6th May

Years ago, on this day, I lost a watch my parents had gifted me for my birthday. I was newly married and had stepped out alone to run a quick errand just a few streets away from our home.

When I returned, the watch was no longer on my wrist. I retraced my steps, asking shopkeepers and passersby if they’d seen it. No one had. I came back home in tears—it was a watch I truly cherished.

Later that evening, the husband came home from work, and I told him what had happened. He said gently, “It’s okay, let it go. That was all the runa you had with it.”

I was furious. How could he be so calm, so dismissive? He replied, “We can always buy another watch. Maybe the person who found it will cherish it. An unexpected find might have made their day better. But you know—I lost my father on this day. And I cannot buy another father.”

And every year since, I remember those words—a quiet, sobering reminder of how fragile life is, and how grief teaches us what truly stays.