Over the weekend I found time to leaf through my 2008 personal Journal and revisit few days of the past year. As I read my account of those days, memories came flooding back and the reflection that followed taught me few lessons.
One such lesson was about turning our disappointments into appointments of Joy!
Bina and I had started the practice of a date many years ago. The idea was to have quality time in each other’s company, once a week, away from parental responsibilities and professional pressures. It had worked out well for us and both of us look forward to Friday evenings, when we could be out on our date. The evening is spent window shopping, sitting around in a café sipping tea or coffee and finally dinner at our favourite restaurant.
The page that caught my attention was a Friday when I was down with a back problem. The problem had started a couple of days ago and I was on medication. I was hoping that I would be well enough to take Bina out on our date but by Friday afternoon, it was evident that my back was yet to heal. An extra dose of medicine too did not help. I was disappointed and felt sad thinking of how disappointed Bina would be, when she learned that the date has been cancelled.
The disappointment and sadness were all set to paralyse my brain and help me wallow in self pity. I however managed to break free and think of alternative activities which we could do together at home. A number of ideas came through but the one that I liked the best was about having our date at home! Soon pieces of the plan came together and I set to execute it. . .
As soon as Bina came home I told her that I had planned a very special date at home. She was very understanding and said that my health came first and that there were many more Fridays in the pipeline and that she was OK with staying at home. When she went to another part of the house I managed to get off the bed, have a bath and dress up. Next I limbed around and immersed our sitting area in candle light with a dozen or so candles and called out to Bina. She was surprised to see me dressed, and the room flooded with candles, but lost no time to catch the mood and kick off our date.
Friday is the day off for our house keeper, our children too have their own plans and so we had the house to ourselves. Bina made some tea and we sat sipping tea and chatting. Later as it started raining, we watched the rain and felt the magic it created for us. At some point of time my date excused herself and called our favourite restaurant and asked them to deliver our dinner home. Even though it was outside their delivery area and it was raining heavily, they obliged!
Soon we were having a candle-lit dinner with some great music in the background. Overall it turned out to be a very memorable date for us! We enjoyed every bit of it and wished that the night would never end!
Yes we can turn our disappointments into appointments of Joy if only we try!
