The Black Hairclip

Ammmaaaa!35-year-old Anu yelled as she was getting ready to work, I need my black hairclip its missing. Anu always wore this black hairclip whenever she had important meetings or events in her life. It was gifted to her by her mother on her 16th birthday and till date she has believed it’s her lucky charm. She wore it whilst defending her PhD thesis and many such occasions.

Today was yet another important day, her manager wanted her to present the results of a research to the research director and the future of her team rested upon her frail shoulders. Mom emerges from the kitchen and hands over the clip to her. Anu always had an independent streak choosing career over everything else. Amma hugs her grown up daughter and winks at her pinching her well-formed cheeks, exclaiming!” you are still my 8-year-old darling”. Anu touches her mother’s feet rushes out of the door and zips to work in her red range rover. She was a proud owner of several enviable baubles the car being one amongst them. She reaches work and heads straight to the meeting; she is running five minutes late and didn’t get time to go in for a bio break. The meeting went swimmingly. Her team members hug and exchange high fives, an ecstatic Anu takes off for the day and gets home. She rushes to her mom’s room and hugs her with a fervent vigour exclaiming that the meeting well. Her mother knew her daughter was very capable yet lacked self-belief, she knew she believed anything good that happened to her was either luck or coincidence. Anu exclaims,” amma I did it, if not for the clip I wouldn’t have clinched the deal!”. Her mother then gently removes the clip from her hair, Anu is left shocked, it’s not her favourite black clip. She is full of anger, disbelief, and silent tears of disappointment fall like dewdrops leaving trails of mascara on her cheeks. Her mom hugs Anu, wipes her tears and says,” My dear baby, it was always you, you don’t need anything except yourself to succeed!”. Anu wipes away the tears flowing down her flushed cheeks and embraces her mother. Once she discovered self-belief, she was now unstoppable. Henceforth, Anu only wore herself belief and hard work as symbols of good luck.