Of Gandhi and Sugar

During the thirties, a woman asked Gandhi to get her little boy to stop eating sugar because it was doing him harm.

Gandhi gave a cryptic reply: "Please come back next week."

The woman  returned a week later. This time, Bapu Gandhi simply told the boy, "Please don't eat sugar. It is not good for you." Then he joked with the boy for a while, gave him a hug, and sent him on his way.

The mother, unable to contain her curiosity, lingered behind to ask, "Bapu, why didn't you say this last week when we came? Why did you make us come back again?" 

Gandhi smiled. "Last week," he said to her. "I too was eating sugar."

Hundred and four days later, I still cry in the shower.

I am still hurt. I still ask 'Why?' 

What is it about love that makes us stupid? You slave it all on someone, hoping when the time gets better, you will reap the reward together.

I must have known that when the time gets better, it wasn't me that will reap the reward.

I must have known.

For the sake of respect and love, I will not divulge what i have done for him. I'd like to think that when i did it, it was purely because i love him.

But that doesn't stop me from feeling stupid. I still walk around, shoulders heavy from carrying my own cross, sending out what I can only imagine as a distress call for him to come back, and end this.

Letting go is difficult. I just have to keep my focus and continue what i set out to do.

Just like Bapu Gandhi, if I want to prove a point to heart-broken women, I first, have to follow the rules.