In 2015 I wrote my first blog sitting in my office where I was running and managing with my friend Srini, a beautiful cafe and bar called ‘Truffles’.

This was a dream I had when I was globetrotting and living the life in Singapore and New York in the early to late 2000’s changing careers from one extreme to the other.

My travels across the world, the experiences I had, the cuisines I enjoyed and the concept of creating one of a kind cafe was in my head and heart and it was only in 2008 we went into it and in 2011 we had opened this destination cafe, a one of a kind place in Hyderabad in Jubilee Hills amidst the rocks and trees..

It was a different life and lifestyle when I wrote that first blog. What made me do that? It was an outlet for me, after seeing the ugly and worst of the hospitality industry, to know and understand that principles mean nothing, and to realise that the entertainment and hospitality world is what entices almost everyone the most and has the highest failure rate yet people dive into it.

We created a brand with the cafe and when we sold off the place in 2018 I never looked back and I went into a different lifestyle leaving everything behind.

What made me rake up the past while I am writing this? It’s because a few days ago Srini said that people still remembered Truffles, his friends who were consultants with big hotels and now happening places still heard customers talk about Truffles with a wistful nostalgia and they miss it and it was ahead of its times.

And now I can say with pride that we created a place that not just in Hyderabad, but no city in India had ever experienced. It’s time to shed the humility and accept that we created and ran a place for almost 8 years and it was a milestone in our lives.

But at that instance when he said how people still remembered our cafe and bar in today’s attention span of 10 seconds shorts on YouTube and Instagram , I didn’t feel a thing. Neither sadness nor pride. Nothing, it was zilch.

If anything, the year of 2024 has taught me is a reconciliation to my reality and my relationships. From the closest to the inner circle. To finally accept it’s useless to go beyond a point. The twain shall never meet and it’s time to end it or transition to a different phase in life.

My time is running out, yes it is, because it truly is. I don’t know about others and how they feel about it but it’s not my story. The past me would make others lives and stories a part of my story and it’s a responsibility I took on by choice. That no longer exists.

I am an ordinary person that had an out of the ordinary life and experiences.

Being born as an only child to much older parents, they were so ahead of their times in the way they raised me, which I don’t see it in today’s parents either. I give credit to my departed parents.

To a life I never planned, to a country like my India I thought I will never leave, which I did, first to Singapore then to New York then giving it all up for an ashram life in Kerala to going back to dealing with my fathers death with Cancer. After that, I lost my mother within two months after opening Truffles. That’s life isn’t it?

The story of my chequered life can become one biography, just that I am a nobody and no one will read it, so I blog, because it’s ‘free’ because the few I send it to, even fewer ones just might read it.

So 2024 huh? What do I say? The constant thing in my life in recent years has been the love I get and receive from the dogs I keep meeting and separating since I started this rescue work. That too was unplanned. I have been rescued by them through their pain, suffering and healing.

To knowing I was going through perimenopause in my 40’s this year on my birthday changed everything.

I became more sensitive, more receptive and more disappointed by the ones around me who didn’t make an effort to express nor take care. It didn’t make it better knowing this is a pattern that I was ignoring it all these years. Sometimes one doesn’t want to face the truth and keep living in a bubble.

I buried dogs when they were very sick to seeing so many others nurturing and growing to heartbreakingly accepting when I didn’t see a few more, that they died and there was no point searching for them.

To trekking in the Himalayas ( my once a year trek) and meeting an awesome group of which I wanted to blog but life took over as I had one emergency after the other.

And then of course just like a year ending gift I had the accident, and whatever little push I needed to get out of the person I was, it happened with this. Let’s say it was a bulldozer effect on me. The bubble finally popped.

And all I can remember of 2024 and I carry forward to next year is the accident. it has been that impactful, that milestone of my life that crumbled everything around and within me. It removed the unnecessary dirt that was clogging my heart.

I accept that I am an emotional fool that gets steam rolled by close ones because I give them that chance. I keep saying it’s ok, it’s ok, while it is definitely not ok.

And there are those very few who remind me to not become pessimistic and to not lose hope on love. It’s out there and to never give up on love and keep seeking wholeheartedly.

So as I leave 2024, what do I look forward to? LOVE and its many forms and love in people in various ways. Because I owe it to myself. I want love and this world needs and wants more love this time, more than ever!

So before I leave, I can only give a suggestion, nay, shout out LOUD! Stop checking your phones constantly , stop scrolling and stop bending over your phone and watching nonsense and live a life.

Know and experience love in its truest form and that can happen only when you get your nose and arse out of the phone.

There is love only if you look with naked eyes, a full heart, earnestly, because you know something? The universe existed before you did and it will continue to exist without you. It is for YOU that TIME is running out.

Just start loving and expressing it to those who deserve you ❤️❤️