Suzanne Bernert

  A small line of sweat was slowly trickling down his back while he was bending over a beautiful Linen Kurta by Mrs. Sharma who lives on the second floor in the next door building. The fan was whirring, the heat was picking up and the sounds of Mumbai enveloped him.                                                                                                        The folding had to be neat or otherwise Mrs.Shama would scold.  Not him, as he was bound to the ground floor, forever attached to his iron. She would scold his young daughter who would zoom around in the afternoon delivering the ironed clothes all over the neighborhood.  His daughter Swati, who right now was busy writing another straight line of  ‘...

She was riding high....on the shoulders of her dadi or nani, a string of her hair in her fist, surrounded by the other female members of her clan...  Colorful Saree clad cheerful procession just from one home to the other's home.. Aunt.. Mom....Sisters....Friends... All just gliding along taking up nearly all of the side street we were walking on...  I laughed and smiled...called her Chhoti Rani... she looked at me with big brown eyes, still holding her human vehicle's hair tight and sucking on it... all the women were laughing ..  yes yes...ye humari Chhoti Rani hai  .... she is our small queen.... Say Namaste Rani bitiya ...  With a shy smile and finally releasing the hair  .... Chhoti Rani waved a hi.... And with that the whole procession moved on.... And on top Chhoti Rani giggling and riding high .... 

Thoughts and emotions are fleeting.... What you thought and felt last week or even yesterday..... it is gone ...  Unless you concretize your thoughts and make them into a way of life and call that belief.  And that belief becomes the end of your searching, living and wondering at life   .... It stands right in the way of living...

Knocking at the door of sleep... I am getting so lost in myself ... Tumbling down inward into the myriad ways of sleep... the inside you that you experience but can't remember... The inside you that reflects your day,week,life but in such an irrational and unbelievably real way that you wake up disoriented.... ... sometimes laughing ... ... sometimes crying ... ... never really knowing why ...

My personal view 🙏 If you are centered in yourself the question  of boundaries doesn't occur... you will intuitively know when to do what. I have discovered this myself in the Pandemic when Kriya Yoga and Meditation came into my life. After about 6 months my interactions started changing to the better and I didn't try to intellectually understand a situation....I just knew ... in the case of bad intentions? You can never protect yourself from everything that can happen...it would mean protecting yourself from life. And life we are born to live full on....

That moment between sleep and awake..the twilight zone where the dream feels more real than what the day promises to be... where the temptation to just fall back, pull the covers over your head and go back to that sweet state of dreams is so big.. Definitely bigger than the promise of a cup of hot coffee while the noise of the headlines is screaming at you ... this has happened and that will happen....there is a crisis here and an impending disaster there... Bigger than knowing you will be going to work to a job that you might no like anymore like you used to... Bigger than the talk you need to have with your partner about the problems that you have...  Oh yes...so tempting to just go back to sleep and let that crazy world go ahead without you for a few moments more....

Melodious ... unbelievable voice ...  The voice that embodied every emotion ever portrayed on screen..... The one voice that you felt is part of your life....part of memories you made on the way.. the first kiss, the first fight, the first drive in the new car while one of her songs was playing on the radio... the magical time in cinemas ... the first loss and now the ultimate loss.... A nation says goodbye to it's nightingale....and keeps the melodies alive in the hearts of millions. While her songs are being played all over the neighbourhood we bid farewell on Social Media...  Om Shanti Lata Ji 🙏 ॐ शांति