Dreaming is the best luxury, a human can ever possess. Dreams give you the power to feel the desire which is deep hidden in your heart, about which only your heart is aware of. Aspiration is also a dream of achieving something that makes you stand out, that makes you one in a million, and which most importantly quenches the thirst of your yearning heart.

A mother is often said to be a daughter's best friend because deep down she knows what her daughter's heart beats for. She had felt those beats when her daughter was still a mass of cells growing inside her. A mother is that person who leaves behind her dreams once she is aware that an angel is on her way. Her heart beats only to fulfil the dreams of her daughter.

A mother's point of view:

It was a beautiful Sunday morning; I had just poured freshly brewed coffee for my daughter Aisha. She was sipping it slowly, enjoying the aroma of the strong coffee, and occasionally taking bites of her sandwich. Today we are going to transform the storeroom into her little studio, where she will be shooting her podcast over the summer.

The brownish-black door creaked as I unlocked the dimly lit room, the thick smell of old leather and dust enveloped me. The room hasn't been used for a long time. My eyes scanned the room and automatically landed on the five-tier vintage bookshelf which has been untouched for years. I picked up the feather duster and walked towards the Oakwood bookshelf. My fingers absentmindedly brushed over the leather-bound books and stopped to linger at a journal that was familiar to my heart but had become a stranger to me. My hand as if having a mind of its own, pulled the journal out. The leather covering of the journal have damped at several places, the golden engravings on the top have started to fade just like the dreams which were long locked inside this cage. I flipped open the journal, and my eyes landed on a line that I wrote years ago.

"I WANT TO BECOME AN ARTIST"

The line was written by a naïve girl of six, who aspired to produce art out of her imagination, who then after a decade realised that some dreams are meant to remain as dreams and she locked her dreams in the old fat journal.

I turned the pages and saw the drawings that I made out of my mind years ago, drawings that were forgotten over time.

"Wow, mom! They are beautiful." I glanced at my daughter who was looking at my art with awe, her eyes sparkling with proudness. The same proudness that I once witnessed in my mom's eyes when I showed her my first drawing.

"Wow, my angel! They are beautiful." My mother had said decades back. My vision blurred with my memories of childhood. Soon in front of my eyes, I saw my mother giving a six-year-old me a leather journal. "Fill it with your dreams," she said, "Dreams that you want to turn into a reality one day." I saw myself hurrying across the room to grab a pen and then I wrote my dream on the very first page. My dream was to become an artist, to host my art exhibitions where I would proudly display my creativity, my talent. I smiled at that memory. I saw myself growing into a girl of sixteen. That day was crystal clear to me, I was preparing for my first art exhibition. I saw myself scurrying across the garden, arranging my works. I was full of energy and enthusiasm. The only drawback of this exhibition was that the onlookers weren't a devotee of art. They were the 'wise' women of the society to whom art meant nothing.

They approached my mom. " They are good, Mariam is good at her work." Said a woman of about sixty. My mother beamed proudly. "What is she taking after grade 10?" the lady asked.

"I'm planning to enrol her in an art school in Delhi. And then after a year when she is eligible for scholarship at University Of Arts, London she will leave for London." My mother replied happily.

"Dream?" the same woman mocked with disgust dripping from her voice.

"Are you aware of what you are talking about Fatima? You are planning to send her to Delhi and then to London? Have you gone insane? What will she do after becoming an artist? Sell her drawings on street?"

Another woman chimed in,"Moreover she is a girl for god sake! Are you unaware of the crimes that can happen to her? How will you live in this society once she comes home tainted?" I was standing a couple of tables away, clearly hearing what they wanted me to hear.

"She will come back home only once she comes back from London, looking at today's society it is impossible to see her coming back. She will never come back. A girl remains a girl till she uses her feet only, the moment she starts using her wings she becomes a bird who despises her cage, her home. Her newfound freedom is all she wants. And remember, the prettier the bird, the more tempted the hunter will be to shoot her." Added the old lady.

"We know she draws well. But what is the need of her to draw? Some dreams are meant to remain as dreams. Their changing into reality can be toxic for the society. None of us will support this decision of yours. And she is a 'girl' too delicate to face the harsh realities of the world."

I looked up at my mother, her eyes were filled with tears of helplessness. Tears which indicated that she was a helpless woman in a patriarchal society. My chest felt heavy, my breathing became shallow, my vision blurred with tears which I tried holding back. I became oblivious to my surrounding. Ten years of hard work, ten years of just one dream to see my unnoticed art become branded with my name. The only dream that I had, came crashing down. Sure everybody has the power to dream but not everyone has the right to transform their dream into reality. I lived in a society where a girl was merely a showpiece, whose only work was to be the ornament of the house. Yes, I could have protested and gone to art school, I could have brought a change, I could have spoken up but at that moment, the sixteen-year-old me felt weak. I felt unsupported. There was no way I was ever going to defame my mother in this society, even if it meant giving up on the only thing I love. I looked up at my art for the last time, satisfying my heart from the hunger for art.

I closed my eyes, feeling every stroke that I painted, which in coordination with other strokes resulted in my masterpiece. My hands felt empty, fingers abused, my mind was cramming up with the ideas that were impatiently waiting to be painted on the mocking canvas, the blank canvas mocking me how untainted it will remain forever without my art on it.

And unlike Robert Frost, I took the road conventionally travelled by.

"Mommy! Look what the Harvard Medical School has sent. Along with the acceptance letter, they have sent my Visa as well. The medical school I have always dreamed about." I was brought to the present by Aisha's high pitched gleeful voice. She has always dreamed of graduating from Harvard Medical School, and becoming a cardiothoracic surgeon, where one day she will be in scrubs, holding a scalpel in her hand and making an incision through the soft tissues above the sternum.

"Mommy are you fine with me fulfilling this dream? Will it be okay with everybody?" my angel looked at me hopefully.

Everybody? Never! The decision of any girl going abroad or chasing her wildest dreams will never be okay with everybody. This society was, is, and will somehow always remain patriarchal. There will always be somebody ready to cut the unused wings of a girl who dares to dream.

A year ago when Aisha asked my permission for broadcasting her podcast, I happily agreed. When her first episode came out, a lot of people told me that she is 'too outspoken', 'way too open', 'direct and blunt', 'overconfident to be a girl' but these labels didn't mean a thing to me.