Poems & Short Stories

I met my college friends recently and we finally sat in a café for much needed caffeine infusion because what we thought as a retail therapy turned into a retail fatigue. The café looked like a snug retreat with four of us flipping the pages of the old college diaries and reminding ourselves that how we have transformed over the years. Physically a lot but mentally we are still the crazy bunch who get excited with shopping expo and art exhibitions, meandering our way like those socialite aunties in Feb afternoons. Our conversation went on for hours and it finally rested on a question that strongly demanded me to write an entire page about it. “What is the first gift you gave yourself from your first pay- check, from your first job? Our coffee and cake arrived and so did the answers. Each bringing on their own flavor and reminiscing the memories attached to it. My eyes rested on my plain Jane gold ring. What is it about this ring that makes it extra special? Is it because

Mae Mobley: “Colored folks are dirty. Black is not good.” Aibleen: Little girl, who is teaching you these things? Mae Mobley: Our teacher in school – Miss Taylor This is the conversation that one of the protagonists has with the little girl she takes care of. Aibee   thinks, “What person out there don’t remember their first grade teacher?” Totally agree! Like Aibleen, my jaw tightens and fists get clenched. The Help is a gripping tale of what it was like to be a colored maid during the civil rights movement of 1960s. It talks about color discrimination and the heinous aspects attached with it, through the lives of housemaids in racially conflicted area – Jackson in Mississipi. “ Don’t judge by the color, love all the people” , is what this book determines to tell through the three voices. These bold voices take turn in filling the pages all along. Aibleen - with a balanced mind, Minny – the sassier of the three and Skeeter – though a white, pledge to make life easier