Sisters and Brothers…

A few days back, my sister, the eldest one, posted some lines on her timeline… lines by Dalton Day

“Write because you want to communicate with yourself. Write because you want to communicate with someone else. Write because life is weird and tragic and amazing. Write because talking is difficult. Write because it polishes the heart. Write because there is a blackbird outside of my window right now and oh my god isn’t that the best start to the day? Write because you’re trying to figure yourself out. Write because you might not ever figure yourself out. Write because there still aren’t enough love poems in the world.”

I write because not only do I believe in all of the above, but also because writing is the only way I can immortalize how I once felt; emotions can be transient, almost fleeting, so writing is a way to catch them before they escape your grasp, before you start doubting their reality, before you become so full of yourself that you refuse to acknowledge somebody else’s greatness.

I have two siblings and I complete the trio that is us. We are an ‘all-girls-batch’ that came out of our mother’s womb. The elder two were born two years apart, while I came much later. As of today, we stand at 38, 36 and 29. We’ve had a dysfunctional yet interesting childhood, which is clear from the fact that there is no dearth of stories when we are together. Even my nephews and nieces, my sisters’ children, enjoy the time travel, imagining how we must have been when we were their age. On the face of it, we are not overtly devoted to each other. We got married when we were 23, 20 and 29, the middle one taking the plunge first, with the eldest one joining her a year after. I kind of hibernated for years on a roll before deciding to be in that league. Once a slow starter, always a slow starter. Now do the math !

People sometimes pity us for not having a brother. The usual question is “how many brothers and sisters are you?” The answer “three sisters” does not sit well with most of them and we almost wait for the amusing query that follows – “No Brothers?” and then that awkward almost sympathetic pause.

It took me a while to realize that my sisters have married men of such great honor and integrity, that they have been so loving and loyal to my sisters and our family that if they are not my brothers, I doubt anybody else ever having the potential to be. My eldest brother in law, Advocate Ghuman, as he is popularly known, and I started off as nemesis as I blamed him for taking my sister away from me. I remember giving him tough looks when I realized my sister, Manveen, was falling for him. He has been so much like a shadow all these years that I conveniently mistook his generosity of spirit for his weakness. I forgot that he taught me how to drive and thrive, took care of my paperwork – be it my admissions, my first foreign trip, my driving licence, helped me buy my first phone and what not. A brother who has made me self-sufficient, so that I do not have to look at him to protect me… and believe you me, there have never been any big-brotherly sermons to assert his authority. He has always been there for his parents and his siblings, his wife and his children, my parents, extended families, my hundred year old grandfather who cannot imagine a day without Malwinder Singh Ghuman being around, and not to forget, his fields and cattle (he is a proud Jatt you see). All this, without a frown, without ever raising his voice. Mind it.

My sisters and my brothers-in-law gave me away on my marriage, literally and metaphorically, making all the necessary arrangements, taking all the pains to get me married to a man of another religion, against all odds. Sometimes I sit alone after a day’s work and remember how, a day before my wedding, my other sister, Simma Singh, sat at my feet, wiped my tears and my mehndi- laden limbs, joking all the while how she’s paid all possible debts (did I tell you that, as children, I used to be her punching bag). Jet-lagged and exhausted, she kept herself awake at night, making sure I was okay and alive. Despite being thousands of miles away, she has, over the years, always made the effort to lend a kind ear and be around.

I am reminded of my younger brother-in-law, Rupinder Singh, a humorist by birth, who himself rarely ever laughs. Always making jokes about me being a pampered child of twenty nine and how my mother even peels off the skin of an almond before serving it to me. My mother calls him a ‘soldier’, such is the boundless energy in that round frame. Always on the run, he is the master of disguise, hiding his real emotions and struggles under all that fun. And the two saadus are so fond of each other that we often joke about them being lovers.

My eldest sister, Manveen Minna Ghuman, has been my keeper, right from the day I was born, playing the role of a mother as our mother was a working woman, with a job and a family of twenty to manage. But, with her marriage and children, we grew apart; deep in my heart, I longed for her attention and guidance, outwardly, I started acting aloof. I convinced myself that she had all but forgotten me. I remember how she cried when I was leaving for a job in Jharkhand. My father had convinced her that I would not make it back; that the naxals would kill me. I remember peering in her eyes, not being able to understand her concern, because I had already decided that she did not love me anymore. The veil of my ego finally lifted when, years later, she reprised her role as my sister and put a stamp on it, once and for all. Realizing how incapacitated and in doldrums as a bride-to-be I was, she took control of the situation and turned it around… and how. Even now, she drives me around wherever I have to go, taking care of my little big needs, without me ever asking her to.

We all know we can never be the kind of siblings who pout-out-loud on Facebook or who call each other every other day, but what we feel for each other looks a lot like love and that love is here to stay.