It’s my life

Mona

Kamla K Kapur chose the unconventional life from the word go! When asked to toe the line, she would revolt, ‘You think you have power over me for you feed me and clothe me,’ she would ask before stripping down and running off from home. As she grew older, she would keep the underwear on before dashing out, making her father shout after her in good humour, ‘that underwear is ours too, leave it behind’.

She sure was not the one to follow a conventional path, so when she fancied doing masters in the US and her father expressed lack of funds for he had just retired, she asked for the money he had kept for her dowry. Indulgent father accepted and so followed a career in academia before turning to her true vocation – writing!

This author, who is equally deft in wringing poetry to prose, plays to fiction, is out with her another book The Singing Guru, Legends and Adventures of Guru Nanak, the first Sikh.

As she divides time with her husband in San Diego, California and in Kullu valley, Himachal Pradesh; she stops by at her third home, only place where she comes out of her self-imposed exile, her point of social contact — Chandigarh. Comfortably sitting in her parental house in Sector 33 on Thursday afternoon, Kamla looks back, at the choices she made, prices she paid and how she ended up living a life fully sans any regrets.

Of pain & poetry

It was my father who pushed me ever so gently into writing. Post our holidays, he would encourage me to write down the experiences and take immense pride sharing them. My first poem, however, came when I was in boarding school and sick as I lay in my dormitory and all my friends happily played and screamed in the fields outside, I felt left out. So came out a sentimental poem with lots of ‘thous’ and ‘thees’. I wouldn’t knock that down for that started me on to a path that I would follow till me last day. I haven’t really stopped writing from that evening. I could see that putting pen to the paper alleviates the pain. So have I followed the path that led me to many failures and some successes.

Off-beat life

Showing up in the US to do masters, followed by a doctorate, I got into academia. That whetted my appetite to put my experiences into writing. But then, when was I made to follow tracks? So came a break from teaching and taking up writing full time. As for not being a conformist, I did marry but not out of compulsion but out of choice. I feel fortunate that I have families. Child bearing was not for me but I lead a fulfilling life with my husband Payson R Stevens who is a fabulous painter, poet and filmmaker. I wanted someone who would support me fully and yet give me independence to pursue my path. We both are there for each other yet leave each other free to follow our individual creative paths.

Price of freedom

Freedom that I chose over everything else has come at a cost. A. When pursuing complete freedom, you often get lost. B. It brings with it sufferings. But then that happens to everyone. Acknowledging that you are lost is the first step towards resolution. And, each suffering comes with a lesson. It’s pointless to suffer without accepting the great deal of learning that comes with it and I see so many people suffering pointlessly. When I have demanded a free will, I have also imposed self restrictions. It’s important to live consciously. It’s not like I didn’t make mistakes or suffer but my consolation lay in the fact that it was I who chose a particular path and learnt along the way. On my journey yoga, meditation and kirtan have been my constant companions as has been my pen.

A spiritual journey

Kamla K Kapur’s father, a devout Sikh, always wanted her to write about Sikhism but she came to this point through a circutatious route. 

She wrote Ganesha Goes to Lunch and Rumi’s Tales from the Silk Road before starting on to this Sikh saga. The Singing Guru, Legends and Adventures of Guru Nanak, the First Sikh, is a spiritual fiction that places the enlightened one Guru Nanak and his companion Mardana together on a journey. While the first is certain, centred, detached from comfort or discomfort, satisfaction or hunger, prosperity or adversity; the latter totally opposite. 

When Kamla was done with the first book, she realised there is so much more to say. So followed another. Her second in the Sikh saga is nearly complete and she is pepped to write few more; take this journey till Guru Gobind Singh. And, also comes a fantasy for teens and another fiction.

The book release function has been organised by Chandigarh Literary Society on July 25 at 5pm at Chandigarh Golf Club, where Dr BN Goswamy and Neelam Mansingh Chowdhry would release the book.

mona@tribunemail.com