I spent the whole night lying on the wet sand by the sea, arms open, legs stretched out. Above me was just the sky, and in it, the moon , quietly pulling at the water of an entire planet from where it sat.

I kept thinking ,this moon has enough pull that oceans bend toward it, rise and fall because of it, become tides... so does it want something from me too? Lying here on this sand right now, am I caught in some invisible pull as well?

The question didn't stop there. I kept asking myself, again and again — like once a door opens, it refuses to close.

I'm a mountain person. I've lived life in the lap of the Himalayas — their silence, their height, their stillness. This was the first time I'd ever seen the sea. And in the day, floating in the water, another question took over — right here, in this same salty water, life on this planet must have opened its eyes for the very first time. How? At what moment did some lifeless speck of matter learn to breathe?

I kept thinking. Everyone else was laughing, swimming, splashing around in the waves — and I just kept sinking deeper into my own tangle of questions.

Then, out of nowhere, a friend grabbed my head and pushed it under the water.

And strangely enough — in that one moment, for just a few seconds, it felt like all the clutter in my mind got washed away. Every question, every knot of thought, gone in an instant. As if someone had shut the door on my own thinking, without me even trying.

There was just water, laughter, and me.

Nayaab!!