Under The Ink - Vaishnavi Kabadi
Vaishnavi Kabadi says, “Would I be able to make it as a writer?” was a question that haunted me the most through my teens. Did I find an answer to it? “My Grandpa is an author. So the most natural way to carve a smile on his face was by showing him a write-up. As far back as I can scavenge, those were my best memories with him. The way he lighted up with warmth, seeing my innocent scribbles was priceless. Growing up, he was the beating heart of my inspiration. Watching him write daily ignited the flare of writing in me.
“Childhood was a blissful breeze, reading Amar Chitra Katha and scribbling my thoughts out. But my early teens, in contrast, were mind-boggling episodes of mental stress. It seemed as if all of my interest had faded to dust. I couldn’t bring myself up to writing or reading. I wondered what happened to my dreams of making writing my career. It seemed like a nightmare that wouldn’t end. To hold me from spiraling downwards further, I enrolled myself in a Visual arts course. But what started as a distraction became a detox to my anxiety.
“Over the six months, I met many cheerful, like-minded people, who supported me through tough times. People who are into art are highly expressive, and they can interpret your thoughts, which is beautiful. The interpretation of paintings through words was something I was great at. All this fuelled my artistic side, and I picked up my pen again. I jotted down some writing pieces which ended up being a part of an anthology called ‘Fragile Abstraction.’
“The feeling of being featured in it was phenomenal. All this amped up my courage to write my book. It will be a collection of poems and short stories of unprivileged women hailing from backward societies. So I’m hoping to give my best.
“My break from writing made me realize that it’s okay not to take the pressure of creating great art every day. When you take a break, you develop a new perspective and get better at it. My mom’s saying always reverberates in my ears – ‘It’s okay not to be okay. It’s okay to not give your best every day, but it’s not okay to not learn from it’”.