My dear little Sister,
I know you are not the little one. I am. Yet I have this impending desire to treat you like my pampered sweet little sister. We have developed this unique bond of friendship and love over the long 23 years and now we are matured women from little chirpy girls! Most of my childhood memories are filled with your essence, your scolding, guidance, and unfailing love. I do not know how it feels to take up a new born in one’s own little hands and feel its skin, and touch its fingers and feel its smile. You felt me even before I felt myself.
I am sure there have been many such days when you would wake up at night due to my cries. There must have been days when you couldn't go out to play as I held your fingers tightly. There must have been days when you were angry for my existence which divided our parents’ attention and love and there must have been days when you felt I am the greatest gift one could possibly have given you. I am, you may say, an amalgamation of all your feelings and resentments embodied together.
Despite growing up together like two leaves on the same twig, we grew up to be two different persons. You have held the light, and I have seen the world. We have learnt, observed and absorbed together. We have drunk the elixir of literature, sunk deep into the melancholy of music and woken up to the enlightenment of physics! We are like these two little birds learning to fly while enjoying the flight. From puberty to first love to jerk boyfriends and messy breakups, we have had them all and in a similar pattern!
I remember as a child, my only dream was to be like you, to grow up into this wonderful young woman with headstrong ideals with an ocean of knowledge, to be famous with teachers like you, to fetch marks like you, and to even look like you. My dear big sister, you have been my icon from an age when I didn't even know the word. You have shaped up my being, made me the person that I am and filled me up with so much love that I am never in dearth of it. You have always provided me with the courage of leaving the shelter of security and seek what I want. You do not know what you have done to me through all these years and in every passing moment.
You know how crazy we both are about mother’s recipes. How desperately we want our own preparations to taste like hers. Well, I dream of a day, when we would have our own recipes, our own secret ingredients to share with and sit down together for a lunch and appreciate each one of them. And of course we will sing Begum Akhtar! And we will live happily ever after.
That would be my fairy tale, you smiling and giggling with your beau by your side, I smiling and giggling with, well, or without someone by my side and there would be Ma, Baba, and peace.
The purpose of the 500 plus word-strong letter is just to tell you that I love you and I will be with you no matter what. Deal Sealed with a kiss of love.
Yours loving little sister