Beauty in Bowls

My dad bought these delicate light gray bowls in 1956 - 64 years ago. He was 21 years old. He had come to London from India to study Engineering at Imperial College, and he worked several odd jobs to make a little pocket money. He used some of his hard earned money to travel to Lucerne, Switzerland; and the rest to buy these bowls there. Imagine. A young man with such an eye for beauty and aesthetic that he would have rather spent his few pence on bowls than a cool shirt or some other indulgence. He wasn't married, he didn't have a home, he would end up traveling continents, but he loved the shape and color of these bowls. He crisscrossed the globe with them for six decades. But he never used them, not once. Appreciating their beauty was fulfilling enough. When I was packing up my parent's home two years ago, I found these bowls covered in dust. Mom washed them, scared not to break them. And then we scooped some Haagen Dazs dulce de leche ice cream and savored every last bite, 62 years in the tasting.PS: my dad passed away 1 1/2 years ago; now these bowls are in my glass cupboard in the kitchen. My eyes wander to catch a glimpse of them every day, and I too am mesmerized by their simple elegance - but more so by my dad’s appreciation of such beauty and lightness, in a shop window in Lucerne, despite the weightiness of the world he must have faced.