EP08: The Urge to Make Things Last
Some mornings don’t start with alarms. They start with mosquitoes.
Aarohi was sleeping peacefully, bundled like a burrito in her blanket, until that irritating zzzzzz buzzed past her ear.
Swat. Miss. Swat again. Miss again.
If mosquitoes had a sense of humor, they’d probably be laughing at her. Irritated, she got up, walked to the plug point, and saw the mosquito repellent staring back at her, it was empty.
Not “maybe a little left” empty, but absolutely, hopelessly empty.
And yet, what did she do? She unplugged it and plugged it back again thinking it would magically start working again. Satisfied with her “effort” she went back to bed.
This, my friend, was the theme of her life.
When she went to brush her teeth, the toothpaste tube looked like it had been through war.
Flat. Limp. Done.
But we don’t throw toothpaste until we’re absolutely convinced it has nothing left to give. She rolled it, pressed it, even flattened it with a belan until a tiny streak of paste surrendered. Victory!
Then came the shampoo. Same story, new battlefield. The bottle looked like it had air for breakfast. She shook it, tilted it, nothing. So of course, she poured in water, shook it with Olympic-level dedication, and voilà ; a thin, bubbly liquid that could pass as shampoo for one more day.
Next, the kitchen lighter. The old fellow was stubborn. She clicked it once, twice, ten times. It refused. So she blew air into it, banged it on the slab like a cricket bat, and tried again. And when that tiny flame finally sparked? You’d think she won the World Cup.
By now, her morning felt like a full-blown survival mission. But it wasn’t over. The TV remote decided to play dead. She opened the back cover, rubbed the batteries on her palms , switched their places, gave the remote a couple of thuds, and… the TV blinked to life. Honestly, who needs science when we’ve got these desi jugaads?
Her phone was next. The charger wire looked like it had survived three lifetimes, it worked only at that one particular angle.
She plugged it in. Nothing. Tried again. Nothing.
On the third try, with a little twist and prayer, it worked. Green charging symbol. Sweet relief.
And just then, ding. A notification.
Dozens of messages from him.
“Hello, where are you?”“Why are you not replying back”
Her hands froze. The lightness of the morning vanished.
Another message from him, “I am sorry, I love you! ”
She touched her neck. The red marks had now turned blue.
Bruises, the reminders of last night’s fight.
Her eyes welled up, but no tears fell.
She looked back at the screen, fingers trembling. And then, she typed the words he was waiting for:
“I love you too.”
~END~
Squeezing toothpaste tubes till they’re paper-thin.
Pouring water into shampoo bottles.
Adjusting broken chargers until that one green light appears.
We laugh at these moments because they’re universal. Little acts of stubborn hope.
Our refusal to let go. Our need to make things last longer.
But here’s the thing that sometimes, it’s not just toothpaste or remotes. Sometimes, it’s relationships.
The Weight We Don’t Talk About
We stay in bonds long after they’ve emptied us. We keep pouring in effort, like water into a shampoo bottle, hoping something useful will come out. We keep on believing maybe this time it will work. Maybe he’ll change. Maybe she’ll care. Maybe love will feel like love again.
But deep down, we know. Just like that toothpaste tube, there’s nothing left to give.
And yet, we hold on. Not because it’s working. But because letting go feels too heavy.
Because pretending it still works is easier than admitting it’s broken.
That’s why she whispered “I love you too” with bruises on her skin. Not because she didn’t know the truth. But because the human heart is wired to repair, to adjust, to keep squeezing even when it’s already empty.
But here’s the quiet truth:
Toothpaste tubes end.
Shampoo bottles run dry.
Chargers give up.
And so do people.
And maybe, just maybe, the bravest thing you can do isn’t to keep forcing life out of what’s already gone,
but to place it gently aside and say, “This is over. And that’s okay.”
Because love, like everything else, is not meant to be a constant act of repair.
Sometimes, walking away isn’t failure.
It’s freedom.
It’s choosing bruises that heal over wounds that never close.
It’s choosing a life that doesn’t need constant jugaad just to keep working.
You fear that one you walked away from might have been the most perfect?? But I guess you will never know until you walk away from if you have to walk away from. That's life's way of making one live in present.
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