“Maybe working on the little things as dutifully and honestly as we can is how we stay sane when the world is falling apart.” ~ Haruki Murakami

I’m a connoisseur of simple joys. By simple joys, I really mean those which get as effortless as they can. The way the sun shines on things and brings out their shadows and highlights or getting inside an empty class way before everyone and basking in the solitude of morning, these little joys.

Rewind to my childhood, the word “GIFT” always set fireworks to me.I’ve curated gift boxes in my head for each person whom I hold close to my heart with a hope that I’d give it to them when I really can. Growing up, I really lost my knack for surprises. But there’s always a thing that I look forward to whenever someone gifts me a book. I get it with a smile and open the first page to see if there’s something written on it. It might be my name with the date it was given to me or if I’m lucky, I get a few more sentences to go with my name. 

A bird sits on a branch near your window and sings a melody. The tune still lingers in the air long after the bird flies away. My 15th birthday had my friends presenting me with a copy of “The Fault In Our Stars”, quite a rage back then. Our paths have diverged and life took its own twists and turns but to this day, a smile escapes my lips at what was written on the first page. See, this is why first pages are important, always.

Finding a letter slyly hidden inside one of those books gets me on cloud nine.This would make its way into my top ten things that instantly make me happy. I make sure I’m in no hurry. I open the letter, savour it word by word, and put it back into the book knowing very well that I’d be giving it a hundred rereads. What does it take to gift someone a book? To me, it is a process that so sparks happiness that I question myself. What do I like more? Gifting books or being gifted them?