Each year, as Diwali inches closer, there’s a shift—a quiet crackle in the air, an almost inaudible hum that fills homes and hearts. Windows are flung open to welcome the coolness of October, and every corner of the house seems to throb with a secret it’s keeping, waiting to be alive again, just for a little while.
In the bazaar, marigolds tumble from baskets in bright, extravagant heaps, orange and yellow petals spilling out like little explosions of joy. There’s the sharp, sweet smell of sugar and incense, of things old and things yet to be. Strings of lights glint in the hands of shopkeepers, each light a small promise waiting to be taken home, to cast its glow over rooms that, for a few shimmering days, might feel a little less ordinary.
Inside, families are drawn into the soft, familiar rituals that make Diwali what it is, what it always was. Mitti ke diye—humble clay lamps—are lined up with a care and reverence that only comes with rituals that know themselves. Diyas waiting like tiny soldiers, knowing that by dusk, each will be lit, each will play its part in the night’s choreography. Passed down from hand to hand, dadi to maa to beta, these rituals are threads that stitch generations together, each diya a quiet reminder of the past, each diya a whispered blessing for what’s to come.
In the kitchen—the thick, bustling heart of Diwali—laughter mingles with old, worn-out stories and the warm smell of ghee and elaichi. Recipes that are as old as time itself, shaped in hands that remember and hands that are learning. Some mithai from the halwai down the road, some made at home, each sweet carrying the taste of a memory that has lingered, sticky, on the edges of childhood. Children light phuljhadis, tiny sparklers that hiss and spit light, and their laughter rises into the night, echoing off walls, spilling out into the streets, filling the night with a joy that can’t be held back.
As the sun dips, the world begins to light up, diya by diya, each small flame spilling out onto doorsteps, casting a soft, golden glow that touches every house, linking one home to the next. Friends and family gather, not for grand things but for small, forgotten things. For warmth, for laughter, for moments that slip by too easily, for stories that only come alive in Diwali’s gentle glow. Each diya, each smile, a thread that ties them back to something fragile and unbreakable—a sense of belonging, a sense of home.
In a world that rushes forward every day, Diwali comes like a breath. An invitation to stop, to breathe, to listen to the laughter, the closeness, the warmth of people who stay close even when the world spins too fast. Diwali asks us to pause, to let go of the hurry, to be here, diya by diya, in the soft, forgiving light.
In every diya we light, we find ourselves—a reminder that the light we seek is the light we create, and in it lies the power to come home to ourselves.
|| Shubh Deepawali ||
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