Little Legacies

The past is a strange thing. It can never be relived even though we often carry it with us. We’ve all been down paths of nostalgia remembering with fondness even that which had, in the past, felt like tough times. And then, there are pieces of the past we visit every day without giving them much thought. For instance, you may tie the laces of your left shoe before the right because a kindergarten classmate told you that it was lucky. Now, decades later, you continue to do so subconsciously. Come to think of it, it’s likely the only remnant of the friendship you once shared.

I think of these as little legacies. It could be anything at all – a friend’s remedy to avoid a hangover, an oft-repeated phrase, a recipe passed down by a family member, a lesson imparted by a favourite teacher or a superstition created on a day when things worked out well for you.

I know someone who support a sports team she was introduced to by a friend. Time and circumstance eroded their bond but not before loyalty to the team took root in her heart and now, it’s her team. But if you look closely, it’s a legacy of their friendship.

It is said that the tragedy of human life is that we are loved more than we will ever know. And that love is reflected in our adoption of the traits, habits or gestures of the people we like. We carry these little legacies with us for years, if not the rest of our lives. In that way, so much of what or who we are, is a gift from those we’ve known. Sometimes, the association may be brief but the impact is lifelong. Perhaps, we are all like giant jigsaws with pieces borrowed from people who crossed our paths and walked beside us for a while until the next fork in the road.

A friend of mine, Reema taught me the basics of badminton on a makeshift open court with what only someone very kind would call a threadbare net. We went on to play on beautiful, indoor wooden courts and also, improved as players. Reema and I lost touch but my love for badminton persists and I continue to play. That’s another little legacy.

The quirks and affinities we pick up without ever being able to pinpoint their original source fascinate me the most. I like to believe that my writing the digit 7 with a pen stroke slashing through its torso or using a hair comb pin in my hair are souvenirs from places and people that lay dormant in my memory. Their origins are lost to me and yet, they’re a part of my life today. How poetic it is that a quote about such legacies is attributed to Anonymous,

“What you leave as a legacy is not what is etched in stone monuments, but what is woven into the lives of others.”

Another friend of mine, Raj is a stickler for checking the air pressure of his vehicle’s spare tyre before a long trip. It’s a habit he picked up from his father and it’s served him well over the years. There’s a journey metaphor in there which I will spare you!

You may start to ponder about the little legacies littered throughout your days and life and yet, barely any come to mind when you think about them actively. I know it to be so because I’ve tried it. When it finally strikes you, drop me a line in the comments.

In the meantime, here’s another of mine. Teresa, the owner of the salon in Delhi where I like to get a haircut, showed me how to blow-dry my hair for extra volume and bounce. I use her technique whenever I want my hair to look extra-nice. I’m certain Teresa didn’t give any thought to the value she was adding to my life and yet, here I am—writing about something I learnt from her.

Little legacies are just gestures, habits and ideas assimilated into our lives through a kind of unconscious osmosis. And yet, the alchemy of memory burnishes the most ordinary of things with the lustre of value and charm.

Only that which is continued by another, persists. Everything else ends with us. So, may you never minimise the value of little legacies and the role they play in all our lives.