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Uttama

u̇-təm-ä

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Project Type: nonfiction

In Pursuit of Solitude

letter to Jyoti Singh Pandey

Dear Jyoti

Pride flag

#CanWeTalkAboutThis

Dada portrait

Daddy’s Diaries XVIII

Uttama

Confessions of a Closet Introvert

Bride and Groom

An Immaculate Misconception

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FOLLOW ME FOR MY DISTRACTIONS & INSPIRATIONS
"The work will rescue you instead of you rescuing it." Comforting words as I revise sentences I wrote 7 years ago, wondering if there is anything novel left in my novel. I was 15 when I formed a vision of my daughter, and 16 when I decided to adopt. Most people dismissed my choice, told me adulthood would derail my dream. My parents did not. My sister did not. My English teacher did not (and helped me pen the words to say so in my college application essay). None of them knew how harrowing the fight would be, or that a young girl most described as ‘quiet, shy, delicate’ would make every life decision based on this eventual end. When I’m asked how it feels to have Zaya now, there is no singular way to describe it. She’s been in me for 23 years, and remained there while I found love in a man who wanted to be her father, carried and lost her siblings, wrote a novel about parenthood as a choice (not an assumption), swam with wild dolphins and lit her grandfather’s funeral pyre. Zaya has been a silent witness to much more of my life than I have been to hers, and when I look at her, and she looks back, there are only two words that come to heart: thank you. grazing by the beach [Link in bio to read] - I wrote 'The Sacrificial First' after discovering a grave fact: the best chance an orca has of giving birth to a calf who survives is after having a miscarriage. Sitting with sadness, beside my happiness. Daddy passed away six days after my birthday, and every year it is a reminder that life and death are in close partnership. Grief, too, is a living thing. For me, twelve years old today, growing and giving, refilling with hope what it stole of time. On a morning stroll after ages, I savored the quiet streets, doors still shut, and sleepy dogs; a reminder of how peaceful Pondicherry used to be when we visited as children. Just as I ached for the safety of that past, the refuge my father's hometown used to provide, I was gently interrupted with the question, "Are you Kirit's daughter?" And in answering, met an old friend of Daddy's, who must have recognized something of him in me. ✨ "Resist chronology. It will always try to impose itself." Delhi providing us colour, calm and charm amidst the chaos. CW // loss
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