My Soul

 Every soul, at some point, yearns to complete something that once lit a quiet fire within.

I was thirteen when words first found me. Stories and poetry poured from my pen like a river long waiting for rain. At fifteen, I dared to dream bigger — I began writing a novel. But like many tender dreams, it remained unfinished, tucked away between schoolbooks and growing responsibilities.

Then came the rush of life. Education demanded my time. Writing slowly slipped away from my fingertips, like sand through a child’s hand at the shore. After marriage, as I left for my husband’s home, I chose not to carry my old diaries — the ones that held my fragile worlds of imagination. Instead, I burned them. Perhaps it was grief. Perhaps it was a quiet farewell to the girl I once was.

The years that followed were filled with family, work, and the unyielding rhythm of daily life. I did not think I would ever return to writing.

But fate has its own sense of timing.

In June 2019, while recovering from dengue and forced into stillness, my husband said something simple yet life-changing: “Why don’t you write again?” He even opened a Blogger account for me. That small gesture reopened a long-locked door within me.

Words returned. Stories unfolded. I wrote and wrote — 350 short stories in Malayalam, shared across various platforms, each one a whisper from the heart I thought I had silenced.

Still, a novel — the novel — remained my unfinished song.

In June 2021, I began again, filled with hope. But once more, life intervened. I couldn’t finish it then. Not for months. Not for years.

And yet — here I am now. 25 chapters. One complete novel. A dream I once buried has finally bloomed.

To the universe, to the quiet voice inside me that never truly faded, and to God — I am deeply, humbly grateful.

....................Suja Anup