Ullage of life

Every single day I get a new word in my inbox from dictionary.com. Sometimes they are words I know, sometimes they are new.If it is a new word, I usually try and understand the context in which it is to be used and I look at the way it is pronounced too. An interesting word I got yesterday was the word 'Ullage'. It set me thinking.

Right now I have relocated from UK to India, and we have moved into a lovely home, which is at the moment, completely bare.  There are no tables, no chairs, no microwave, no TV, no kitchen utensils and worst of all, no writing desk, books, the kids toys or my art stuff which is all bobbing in a ship, in a container in the Pacific Ocean or perhaps it has reached Indian Ocean--who knows! They tell us it will finally arrive by month end. (am keeping my fingers crossed). I am cooking with a few borrowed pans and plates. We sit on the bare floor and eat our meals. Getting stuff organised in India, I am discovering is a long, lengthy and extremely frustrating process.(and God help you if you are not an Indian! I cannot imagine any of my English friends being able to manage in India, unless they knew someone here).  Even obtaining a local mobile phone number was a big hassle and they debarred my number twice, despite my visiting the customer relationship centre and submitting every necessary document two times. Renewing my Indian driving licence is another lengthy lengthy process and if you do not have your own vehicle in India (and right now I don't) one knows how inadequate the public transport system really is. But hey, this is not an NRI returning to India and cribbing and cribbing about what is wrong in the country. (I do love my country, am very patriotic and have  spent more than a year in very uncomfortable and extremely difficult conditions, teaching slum children English and Math, because I do believe that each of us can indeed make a difference if you truly care).

So how is all this connected to the word I received?  Mostly I realised that many of us (and that includes me) tend to focus on the 'Ullages in life'. We look at what isn't right and we feel bad. We complain about the traffic instead of being grateful that we can afford a car/two wheeler. We complain about our jobs and how we got a 'raw deal' instead of being grateful that we're not laid off  or unemployed. We complain about how we don't have perfect figures (propelled by media frenzy which mostly objectifies women with all the hype about size zero) instead of being grateful that we have a healthy body free of disease. One of my good friends recently had a mastectomy done and has battled breast cancer and is a proud survivor. Her spirit is truly amazing as never once has she moaned, cribbed or complained instead she asserts how much she loves all of us, her closest friends and keeps sending us messages of love and hope.

We all tend to look at what we don't have, instead of being happy and grateful for the things we do. Let us stop looking at the ullages of life. Let us instead appreciate what are fortunate to possess.Let us fill our lives with joy, laughter and whatever makes us feel good from the inside.

On my part, I am grateful to have extremely supportive friends (because of whom the relocation from UK to India has been smooth), I am grateful to have a wonderful home, happy that my children got into a superb school (despite it being mid  academic year). I am grateful for the three newspapers (yeah I subscribe to three :) )  I receive every single day (Newspapers were a big luxury in UK and many people don't buy one daily) and which I devour from end to end :-)  I am grateful the extremely cheap texting (I could not believe my ears when the guy told me that I get 500 free SMS a day! I kept asking him if it was for a month! Texting is so expensive in the UK)  which I use liberally to text all my friends my friends  my friends who reply. I am grateful for the sunshine, the lovely weather and a lovely lovely garden which my new home has. I am grateful for the superb facilities which my residential complex has and doubly grateful that I can visit my mother who lives in Kerala very easily now. :-) I am also grateful for such well adjusting children (they have been real darlings) who do not complain even one little bit about anything even though the transition hasn't really been easy for them, moving from UK to India.


What are you grateful for today? If you share I am listening.

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 PS:  I leave you with a wonderful video which I loved. Listen to it with your headphones on :) It is surely a pep up :)