Tucked away in my heart – Articulating…

He responded to me two days later with a, “I took your parting shot and was busy trying out the food on various flights from Mumbai to Singapore and then to Thailand. Thank you for the bon appétit. I know it’ll be early evening for you, so are you back home from work? And can we connect on yahoo messenger? While I truly believe in the power of letters (well, ok, emails), instant messaging is just so much more, well, instant, for one and real time for another. AND there’s a voice chat feature, so if you have a mike and speakers, we can actually talk! Till I hear from you, I shall cook.¨ Hmmm, I thought to myself. Someone who can articulate himself with some semblance of wit. Let’s see what he’s got. I added him to my yahoo list under the “friends¨ group and sent him a ping ‘I’m here. What’s taking you so long?’ No response. I looked at the screen for about 45 seconds. Nothing. I wrote him off in my head and just when I was turning away from the laptop, I saw the window flash. “Hey! Was caught between responding to you immediately and a chicken on fire. Decided to attend to the chicken first, else I wouldn’t have been able to establish my prowess as a cook :D!¨ “Oh my. And a chicken-on-fire takes precedence over me?”, I asked. “Only till such time we decide we’ll be eating together!¨, came the prompt reply.

My attention was definitely caught with the pert reply as much as it was with this man comfortable enough to tell me he cooked and he cooked well. A few more wittily polite messages later, he asked me for a voice chat. Interesting. Gentleman enough to ask for my permission and not presumptuous enough to hit the “talk¨ button on his own. He had my undivided attention at hello, to almost borrow a quoted - and much used - line. What a rich, deep voice. Clark Gable. Amitabh Bachchan. You name the demi-gods with rich baritones and he could beat them silly, mouth closed, with his voice. And so well spoken. And articulate. And I’m drooling again, just thinking about him.

That night, over Yahoo, you dirty minds, we found we shared the same value systems - the most important to both of us and non-negotiable. We both loved to read and listen to music, so much so that we liked the same genre of music - rock. We both had similar tastes when it came to colors as well - we both loved blue. We both worked with NGOs - the difference being I worked for people who were struck by AIDS and he with street children. All in all, it looked good. It felt like falling in step with someone I’d known forever and we both actually joked about the “saat janam” bit that you hear in b-grade movies. Somewhere in the middle of the conversation, I excused myself for a few minutes and as I was walking out, I heard him softly sigh, “Lady, where have you been all my life?” I smiled and said to myself, “Where have YOU been?” The night flew by and took along with it any need for sleep. A conversation with him was as heady as coffee. And quite as refreshing.

In the morning, I walked out of my room and into my parents’ and made an announcement that left them stunned - remember, this was early in the morning and they were still rubbing the sleep out of their eyes. “I’ve found the man I want to marry” is what I’d just said to them.