On a warm, sunny Monday morning, a bunch of writers came together to discuss writing styles and be taught pointers on good and effective writing from published authors and also participate in an interesting writing prompt. The Write & Beyond group run by the lovely Kiran Chaturvedi is doing a fantastic job of mentoring upcoming authors. After almost a year of jinxed plans to join in for one of their sessions, I finally managed to participate in this one. It worked well, as it was a weekday. I usually don’t compromise on family time on weekends.

The glow of the winter sun along with the stimulating discussions at the lawns of the Patio Club lent the participants an adrenaline rush. Kanchana Banerjee http://kanchanabanerjee.com, author of A Forgotten Affair emphasized on the importance of choosing a befitting name for our characters. She said they added an interesting dimension to our stories. Thus Kiran came up with a prompt of writing a character sketch or a story line based on the protagonist’s name. We all got started, weaving our stories with a 25-minute time frame. The participating writers presented a myriad collection of pieces wonderfully put together. Some jestful, some poignant, some delightful. Here’s what I came up with.

AMBROSIA

She is a doctor by day, mother by evening and writer by night. She is like God’s ambrosia; sweet and replete with vigor and vitality.
She is Amrita. Dr. Amrita to be precise.
Her enchanting hazel eyes and soft brown curls that cascade down her long neck and delicate yet confident shoulders draw a lot of attention.
When she walks into the clinic, stethoscope casually thrown around her shoulders, in her simple salwar kameez or cotton saree, she manages to grab quite a few eyeballs. It’s rumored that many patients come to see her not because she’s an acclaimed doctor with a heart of gold, but because of her pristine beauty, calm, caring demeanor that helps cure most of their illness.

Her family dotes on her as much as her patients do. So do the writers from her writing community. On her birthday yesterday, the Twitter wall was flooded with innumerable tweets.

After putting her baby to bed and kissing her husband goodnight, she logs on to her MacBook and starts tapping on the keyboard. She has so many untold stories. Those that she wants to turn into books. One being of Ashok Kaku, who was the predator in their family. Who marred the lives of many children including hers and made their childhood traumatic.
She has learned to cut cords and move on. But some stay shaken, as the scars haven’t yet healed. Amrita continues to heal them and others. She is truly ambrosia to people’s soul.

Disclaimer: This is a piece of fiction, though the name has been inspired by the beautiful, blogger-twitter friend Amrita Basu Misra who blogs @ http://www.healthwealthbridge.com. Mayuri, the pen maiden @ http://www.sirimiri.in linking you up to this post too, for having introduced me to Doc Amrita. 🙂