Two roads diverged in a wood, and I—
I took the one less traveled by,
And that has made all the difference.

– Robert Frost (The Road Not Taken)

The words of Robert Frost inspire many but I did not follow it until it was too late. I obviously took the road much traveled and trending even though I knew that my soul lay buried deep within words. I chose a career in management followed by marriage and motherhood. Not that I regret but I do realize that in interweaving the worldly ways with myself I left the self far behind only to find it once again on a path I tread. Once again diversions came up and once again I chose the world only to sometimes feel melancholy and sometimes jealous of people who have made their way into choosing the life they wanted. But I am lucky in many ways,one of them is I write, so I can express my disappointment through my words.

I do not regret the path I chose for it brings more experience to my ink in a realistic way. My son takes me back to my childhood as he looks forward to listening stories of not so very long ago just like I did from my Pa.

My childhood was not specifically about stories but conversations. Long long conversations with my father and the stories I know were somewhere intertwined in them. Pa had traveled to many many places and he always had an anecdote or two up his sleeve about places he visited. Not only this he was well read or aware about the places he visited, their topography, the mythology, history, facts and science. He encouraged our quest for knowing more about places and my sister and I found solace in books, lots of books we read.

When I look back at the lavish life of me as a kid, the luxury was not about money, the luxury was the time spent in conversations with my father. He filled my life with stories, fed my curiosity with information and made sure he was around to emotionally anchor us to his being in such a way that we derive strength for living through the realities of life even if it means his death.

I recently visited a temple in of the divine Goddess, at a place called Jwalamukhi. The popular name to the place is Jwalaji. For those who are not aware of this place, Jwalaji is a temple in Himachal where an eternal flame rises out of the earth and continues to do so with no known source of fuel. The phenomenon has left scientists, geologists and all forms of researchers with a question mark. My father had visited the temple a couple of times. Being a geophysicist himself and that too into seismic survey for finding petroleum, I am sure the place must have intrigued him. But beyond the science that he had explained to my smaller self, he left me with stories of the place. Stories woven into my memory in a way that I felt I had visited the place before. Stories which I could share with my son as I walked through the temple courtyard, stories which formed a base for me turning into a storyteller in many ways.

He left me with the subtle learning of how beautiful is a life full of stories! For a story can never un-cheer anyone. My childhood is summed up in the conversations I had with my Pa, in the anecdotes he shared along with his experience… in the stories where he explained the difference between, belief and science and the similarities too.

I may not have the same level of knowledge but I have my share of stories and I have a son who waits to hear them. I am not the perfect parent and I do not have the perfect child but we have our share of stories and as I tread through the path taken more often, I am still able to curate my trail with stories for a lifetime for my child and me. That is what will make the difference… and that is all that matters.