Entering your 20s is an uncomfortable place to be. I tie my insecurities into a messy bun and try to conceal my fears of not being understood with my face cream. Nothing really helps. I look back at old Urdu newspapers, flowers wilting in my hand, and Nanu’s radio, all of which remind me of the days long gone away, never to return again, just like my childhood. The wooden box in which Abba Dada packed his clothes when he left for Aligarh to pursue his bachelors in English at AMU, has actually outlived him. The cracks on the box are unapologetically visible, and that makes me slightly envious, for I too have chinks in my armour and fears in my heart, but I am not allowed to reveal them. I find my daily dose of joy in the little things that remind me of my grandparents.Nanu and Abba Dada’s home remembers the child I used to be. One half of my childhood is stored in photographs, the other half is tied to birthday cakes, room coolers, bamboo chairs, old televisions, the chhat, the lawn and a sense of grief. They say that grief eventually passes, like a gush of wind, as all things do. In my case, it strikes like lightning at 2:34 am and rips my entire being apart, but also keeps me alive. I hold onto all of these things in an effort to let Nanu and Abba Dada know that I will look out for them, even after they’ve disappeared.Their skin was enveloped in wrinkles, just like the mango tree in their aangan which is adorned with aam ke baur every alternate summer. I still remember Nanu putting mangoes in a bucket for me to play with. I remember waking Abba Dada up for namaz in the evening while sitting in my walker, calling out, “Abba, Allah”. Nothing in this world can complement grief, apart from memory. Grief and memory are like the parallel tracks of my metro to the university. My favourite journalist once said “khamoshi mein mujhe rone ki awaaz aati hai“, and I cannot stop thinking about it since.My parents are ageing in the same manner as all parents are fated to age. Dr Zehra and Dr Shagufta have made it to the top of my mother’s call logs and three shades of grey blend in my father’s hair. I wear my amma’s kolhapuris to college now, while she styles my colourful hair clips with her kurtas. My dad sneakily takes away a few of my face creams, while I try to carry his oversized bush-shirts with a dash of style. Our lives converge and intersect each other, every day.To speak of my childhood seems like remembering a moment two centuries ago. My childhood was buried with Nanu, lost in the sadabahar flowers in her lawn and the mango blossoms in her aangan. My shoulders are heavy, but I’m carrying no weight. It’s June already, and I’m tired of being brave. And I have grown to realise that we grieve, not to forget someone, but making some space for them to thrive within us. Perhaps my friend was right in asserting, “the seemingly little things in life aren’t little.”Syeda Shua Zaidi is a student at Miranda House, University of Delhi, who loves literature, journalism, filmmaking and all things vintage.We’ve grown up hearing that “it’s the small things” that matter. That’s true, of course, but it’s also not – there are Big Things that we know matter, and that we shouldn’t take our eyes, minds or hearts off of. As journalists, we spend most of our time looking at those Big Things, trying to understand them, break them down, and bring them to you.And now we’re looking to you to also think about the small things – the joy that comes from a strangers’ kindness, incidents that leave you feeling warm, an unexpected conversation that made you happy, finding spaces of solidarity. Write to us about your small things at thewiresmallthings@gmail.com in 800 words or less, and we will publish selected submissions. We look forward to reading about your experiences, because even small things can bring big joys.Read the series here.