workers who eat ten chapatis more than the health-conscious thin people who read and write and have one roti in the entire day.
At the end of the day, I am a simple human who wants to sleep well, eat well and warm, work well, laugh, and be with her loved ones. As simple as that. I don’t want anything less or more. I know there is some inertia in me trying to attempt things. That I can think a bit less and do more. Well, I have seen myself think not at all and only do. A very peaceful part of me knows I’m already successful for trying. That though I don’t have a roof to call my own, not even one day did I have to sleep under the open sky. And if I would have to, I would love it too. In fact, I want to.
This write-up is reminding me of the Ted Talk: what if nothing was wrong with us.
Yesterday when I started the newsletter, I wondered if this narrative would end up as one of those files in folders I wish to get to one day. The long drafts of Pondicherry, Goa, Vietnam, Himachal, Siliguri, Kerala, Ooty, Kodaikanal et cetera. I will get to those things.
For now, I want to share a little bit about my experience at home.
As writing about living with parents is a fairly open subjective topic that could take me a few novels, I will be short and succinct.
You could never be right or wrong. Nor are they. Things are as they are always, that is black and white. Don’t expect the slightest change. Your slight might be their really big. How you think about something has nothing to do with how your parents think about it. In the end, maintain peace in all conditions. More than peace, happiness, joy, childlike giggle, simplicity, warmth, decency, and hot food that gives nutrition and contentment. These would establish peace.
What else did I do at my parent’s home? Though I try to bullet-point my life, I really can’t. I have learned. So at my parents, I not only read, wrote, cooked, absorbed, listened, practiced, exercised, and shared, but I also lived. I don’t have many narratives from home or a lot of journal entries, but I have memories, a lot of them.
I remember my mother’s face early in the morning, or late into the day. Her wrinkled, frowned-up face with hair whiter than ever. All her aches and pains stretched out onto her cheeks and forehead and arms and neck. She is struggling, more than I have ever seen her struggle. She couldn’t sleep many nights. She had headaches, stomach aches, and high blood pressure. She had backaches and leg aches and throat aches. Her mouth had ulcers and her eyes were heavy. She had one eye operated and another one has to be operated too. She wouldn’t eat couldn’t eat and couldn’t rest. Thoughts of my father, the things he said to her over time, and the part of her life that was affected or restricted because of him all have been running through her mind constantly. Sometimes she thinks all night. Some days she can’t stop talking about all these issues to my sister or me. She can’t work that much now nor can she stand for that long.
My mother’s enthusiasm for life is reduced and she says she is counting days, a thought that saddened me deeply. As if all color dripped from the day and it turned black and white. But then I saw my mother worried for her eye, her things, and other trivialities. She isn’t ready to go yet. She just likes to say it. She likes to think that she has no attachment to this life now and she would rather leave. The ground reality was different though. She has changed a lot from how she was in 2021. More than two years earlier. I visited her twice then. She would stay up until 11 pm. She would come out with us. She would play games. She was happier, jovial, and more active. Now she was tired, restless, and listless.
I had gone home with a feeling, a notion of my mother. I left with the reality, or at least, my interpretation of it. I know she will quieten the entire neighborhood so her fragile daughter could write.
My father is ever more active and desperate to cling to the life he has led. Doesn’t want to rest, doesn’t want to slow down, wants to try everything. Doesn’t want to be called old or to bring an end to this all. Watches television all the time and keeps both eyes on the share market. Walks out to buy groceries multiple times, to the apartments he constructed, and to his friends and many businesses.
At this age, my father gives me more energy than I get from anyone else around me. He inspires me to work, try, try harder, and quickly make decisions and get moving rather than thinking, ambling, and being indecisive. Every day he seems to climb a mountain, and I want to climb along with him.
The other most important thing I wanted to share was a bit about these mountains I have been in for about a month and a half now. I have stories and some sun-drenched pictures to share. I am in the Himalayas again, but not in Himachal Pradesh, the Indian state I always venture into. We are in Uttarakhand, the state I have always ignored. The food is simple here. Over-tourism has never seemed so threatening. Plastic and plastic bottles are a serious concern. In Dehradun city, which was in my mind a paradise and from where one of my best friends is, gave me jitters. How can one ever live in this city? Millions live in the city though and on every corner you turn every empty plot is being constructed upon. The jungles and woods are being chopped to make more empty plots which would be then turned into buildings as well. So is true for Rishikesh, where I am now.
In Uttarakhand, you can travel by bus, shared rickshaws, scooters, bikes, and by car. Once we have made it from one destination to another, we prefer our feet. We have been slow travelling here, living at one place at a time, hiking a lot, walking a lot, cooking much, eating enough, sunning ourselves all day, being free a lot, looking at the sky much, watching the rivers rush past us all the time, making too many picnics, and doing all those things I hadn’t been doing for a while.
This reminds me I need to read this old article of mine again about little things we can do every day to live the best version of our lives.
How have you been? Do you want to read about anything specific in the newsletter? What did you miss the most? What would you like to read on the blog? Please let me know. Your comments and answers keep me going.
And yes. As to that project that I have been finishing. I’m almost done, in more than two years, I’m almost done. And so it is time to disclose what I have been working on and what took all my time and energy. Please wait for my next email. Move this email to your primary inbox so that you don’t miss out on the news.
BIG BIG NEWS!
As for the usual rest of the parts of this letter, I would attach things I’m reading, watching, and other updates in the next one. This one is too long already and Substack has been warning me non-stop.
Have a great, sunny, chirpy rest of the week.
What does the sky above you look like?
Thank you for reading!
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Yours,
Priyanka
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Great blog. Interesting title. Keep writing. Sometimes we want to read the mundane life of others, to know we are not that different. That life goes on. And the morning under the trees looks heavenly. Nice intermix of snapshots of life. One of my favourite blog to come back on a lazy Sunday morning and read.