10 Apr Stories
Our soul tells a story. Each soul has numerous experiences that make up its journey. Whether that journey is short lived or aged into many lifetimes, it is a journey of moments which make up a story as individual as a fingerprint.
According to my Daadi, I was born an “old soul” always gravitating to the elders: their conversations, their laughter, and stories were intoxicating. I couldn’t get enough! Sitting underneath the stars in Pakistan, in the basement of our family home in Chicago, or on the Persian carpet in our living room in Rialto, the stories were endless, the nights were long and everlasting, and my soul was afire.
The card games alone were delightful. Daadi could memorize a deck or two or three of cards as easily as Rain Man and I was her “partner”- always. She would guide me in her ways: “keep your cards close to your chest”, “never show your cards on your face” (her version of Poker face), “don’t talk unnecessarily”, “be able to read your partner”, and “it’s only a game”. A game she never lost. She played cards like she lived- bold and brilliantly.
Being Muslims, alcohol was out of the question, but the chai flowed all night, sometimes into the early morning hours when Puppa would insist everyone stay for “paratha”, a flour, water, and salt concoction, layered with “ghee”, cooked until crunchy on the outside, and flaky and buttery on the inside. “Let’s use the “salaan” or “dal” leftovers from last night or we could just cook up a bunch of omelets,” Umme would add. No one can ever complain of leaving our home hungry.
“My soul has always hungered for stories. I need food, water, shelter, love and stories to exist.”
My soul has always hungered for stories. I need food, water, shelter, love and stories to exist. If you have shared a moment in your life, there is a good chance that I will recall it with the same precision as you might. Some friends have even said that I remember moments in their life that they had forgotten or dismissed, but because they shared it with me, it got tucked in the treasure chest of my memory bank.
I hoard stories of people, from the stranger to the closest confidante; a part of their journey is protected and given refuge in my mind. Periodically, I do wonder about the souls who came before me or whom I’ve never had a chance to talk to: Who will keep a part of them alive? So my mind goes walking, creating worlds, and reminding all those lost to time that they have not been forgotten.
“Let us strive for peace within our hearts, within our community, within our nation, within our world.”
My mind wanders into graveyards, abandoned plantations, across Native burial grounds, underneath oceans, meandering through war memorials, usually ending up somewhere in the forests of Germany where some of the most horrifying atrocities took place all underneath the world’s gaze. Recently, I’m with suffering families in Syria, grieving yet another young, black man’s death in inner city Chicago, with a scared educator in her classroom in San Bernardino, with the honorable, homeless veteran, and they all have so much to say. They all have stories. They all have souls.
There is an urgency for their stories to be heard, told, re-told, remembered, and archived. There is a panic within their souls that the same choices made in the name of national interest, government strength, security, and the all-mighty dollar will outlive the human connection, will outlive their stories. What good is a nation, any nation, when it is stripped of its soul, the essence that made it strong and good and pure, which gave it a moral compass? At some point, we as a humanity will say, “No more. No more suffering. No more hurt. No more fighting. Let us strive for peace within our hearts, within our community, within our nation, within our world.”
Until then, I shall keep hoarding stories, visiting souls to remind them they are not forgotten, talking to the living who have not been seen or heard- ever, lighting my little corner of the world with love with the hopes that it will spread and be felt by all souls, near and far.
-Samita Syed-Needelman
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