Have you ever been in love?
Not with a person,
But with a memory

I remember my mother taking me on long drives all over the city in her old beat up 1998 Maruti Suzuki Zen. It was dark green and we used to call it the Beetle Wagon because it looked like a bug. 

I remember getting in the car before we’d set off on one of those drives and sifting through her cassette collection to pick out our playlist for the day. I remember accidentally unspooling an entire cassette of 1990’s love songs. We’d blast The Bangles and Britney and Natasha Bedingfield through those tiny speakers and sing along to the muffled lyrics. We’d get the words wrong- we didn’t know this until years later when YouTube karaoke became a thing- but that didn’t stop us from singing to them like we were performing in front of a stadium full of people.

I remember she’d sometimes pick me up from school and take me to the Juice Junction in Indiranagar before these drives. ‘Fuel for the journey’, she’d say. Our order was always the same- veggie sandwich and watermelon juice for her, a chilli cheese sandwich and chocolate milkshake for me. She’d always say I should eat more vegetables but she’d never stop me because she knew it made me happy. Maybe I should have listened to her more.

I remember feeling so safe in that tiny vehicle. It was objectively a pitiful car, but I was small enough for it to feel like a chariot, like royalty on my way to a ball. My mother was so proud of it, how could I not be too? I remember her being so proud to be the first person in our family to make a huge purchase, to learn how to drive, and to teach my father. I know now that the car was more to her than a mode to get places. It was a means for her to get away.

 I miss those car rides. The car got sold nearly a decade and a half ago, the roads we’d take don’t look the same, the cassettes we’d listen to collect dust in the back of my grandmother’s bureau. My sister never liked singing in the car, and once she got older the music was turned down and we’d talk to each other instead. My dad would join in on the singing occasionally, but he’s a talker too.

I miss you, Ma. Singing isn’t the same without you.