By the time, Mira, you have a conversation with me about politics, I would not know how I'd have changed from now. I would also not know how the world would have changed. Maybe it is these fears of the unknown that I want to forestall by writing this down now. I have seen how... Continue Reading →
This year I saw Mira for exactly 3 weeks. The rest of the time I have only watched her from afar, catching snatches of her morning routines or her bedtime sleepy face. I get her to say hi, blow me kisses, make her smile, and in general have a repeating conversation of "what are you... Continue Reading →
Every day I wait for my phone to light up with the familiar blue light of a WhatsApp Video call. I swipe up to pick the call and two faces beam into my world filling me with happiness. The joy I get from my family undermines my vocal cynicism of marriage and my words of... Continue Reading →
Someday, Mira, ask me about how you ended up like how you are. There are decisions that we took, are taking, and will take, that will end up shaping you into who you will turn out to be. We are aware of it, intensely. Your American passport, for example, might be a mundane legality that... Continue Reading →
Yesterday, on a Thursday, I went to the movies. Till date, as a family, as just the 4 of us, my father, my mother, my sister, and I, we have watched one movie in the theatre - Paatti Sollai Thattaadhe. At Solavandhaan theatre in Arasaradi, Madurai. The very first movie I remember watching in the theatre... Continue Reading →
Mira gurgled curdled milk out her nose and mouth, bobbed her head around drunkenly and grinned at the wall. Screams ensued and tears of guilt streamed down everyone else's faces with exaggerated expressions of concern. Both reactions had a calculated feel. The adults were being kids and Mira is just 3 months old. About the... Continue Reading →
Hygge, the Danish concept of happiness and gratitude, stems from belonging. Belonging geographically and emotionally to home and family. I threw the book I was reading on Hygge away in disgust. Both were ideas that were alien to me for a long time. Halfway through my adult life, I was once asked if I was an... Continue Reading →
Three words had sparked a turmoil within me that years of travails, miscalculations, and selfishness have not managed to make a dent. "I am pregnant". I still remember that day vividly. I had just hung up from a work call and was slightly annoyed at the incessant calling. If not for the unresolved doctor's report from earlier during the... Continue Reading →
At 2:00 am N shook me awake. “Your father is in the closet. The light is out and he has been in there for a full minute”. The closet was a 2 feet by 2 feet vertical coffin. I rolled out of the boiling couch, my shoulders and neck aching and slick with sweat from... Continue Reading →
Impersonally Personal Stories.
my love affair with Russian literature
Pandora's Box for Art Lovers and Beauty Seekers
Nicole Higginbotham-Hogue is a lesfic author at amzn.to/36DFT2x. Sign-up for her newsletter at higginbothampublications.com
As I navigate through this life ...
Epic Literary Reviews & Insights
The Reluctant Book Worm 