The Rakhi I Tied
From My New House
Married four months, and Raksha Bandhan meant packing a bag instead of just walking downstairs.
August 2026 · 4 min read
The First Rakhi I Had to Pack a Bag For
Every Rakhi before this one, I just walked downstairs, thali in hand, my brother already waiting because we lived under the same roof. This year I packed an overnight bag, told my mother-in-law which train I was on, and made the two-hour journey back to a house that used to just be mine and is now somewhere I visit.
Nobody Told Me It Would Feel Like This
I expected the day to feel exactly the same, just with an extra journey attached. It didn't. Tying the rakhi felt the same, the sweets tasted the same, but some part of me kept noticing I was a guest now, checking the clock for my return train instead of just staying as long as I wanted, the way I used to.
My New Family Wanted to Know I'd Reached, Too
My husband didn't come this time, work made that impossible, but he still wanted to know I'd reached my parents' house safe, and my mother-in-law asked the same before I'd even called her. Instead of three separate calls to three separate people, one arrival alert did the job — my parents saw I'd landed, and so did the house I go back to tomorrow.
The Return Journey Is the Part Nobody Warns You About
Leaving felt harder than arriving, the way it always does now. My brother walked me to the station, and this time it was my new family's turn to wait for the "reached" notification instead of my parents'. It's strange, belonging to two circles at once, watched over by two houses that used to have nothing to do with each other and now both quietly wait to hear I got home safe, wherever home is that year.
Some Rakhis Are About the Thread. This One Was About the Distance.
I don't know if it gets less strange with time, this business of being someone's daughter in one city and someone's daughter-in-law in another, both real, both mine. What I do know is that the worrying doesn't have to be as loud as it used to be — two families, one thread, and a phone that let both sides breathe a little easier about the same journey.