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21 September 2026
There are things in life we understand only after they have passed.
A conversation we thought was ordinary. A goodbye we did not know was final. A kindness we barely noticed at the time. Even a difficult period that once seemed pointless can look different when we stand far enough away from it.
Perhaps that is one of the quiet privileges of growing older. We begin to see the shape of things that were once too close to understand.
Sometimes we remember a person and realise that what mattered was not what they said, but the way we felt when they were around. Sometimes we look back at a decision we once regretted and discover that it quietly brought us somewhere we needed to be.
Life rarely explains itself while we are living it.
It asks us to keep going without giving us the whole picture.
And perhaps that is why, when we look back, certain memories carry a strange tenderness. We finally understand what they were trying to tell us.
Rajat Chandra Sarmah, Guwahati, Assam, India, Instagram @rajatchandrasarmah5, YouTube: conversewithasmile, email rajatchandrasarmah@gmail.com
