Another Day to Cherish by Kalai Selvi Arivalagan (electronic reader txt) 📕

It is one more sunny morning for the chirping little sparrows. Walking towards the office, Rahila can hear the boisterous chirping of sparrows from the trees on the roadside. The morning air filled with warmth of the sun made her sigh with relief. One more day to go!

Tired of moving mechanically through her routine life, she always found her glass filled only half. She could not help smiling when she remembered how one of her friends once told her that she must learn to be happy with the half filled glass.

Her friend reminded her not to forget that there are so many people who have their glasses empty and literally live their lives without any meaning at all. At the surface, her mind felt satisfied and happy with the life she lived. Yet, something always kept on nagging her from behind. Whenever she tried to fix it, she never succeeded in it.

Mechanically she pushed the doors of the office open. The transparent glass doors symbolically told her that there is nothing here to hide and every thing is open to see and she never tried to understand the clue also.

The earlier office where she worked remained always a challenge to her. Every day a hurdle will come up to test her patience and she had to struggle hard to keep her face smiling.

She always felt an iron curtain that separated her from others and she was made to stand and wait. Struggles at life taught her to be patient and face the challenge. Yet, she could not do so. Though things are different at her new office, still she has to go a long way.

Life is always throwing surprises to her. And she least expected things to happen until the day dawned.

The clock showed 10 minutes to 1. Time for lunch. Rahila has finished much of her assigned work and felt hungry. With a relief, she got up from her table. Carrying her lunch pack, she walked toward the food junction. None to accompany she started to eat.

Once again her thoughts went galloping to find out what made her feel holding a half- filled glass. ‘Socializing.’ Yes. She remembered how she always liked to read books and avoid human company. Now, things are different.

She wanted to have a big gang of friends and enjoy life to the core. Except very few, every one at the food junction kept on chatting with someone over the phone.

She wondered what they will all be talking for so long and how it kept them happy. Can ‘words’ do the wonder. Is it real? Writing always helped her to bring her feelings and thoughts out and made her feel easy. But talking is also something that helps one to bring down the pressure and feel at ease.

She felt sorry to note that she never had a friend who would talk to her like that and make her feel happy. Right from her school days people treated her differently. They never tried to understand her or never gave her the time to make them understand her.

When will she get a friend who will lend his or her ears and make her life also meaningful. The day dawned finally and unknowingly things materialized and helped her to build a way to a beautiful friendship.

Rahila after finishing her test looked around for the person who spoke to her at the reception. She could not find him anywhere. She spent sometime gazing through the glass doors and waiting for the person to come. The time went on and she felt restless.

Opening the glass door, she went in search of the person. She asked a person who was seated at the desk just opposite to the room where she took the test. He asked her to walk to the end of the room and find out.

In a hurry, she walked swiftly along the richly decorated corridors to the end of the room. The ambiance of the big room made her heart beat with awe. She could not even imagine being there. With a smile she thought, will I be so lucky to work over here?

Rahila could find the person over there and told him that she had finished the test. He asked her to be there in that room and he will be back within two minutes. Restless she waited for another two minutes.
It took another five minutes for the person to come and collect the test paper. Worried about getting delayed to her work place, she started to walk toward the 'Exit' gate.

Rahila followed the 'Exit' sign and walked the way down. The way she took was a fire exit that will be used during the times of emergency. When she reached the door she found a door made of metal and not of glass. She did not realize it. There was a handle on the door. Below the handle she could read the sentence.

'You will hear an alarm when the handle is pulled'. Mindless she pulled the handle. Instead of pushing the door open, she pulled the handle and the alarm started to sound loud.

She walked out of the door and looked for the way that led to the entrance of that huge building. Unaware of things that would follow, she was thinking where she should submit the visitor's pass that she got at the reception.

The day started with a thump as it happens in a middle class household. Rahila woke up with a shudder. Her mother yelled at her younger sister for not getting up early. When a day starts like this, by experience she knew everything will go in drain.

"Ma, Will you please stop shouting? It spoils the entire mood of the day". Rahila's words triggered her mother for some more words.

Feeling exhausted both physically and mentally, she went to take bath. She knows 'verbal abuse' is also strong as 'mental abuse' and it always sucked her energy out and make her feel drained and powerless.

"Who is going to take me away from this?" She doesn't want to think the home as a hell because it was once a paradise that helped her to grow into a person with a romantic outlook toward life and enjoy everything around her.

No one can blame for the things that are happening as she is destined to go through all these types of misgivings.

In a frustrated mood on the day, she poured down her feelings and posted it as a poem in her blog. So far, she did not receive any comments for whatever she posted.

The poem she posted on that day received a few comments and Bharath got introduced to her through this.

After reading so many things about friendship developed over Internet, she never believed in building up a relationship with someone she has never met.

To her surprise, it started with a few mails and gradually it developed into a strong relationship that helped her to find her best friend.

Just like a beautiful perfumed jasmine flower which slowly unfurled its petals at dusk and spread the perfume throughout the dark night, her friendship with Bharath extended through her years and helped her to achieve her dream. She started to smile always as she can see her long awaited goal nearby.

How it happened ?

Inspiration' is the right thing that happened with her. His friendship helped to wake up the unvisited domain of her grey cells. Whenever she started to write she can feel the muse in her who walked along with her and let her enjoy whatever she wrote.

Acceptance to whatever she wrote is the biggest thing that happened in her half filled cup of life.

Once in a while she received a call from him that helped to feel confident and secure. Yet, she could not tell whether that was the day which will become her 'another day to cherish.'

Rahila woke up from her afternoon siesta. Her five year old daughter stood there asking her to get up.

"Mummy, you must take me to the beach today."

"Yes, da"

"But you are sleeping. You promise but never keep it up".

"No. We will go today."

Every week they go to the beach and spend sometime enjoying the evening breeze and watching other children play. She could not make it for a while as she was always held up something or other. Though she knew her excuses will not please her daughter, she could not help.

Reluctantly she got up and prepared the evening tea. Her daughter was so happy and she kept on talking on