Not A Fairy Tale
Written on
Once upon a time, in a far away land, lived a people who did not care for the Little Things. They cared so little for the Little Things that soon the not-so-little things became mere Little Things too. One may wonder what took up all their attention, so much so that they stopped caring for the poor Little Things. Well, it was the Big Things- much much bigger-happening in lands across the sea. If that wasn’t enough to divert the attention, some among them would walk around with seals in their hands and mark others’ foreheads with bright red labels that read ‘NOT US’. Then another group made a different seal in neon green that said ‘ANTI NOT US’. Soon they declared that those without a seal need to be hunted down as they don’t belong anywhere, hence proving dangerous. So they squabbled on, over these Big Things- the happenings of far away lands and If not that then the color coded seals they’d invented just a few days back.
The Big Things took so much of their time that one day the Little Things decided they couldn’t take it anymore and slowly faded out of their lives. The people didn’t notice it on the first day. Neither the second. Then on the third day they realized something was amiss.
The wife did not smile at her husband through her sleepy eyes, neither did he turn to cuddle her. The husband did not smell the fresh coffee brewing in the kitchen. The kids did not come running to squeeze them in a warm hug. The neighbor didn’t say hello in the elevator, gone was the friendly smile. The roses in the garden were as perky as ever but had no scent whatsoever. The sky was clear but the sun didn’t shine. The breeze refused to play with the hair. The birds went about their business without chirping their songs. The trees stood proud, offering no shade. And just like that the world had lost all its colour and smell and flavor.
While the men and women were busy debating, disrupting, and deconstructing the Big Things, the Little Things had slowly stepped away. The Little Things took with them all the hues that make the rainbow stretch and all the notes that made music just yesterday and all the joy that made life worth living everyday. And the people? They never truly learned how to live without the Little Things, so they invented Bigger Things to make the Big Things seem Little.
The End.
Nazreen Fazal
Writer, Wife, Mother, Indian, Muslim. So many labels, one me. I write, I rant, I ramble in order to make sense of everything happening around. Join me on this journey as I share snippets of my life, going about work, my parenting wins and fails, and the murky waters that's long distance marriage.
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