Healing through words 😄

When someone asks me, “What’s the longest trip you’ve ever taken?” my mind doesn’t immediately go to flights, fancy hotels or foreign countries.

It goes to a train compartment.

I was a child, travelling with my parents.

There was no business class, no airport lounge, no comfortable cab waiting at the other end.

Just a train, a few bags, my parents and what seemed like an endless number of hours ahead of us.

And somehow, it was magical.

I remember sitting by the window, watching the world change outside.

Fields became little villages.
Villages became towns.
People appeared and disappeared at every station.

And every time the train stopped, my eyes would light up.

“Are we there yet?”

My parents must have heard that question at least a hundred times.

There were steel tiffin boxes, water bottles, snacks packed from home and food that somehow tasted better simply because we were eating it on a train.

And sleeping?

Well, let’s just say the railway berth was not exactly a five-star mattress. 😄

But as children, we didn’t care.

The sound of the wheels became our lullaby.

Khataak… khataak… khataak…

I don’t remember how many kilometres we travelled.

I don’t even remember the name of every station.

But I remember my parents sitting there.

I remember their voices.

I remember the excitement.

And I remember feeling that the journey itself was an adventure.

Today, I love my comfortable flights, beautiful hotels, good food and a bed that doesn’t require acrobatics to climb into.

I have absolutely no intention of giving up those luxuries! 😂

But sometimes I wonder…

When did we stop enjoying the journey and start worrying only about reaching the destination?

That childhood train journey taught me something I understood only much later:

The longest journeys aren’t always the ones that take the most time.
Sometimes they’re the ones that leave the longest memories.

My parents may have thought they were simply taking their child on a train ride.

But without knowing it, they were giving me a memory I would carry for the rest of my life.

And perhaps that was my longest journey of all,

the journey from childhood to memory. ❤️