A Thing of Beauty is a Joy Forever...

This is a love story. It’s a timeless love story!! This is a love story that began when I was fifteen. It’s weird and wonderful how some things, some feelings and some memories just stay with us through the years.

The house I lived in with my parents was a very simple home but I was always attracted to curios and pieces of art. I would forever be glancing at magazines that featured beautiful art. As a teenager the first time I visited my aunt (Jeroo Masi) at her new home, at Colaba-Sagar Sangeet, I felt I had stepped into a different world. It was a world I could live in for the rest of my life without asking for anything else. It was beautifully done up.

She knew of my love for curios hence took me around the house showing them to me, telling me about each piece that she had specially acquired for her new home. Lalique/s, Capodimonte/s, Czech hand-cut crystal, Lladro/s and more but… but… what I was most attracted to was a huge (nearly 10-12 inches) colorless dolphin. A piece of clear glass, cut in one and one piece only. It was a Murano!!

There I was, a fifteen year old, being given information about various pieces of art, some far more expensive than the dolphin and yet there was so much clarity in that one piece that I couldn’t take my eyes off it. Also, the information given, that it was cut out of one piece of glass held my attention. I was in awe! All I wanted at that moment was a Murano!

Did I get it? Hell no!! It was, of course, far too expensive to be gifted to a teenager who had suddenly fallen in love with it. Every time I visited my aunt, I made very sure I could sit next to the table where it was placed so that I could shower loving glances at it.. Sigh!!! :-)

Over the years I’ve been fortunate enough to see lots of Murano’s, all beautiful ones, but every time I see them I’m reminded of the time when I first laid eyes on that dolphin.

I’m forty-four now, this love has lasted twenty-nine years. I know it’s going to last as long as I live.. a life time!! I haven’t seen that dolphin for quite a many years now. My aunt relocated to Miami and when she did she took with her all the beautiful pieces of art and a piece of my heart......... <3

Forgive me for having cropped this pic but my uncle (Soli Masa) was seated on the sofa next to the dolphin and i'm not sure whether he would like to be featured in a pic online, on my blog. There are two swans flanking my baby (the dolphin). It's the only pic i have of it.

~ Bawi ~