Sanjay Sabarwal's Blog

The sun slowly bathes my culdesac in warm light. Contentment courses through me as my gaze catches the wonders of a new place. I can imagine a new car smell in the house, and excitement accumulates as we have people over. One of the joys of a home is hosting. Both the wife and me love to host, but we also love opportunities to spend time that we don’t see often. This past friday, we had a chance to connect with my wife’s cousin and their entire family. What made it great was the instant connection between the kids, but what was better was having deeper conversations with the cousin and his wife; something that hadn’t happened before.

Another perk was the spending time with his father who I liked immediately when I met him over a decade ago. There are some people that come into your lives, and the intimacy makes sense, like a missing piece you didn’t know that makes the relationship a great one from the get go. Each time we see each other, my heart feels fuller, eager to hear his thoughts, and just being able to spend meaningful time together.

Another weekend of blessings, and I cannot help but be touched with gratitude. To be able have so much light in our lives makes the sunlight touching the streets like its reaching inside my heart. I cannot help but express thankfulness to the one above who allows me to experience all the varying emotions not just negative ones, who shows me that life isn’t always an ordeal, but something to experience joyfulness in.

Shukar. Shukar. Shukar

This past weekend, we were able to have friends and family over to experience our new place, but for me the biggest emotion was pride. Pride for my wife who endlessly worked to make our place a true home. Her touch is everywhere, including giving me a writing space that I said I didn’t want and now can’t imagine my mornings without it. A place for me to gaze, to have the sun bathe me in its light (hopefully giving me inspiration, and to wonder how well she knows me and supports me in her quiet ways.

She takes my writing as a part of me even though I don’t share as much as I could with her verbally, but she knew just as she knew what our house needed. Each area turned into something special, and I admit I feel guilty as my contribution was minimal due to work, my shoulder and just not being around during the times she could have used the support. But not only did she not complain, she took joy in molding this into our home. Countless trips, so many touches that still astonish me as I could have never imagined them. I am still in awe as to how much joy she has already created and we haven’t even been here a month.

Joy becomes easier when shared with others and this weekend we shared with the ones we care about, and I can’t wait to have others over, to have them appreciate as she has done. I make no claims except that my wife made us a home, and for that I am truly grateful, and it makes me excited for 2022. Almost three months in, and it looks bright, hopeful, and I am eager to see what we create.

Thank you Babu!

One of the exciting things about being at a new place means decluttering, organizing, and setting up spaces as you imagined them to be. I was happy to say that we brought over a lot less stuff that we have accumulated over the past two years, and even now have been ruthless of what gets to stay and what gets to go. It is nice to push through even as exhaustion sets in, and you promise yourself you are not going to move again for a long time even though the whole point of this exercise is to determine when we will find our permanent home.

And so we push through to new environments because that is the only want to find out what works and what doesn’t. Thankfully, I am paired with a very smart and talented wife who not only knows how to make a home, but knows exactly what pairs well with what while I just scratch my head, unable to make any design contributions, well because I have the taste of a two year old. So she makes do with me, but it has been a blast doing this with her.

It’s a way to reconnect, to recommit, to build a stronger foundation as we push through together and make our new home. I wouldn’t want it other way.

This weekend I lost to fear, but luckily I did not do as much damage as I could have, but what little I did shows me I still have a of work to do. I won’t get into details because it would show me to be a scared little boy, and really the point of this blog has always been about expression not gossip. This past weekend I reacted when I realized someone dear to me tested positive, and while the pandemic is an old story, it has now struck home first with other loved ones, then my heart, and then finally a parent. And fear gripped my heart in such a way that I lashed out in blame when really it is what it always has been: a pandemic.

We got too comfortable too fast, or maybe we needed to in order to survive mentally. I don’t care if I get it, but to see others close to me suffer has been truly painful. I kept my fear in check until it hit too close to home when I wondered would I lose another even though the symptoms were mild. I projected onto a barren future with no parents, to being an orphan when that was not the reality but my mind made it one.

I went into a dark future, and it hit me that others had suffered the same fears and I had said nothing just the same noncommittal “I am sorry” not taking in their fear, just being a bystander. I get it. That is our coping mechanism because if we keep feeling fear, we won’t be able to function, but it does mean that I get to me empathetic, to learn to be present, to focus on what is actually happening to going to the worst place.

I went there this weekend, and it was not a pleasant place, and so I get to keep doing the work of not leading my life with fear, to being present, to take care of loved ones not spread emotions that don’t serve them or me. To not make proclamations filled with anger, threats, and needless worry to others, sharing a weaker part of myself that does a disservice to who I am as a person.

This weeked fear won, and it probably won’t be the last, but it doesn’t mean it will win everytime. It just means I get to do the work so I get better at taking it on.

This past week and month have been a blur, and just like that, we are a few days away from moving to a new city, adventure, and place. It blows my mind how much I accumulated in two years, but more likely it’s stuff I brought in from the last place. And so I let go, declutter, make space in my place, heart and soul for new experiences, new people, new things to talk about. Yet it seems far and close at the same time. So much to get done this week while also celebrating a friend’s wedding.

It’s hard to complain about my schedule when truly I am receiving the fruits of my behavior, from get togethers, to have the ability to move, to getting busier, and having to choose between events. Yet I also know that it is easy to get lost in going from one thing to another, easier to lose sight of my vision, to get buried in work and forget the reasons for getting into lawyering. It means remembering my why. To focus, to keep up morning routine to replenish myself so I don’t draw empty.

It means saying no more often, to putting up my hand and regaining my footing for my priorities so I am not just running from one thing to another even though I want to. I just know it doesn’t serve me when I don’t give myself time to rest and recover as well as heal. I am exciting as I about to begin a new journey to a new place, but also to my physical therapy, I can even allow myself to dream to get back to the gym. To not this 50th year of my life be just about recovering but of bouncing back, harder, faster and richer in experience and time with loved ones.

Happy Monday!

This past weekend, I got a chance yet again to be surrounded by loved ones, to make new experiences with familiar people and not so familiar, a chance to make memories, to spend time not money in a way that enriched my life. Time and time again I am amazed at how many people I am surrounded by who treasure the same things I do. Time with family, deepening bonds, to not just be about one thing but the longer goal which is to have as many people as possible who share the same desires to expand their minds, hearts and ultimately souls.

I know it sounds like hyperbole, but as we drove down the mountain at end of the weekend, a deep contentment coursed through me as I watched my mother sleep in the car while my mother and father in law joked around, and my wife and sister in law sat all the way in the back of the large SUV, and that was just one car while there were two more similarly filled. More than twenty of us made the trek to be together, to share meals, laughter, inside moments, music, dance, the morning light and quiet, the bright sharp sun that kept the chill just at bay.

Each meal done by different people from the moms to their children to the constant baby talk from the 4 month old to the oldest (my mom), we covered it all, and my selfish heart wanted more of this, it wasn’t enough, there were some I wished who were there, the one I always want around from PApa to baby maasi to my sisters and their kids, yet the people there made it such a perfect trip that I knew it was just my own greed, to share with my loved ones since my brother in law and sister in law had created such a perfect birthday event which included so many when they could have simply kept it to themselves.

It is times like these that makes me appreciate them even more, at their efforts to make our bonds stronger, to ensure that their children experience as much love as they have from so many rather than a few. It can be easy to keep it small, but their determination to expand their world, and ours filled me with so much gratitude, and mental pictures that I can savor on my time. I can’t wait for the next trip, to perhaps copy their efforts and make my world experience just a bit bigger with others, or just maybe, I will get more time with the ones in Big Bear, and that just makes my world a bit better anyway.

Thank you Sabina and Rick. Your efforts are truly appreciated.