2026 with my zebra’s imperfections

Crash! The white and black porcelain shards of my beloved zebra lay all over the floor. 

I cursed myself for recklessly tossing my stole over it. My sheer ignorance and…… peekaboo!

It was not one of those slender, muscular and boring beasts—Naaaa.

It looked like some distant (striped) cousin of the elephants. Its big balloon belly hung low—as if it greedily hogged all the grass from the jungle.Those legs were squeezed to the size of a pea and that face wore a mischievous smile. It was nothing less than a laughing Buddha for me. Every time I walked past it, there was a silly grin on my face—especially on the grey days. 

You see, there are a few things you do not buy for aesthetics, sometimes they evoke beautiful feelings in you.

I knelt and picked the broken pieces one by one, worried—I would have to let go of them. But how could I throw them away? After all, my roly-poly zebra had treasured all my beaming smiles. 

So I rushed to get the glue and tried to stick the fractured ears. A few seconds later, they stood still—thank goodness! Next was the neck, it stuck too, but the cracks were shouting my carelessness aloud. 

One of the front legs was beyond repair but still, my zebra could stand after a few limps. 

Of course it didn’t look flawlessly humorous like before. I thought of camouflaging the cracks with some black colour but ‘NO’. Finally, I put it back in the same place—the centre of my home, visible from every corner. 

So what if it is imperfect? It is ‘mine’—and I love it even more now! 

There are days when I too lay broken on the floor—just like those porcelain shards of my zebra.  

And yet, I pick my pieces and try to glue myself together—somedays prayers, somedays dancing and somedays just listening to the chirps of crickets in the night (melody of silence, as I call it).

And I lovingly embrace the cracks in my soul—if I don’t, then who would?

Not everyday is sunny, not every night is glowing and not all rains are soothing. 

So why this unsettling need to be the best everyday? Even when I just can’t be, and I just don’t want to be.

Somedays there is solace in being ‘imperfect’ and somedays there is nothing more beautiful than being (un)beautiful.

I’m walking in 2026 with all my zebra’s imperfections—and you? 

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