Arora Nin

I decorated my entire house this year with painstaking details that only I would notice, as if beauty might translate to worth, as if the oils I blend and the perfumes I create and the careful arrangements might prove I am something. I have stayed in relationships that were performance, never daring to say that it was hard, that I was lonely, because I feared the silence of these holidays more than the quiet suffocation of staying. Each year at this time, I would be scouring the shops and the...

My mother is the most generous woman I have ever known. Not in the showy, headline-making way, but in the quiet, constant way that changes lives. She gives not just to family, but to everyone around her. Long before there was a movie called "Pay It Forward," she was living it, teaching me that generosity isn't about grand gestures—it's about seeing people. She taught me something that seemed counterintuitive at first: tip in advance. When we'd hire a tour guide, she'd pay them upfront,...

Summer has gone and today as I write, it is mid-autumn. It is undeniable that October signals the move towards another end of year—and...