Appa

This has been on my mind ever since he left. That day, when it was all over, when we knew nothing could bring him back, hundreds came home. Really, hundreds. Several of them we didn’t even know. Strangers, to the three of us, would come in and cry their hearts out. Weeks later, someone would call on his phone and…

Four years since.

This is how you get unstuck, Stuck. You reach. Not so you can walk away from the daughter you loved, but so you can live the life that is yours — the one that includes the sad loss of your daughter, but is not arrested by it. The one that eventually leads you to a place in which you not only…

Life with the Savarnas

Sometimes when you wake up in the middle of the night, weird questions come. Like, why didn’t your people tell you that feeling even a little insecure won’t work in a world like ours? Why didn’t they tell you that being vulnerable in relationships is an affordable choice of the…

Disillusionment, mostly.

There are voices in my head. Like in everyone else’s, I must add; lest it seems like I’m trying to make a spectacle out of something very simple, very every day. Some of these voices are clearly mine, some someone else’s, a few are of my friends, but most are of the unknown. See…

Self-care and The Dalit Woman

“All too often women believe it is a sign of commitment, an expression of love, to endure unkindness or cruelty, to forgive and forget. In actuality, when we love rightly we know that the healthy, loving response to cruelty and abuse is putting ourselves out of harm’s way.”
―…

Reckless

So some of us might have heard of Brené Brown, whose TED talk in 2011 kind of became a viral hit. For those who don’t, she is a research professor at the University Of Houston Graduate College Of Social Work, and a lot of what she talks and writes about is shame, amidst others. Shame does speak much, but…

Privilege.

There is no beauty in this ugliness; no, none at all.

There is no beauty in standing next to you, shoulder to shoulder, and see someone else holding your hand.

It is not cathartic to tell a story of brokenness, of vulnerability, to an audience white with…

A Gentle Reminder

What Dalit women face everyday in India and the rest of South Asia is undoubtedly terrible, and our response to it must be immediate, urgent. While here we are, enlisting and documenting atrocities, our sisters are the ones battling forces, which seek to systemically oppress and rip them of…

On Love

These little notes, which old souls like us write, are really our healing manuals; products that sometimes come out of our most private conversations with self. But it’s not like you can’t use it; you should. That’s why, that little courage we muster every time, pushes us to put it out there.