They didn’t let me learn any musical instruments.
When I was young my parents never let me learn any musical instruments.
“Can’t I enroll in a class too, like that friend of mine?” I’d ask.
“It’s far. Who will fetch you and drop you? We can’t send you alone.” And mom didn’t know how to drive and it would have been a bit cumbersome to manage home, cooking & chores, a brother, and dad and manage my hobbies. It was a thankless job to be a mom and now I understand that.
“But it’s expensive and we can’t afford it.” And she was right because we were not rich.
“If you ask Dad he will, of course, say yes, ok. But it will stress him out. You sure you want that?”
I never wanted to stress them out. I understood it when she said we couldn’t afford it, but it made me feel resentful as to why couldn’t we afford it? Of course I was stupid or just a child. I didn’t understand that the place we lived in was a company rented accommodation and dad didn’t have to pay any rent there. If he had had to pay the rent, it would be super expensive and we couldn’t have afforded to stay in that house either. Everyone around us was quite well-to-do. Their houses are fancier than mine and they dressed better than me and spoke better. But I sang better. I danced better than them. I knew it. I also studied better than them, but in that department, my brother was always better than me. Even today when I think of HOW much I would have loved to learn an instrument, it hurts. On one hand of course I feel stupid because I know what I knew intuitively back then that stressing out parents for my whims was not ok and they were trying to give me the best they could. That hobbies were expensive and we weren’t rich, and hobbies were not a necessity. Perhaps that is why I took to art in school so much. I was obsessed with getting the highest marks and I was good at it. It was a hobby that was part of my school work. I had to pass it in order to graduate to the next grade so it was mandatory. It was something that no one could take away from me.
The things that I somehow longed for were art, music, dance, and English. All subjects that didn’t have much value in real academic life. They meant the world to me.
Today I cried.
When I went back to that moment when I asked mom why I couldn’t enrol in a Bharatanatyam class or a Guitar class and she said, “It’s far. No one can drop and fetch you. And it’s expensive. Dad will be stressed.” The daughter in me understood but the child in me felt hurt. Felt this was unfair of God for me to not be able to do what I wanted to do. Today I went back to connecting with that child, the one that was in so much pain. Somehow all that pain, that had been hiding somewhere from that one time my mother told me the reality and said NO, that pain, came rushing back and filled all of my heart, my throat and my eyes. The heart was supplied with pain that felt as fresh as though it had just happened, and the eyes and throat were expressing them like the child really wanted to. I had become that child in that moment. It’s ok, I told myself. It’s ok to take the next 15 mins to just give it a good cry. A nice, long, good cry and get it all out. Let it out. Feel the pain. Don’t say “but it’s stupid. I don’t know why I am reacting now. I know she was right in saying what she said. I know mon didn’t mean to hurt. It was just the reality and I am sure she felt just as bad.” etc. etc.
But I told myself instead to not give myself reasons to stop crying, just feel the pain. Don’t try to shut it or change it or run away from it just because it feels uncomfortable. Let is come out. Feel the pain even if you look stupid. Just stay in the moment and stay connected to that pain. And let it out. Cry it out. And then tell yourself, that you were a child then and it was ok if the child felt bad.
The point is, you didn’t let it stop you and see, you’ve turned out just fine. You didn’t become a mess. Yes, it hurts and you regret that you never got to learn an instrument but it’s ok. Let it all out. Accept the feeling of pain and don’t try to shut it out. And then Kay told me that “It’s ok. I am here. You can cry. But you know humans are built to forget the 1000 ‘yes’es but they remember the 1 ‘no’ clearly.” That’s just us. And just like that, it gave me perspective. While I was crying I was feeling guilty to have felt hurt or in pain for hearing a no. But it made sense to me that it was human to feel hurt or in pain. It was human to have regrets for not learning music. It was human to feel guilty and feel that by being hurt over something that had happened so far back in the past, I was betraying the role of a good daughter who understands. But instead, it just made me realize that it’s ok if I am human. And it’s ok to just let the pain all out so that one fine day I can let go of it and the memory is just a memory with no repressed emotions burdening it or making it a bigger failure than what it really was.
It was nothing but a minor rejection.