The Home – coming

Today she is coming home, the first time after the wedding.  My daughter and her husband.  Should I have said my daughter , and my son(in-law)?

But just at first ,it all seems so strange to me.  I must get used  to thinking of him as a son. The fact has yet got to register.

The wedding was over, just a couple of days ago, and the aftermath of the occasion, is still felt, and seen , around the house.  It is there, in the tang of the freshly painted doors and windows, the polished furniture, and the curtains and cushions that are crisply new.  Someone has spilled a little p0erfume somewhere, and its cloying smell is still  around.

The bride and the bridegroom are coming home today.

It seems but yesterday, that she was a child, romping about in short frocks.  I can still see her grinning, with heer front teeth missing.  Her bobbed hair, unruly, her shin often scratched, climbing that mango tree.  And then the lanky stage, with the hem  of   the frocks getting shorter, and hair now in pig-tails at the sides.  Even that stage passed, and now the child had become half girl, half woman, and we knew then that the sands were running out on childhood, and it was time we looked around for a suitable mate.So, the wedding bells.  So the wedding.

We stand on the porch awaiting their arrival – and there is a conglomeration  of conflicting emotions.  I am to tell the truth both happy  and sad.  Happy that we have done our best.  Given our daughter in marriage to a suitable boy. and that today, she comes home- my wedded daughter.  Sad? Yes, a little thread of sadness, tinges the joy ,just because of that .Because she is wedded, and the daughter who walks into the home today , will not be the girl she was, yesterday.

I remember other  times other days.  Other home-comings .  Away at boarding school, she would come home,running up the steps, with a spontaneous joy , glad to be home.  For then home was with us.  But now, home is with him. Eager to see us the parents , the brother, the two younger sisters , who are kids.  And she would be jabbering away, thirteen to the dozen, news of the school, what had we been doing, what ‘s for  tea, anything in the tin, what pictures are showing, where, are there guavas  on the tree, where’s Judy the dog ?and by jove , guess who has got selected to the district basketball team…. A kiss, a hug, and a sprint up the stairs.  But those were other times, other days, when she was still a child- Now, she comes home – a woman.

They have arrived.  They are coming.  She is dressed in a Kanchipuram sari, with a heavy border ,there are jasmines in her hair, chains on her neck, bangles on her wrist.  Not anymore in jeans or bells.  Staid and proper she comes. A little demure, a little shy. Still , there is a new light in her eye, a blush on heer cheeks.  Her steps match his.  She does not come running.  Not to-day.  Perhaps, not any more days.

And he , my son-in-law?  Perhaps, he finds it strange , as I do too, to have a mother -in-law  sprung on him….But when my daughter calls me , ma, he does likewise, albeit a little hesitant, a little diffident .  But I smile at them both and the awkwardness passes.

So, we go through the day.  Special dishes, special behavior.  The brother who used to tease her, with his own typical jokes, with an easy camaraderie, is inhibited to-day, and seems to have lost his bearings!  And the younger sisters too are intimidated by this new sister.  They just can’t get the hang of it  all.

We talk trying to dispel the strangeness.  Trying to put him at ease, to make him feel he belongs.  But are we really islands, unto ourselves?  We ask him relevant questions, wanting to know how our daughter will manage , in her new surroundings.  And perhaps he feels like a schoolboy on the mat.

My daughter used to sleep in the same room as the younger brother and one or other of the kid sisters used to share her bed.  But now there is another room, prepared  for them, with  a double-bed, and as they go to retire , the smallest one who hasn’t yet gone to sleep, throws a tantrum crying for her sister to sleep with her. I whisk her away, and the child cannot understand , why sister has to have a special room, unlike other times.

Their bedroom door is closed.  It seems strange .  For the first time in our home , our daughter sleeps,  with a door that is bolted. It sort of reminds me , mutely, that one chapter of her life  has closed. That childhood is left behind.  Nor can I awaken her in the mornings shaking her up ,for now she sleeps, with a man by her side.

So, it is, the old order changeth, yielding place to new , and so it is, our daughters leave us,.

As my daughter kisses me adieu, my throat constricts.  Farewell, my daughter, farewell, my son.  They smile at me, as they get into the car, that is to take them away.

And in my heart, The question arises.

Have I lost a daughter?

Or, have I gained a son?

My Initiation Into A Silly Game

With the Asia cup, cricket fever has caught on once again in my house.  My folks were perched in front of the TV. I  make an entrance in with a broom – to do the sweeping, but they will not have it.  “Come off it mom- let sleeping dust lie” said my daughter  knowing that no way will I be able to get them out of the room.  I slumped down on a chair.  If you can’t beat  them ,join them.

“Ah, what a lovely sixer”, that’s my son, jumping up to hit the ceiling .  “And uh..that’s a four.” “What’s a sixer, What’s a four’? I ask. “six runs for a sixer, and four for a boundary.  The batsman gets that extra runs’.”Funny reasoning I say truculently’’ ‘why he never even took one step”.

There is something being said about a square leg.  What sort of leg is that? No ball? Can’t he see the ball in the bowler’s hands?  And pray what is a dot ball?  Have they put dots on the ball?  First slip, second slip?  I didn’t see anyone slipping either “Oh gosh, he is out for a duck”! “Out for a duck? “ I shake my head “Who is going out to get a duck when the game is not over yet”?”  “He has bowled a maiden over”.  That gets my goat.

“Has he come to play the Romeo or to play cricket? Anyway where’s the maiden?  “I say looking at the screen.  Sure enough there are maidens there with warpaint over their faces, acting anything but ladylike.

“Who has bowled , which maiden over?”  I ask again.  They collapse in laughter.  “A wide”  I dare not ask what a wide is, nor an L.B.W. Discretion is the better part of valour.

Only when a silly point is mentioned do I get up and say “Ah,  it’s a real silly game.  And when you kids keep laughing  at me, that is not cricket......

The Mother of All Battles

                                                                 

I’ve fought battles.  Battles with my husband who is on an entirely different wavelength and who differs from me in almost everything.  Between you and me, that is why we still stay hitched.  For if you never had tiffs and arguments, and destination, but reach there looking younger and fresher to boot.  So as the bus went along, I started working my fingertips on my forehead,  drawing the lines, out and away.  And I puffed up my cheeks, first this side and then that, and pursed my lips to say ooh and eek and aah.

I was so immersed in doing myself a good turn, that I was oblivious of the fact that the passengers in the bus were turning around and looking at me strangely, and the lady next to me   got along famously and amicably day in and day out, it would not only be damned boring, but it would make you sick to the gills.

And I’ve had battles royal with my mother-in-law.  Since she would call a spade a spade, and give it to  you straight , without mincing words, and I don’t exactly belong to the type, who given a blow -  verbal or physical – would turn the other cheek, a la Christ’s  injunction.  We had battles galore, with the sparks flying upwards.

And then all the other usual battles, that come in the day’s bag.  Against rising prices, the cheating hawker, the noisy neighbours, and the recalcitrant kids,.

But now as if all this wasn’t enough, I’ve got to fight the mother of all battles.  The battle against – you’ve guessed it – old age.  Like Saddam Hussein I refuse to see the writing on the wall.

So though I’ve seen a legion of summers I take succor believing the dictum – you are not as old as you are but as young as you feel.  So I cock a snook at my years and keep thinking young, so don’t dress in staid sober colours.  Nor do I draw a line at wearing all those fancy chains and what-have-you.

The women’s magazines, which give you beauty tips, say that wrinkles, crow’s feet and frown lines can be kept at bay by smoothening them out with fingertips or puffing and blowing air.  So on a long bus trip, I thought I would kill two birds with one stone.I realized what was happening only when the conductor came up and tapping me on the shoulder said, “:Lady, will you stop making funny faces “?

I realized then that all the passengers were eyeing me warily thinking that I was a lunatic.  Blushing and flushing, I made a quick exit, at the next stop, though I still had a long way to go.

So what if a tooth is lost here or there?  The dentist can set it right.  Only thing is to be careful that dentures fit snugly.  I remember an aunt, who went a-visiting.  While she had an hearty laugh, her dentures fell into the tea cup , much to the consternation of others, and to her embarrassment.

Exercise does it.  It can take away the years and keep you trim.  As for white hair, it can be turned black, thanks to the various dyes in the market.  Time was when grannys were white-haired and dignified.

The other day I came across my photo, taken in my teens.  All young , slim and svelte, and my heart sank..  Looking in the mirror I could see  the difference and it hit me in the pit of my stomach, that not even a blind man would call me young. The die was cast.  I looked old, irrevocably, irretrievably.  Not all the creams or lotions in the world would restore me to my former glory.  I was old .I am old.  I’ll be getting older.

But to hell with old age.  Remember , it’s in the mind.. Have the guts to face the odds.  I square my shoulders, spread a gooey stuff on my face, and I lie down with the face mask, determined not to get up, even if the house caught fire, or the president of India came a-visiting

Tomorrow Is Pay Day

Every last day of the month, my husband says with a smile “well today is the last of this blessed month.  Tomorrow , my dear is the first”.

From there, I go on to dream  of the things I must buy, the things I must do.  Build houses of cards,and factotems of imagination.  But then I reckon without the fact, that between the cup and the lip, or rather between my dreams and the reality, there is many a bill!  For, hardly has the new day dawned, the milkman  is at the door handing in his bill, in spite of the fact , that the ratio of milk to water, is one to four, the bill has to be paid.

So, they come handing in bills, butcher, baker, thinker, tailor.  It comes to such a pass, I lose count  of them all, and seem to be doing nothing else, but paying bills, right and left.  There seem to be a procession of them , demanding their dues.  I wouldn’t  be surprised  if the line included soldier, sailor, nor the devil himself.  The whole world apparently has woken up to the fact, that it is the first of the month

What of the pressure cooker, I had intended buying?  By jove, the pressure is now on my mind, striving to balance the budget, for it is only halfway through the month, and my purse has slimmed down, and wears the emaciated look of the cows you find before the dust bins on our street.  One by one, they get scrapped, the things I intended buying, the things I intended doing, like dyeing my hair, like having a  sumptuous dinner at the Taj Hotel.  And somewhere along the way is scrapped too, tricycle for my kid, the flower pot  for my drawing room.  What of the new sari I had fancied?  The one hanging on display, and which in my imagination I had seen myself wearing – the latest fashion.  I contend myself with the thought that there is nothing as dead  tomorrow as today’s fashion!

Mathematics was never my forte.  But even the problems I had to do at school, were not half as difficult as the problems  I have to face now.  Whom to pay first, whom  to pay last, how to stave off the wolf  from the door, and keep our bodies and souls together, on a pay packet, that is going , going , almost gone!  It is not so  far fetched to visualize a day  when I may have to beg, borrow or steal  All in the interests of existence.

Maybe, when next my husband points out, that we are facing a new month, I should exclaim with asperity “Well , so what”? It’s going to be another month of playing ring around the rose bush”.

But then life is made up of hopes, and dreams, and from the ashes, like a rising phoenix, hope eternal springs in the heart.  Anyway, I am a sucker enough to believe ,  that  this month , as I have been believing every  other month it’s going to be a better one.  That I’ll yet buy the things I dream about.

So I keep my fingers crossed, every last day of the month, even though my mind tells me, that money will just slip through my fingers, and when the month is over, it will be the same old story.. I’ll be where I was in square one, checkmated.

Little Things

                                                             

Why do we hanker for things beyond our reach and think the grass is greener on the other side?   Why are we blind to the smaller pleasures of life trying to grasp the bigger pleasures , we cannot have? Happiness lies in contentment.

In  just watching a leaf fall from a tree. Have you ever stood idly, watching fall, twirling  this way and that, before it touches ground?  Just in watching that leaf do a merry dance ere it falls to rest, you could derive  a moment of fleeting pleasure.  Or an evening at the beach if you live in a coastal  town.  Just sit on the golden sand and watch the breakers splash on the rocks, sending off a spray of foam or look out at the far horizon, where the line of the sky seems to meet the line of the sea, and the setting sun burnishes the sky with molten gold. It is a sight calculated to fill the soul with reverence for the divine.

The freshness after a bath, or the exhilarating feel when you walk in wide open spaces, with the wind in your face.  Or have you tried walking on the wet green grass at dawn, when the world is but half awake, and experienced the sense of well being pervade your bones?

Have you found delight in slipping new drops into the palm of your hand , and wished you could string them into a chain, more priceless than rarest gems?

And when the day is done, spare a moment , to look at the world outside.  The moonbeams filtering through branches and tracing patterns on the ground.  Turning the world outside into a heaven of soft white light, that caresses each bud as it slowly opens into a flower.

Have you gazed at the stars that stud the dark indigo skies and wondered what lies beyond?  When the cares and worries of a difficult day, weigh you down , try gazing at a star for comfort. For the twinkling star up there , gives you a measure of peace, when it seems to wink and say – the pinpricks of the world  are but transitory things.

For the beauty of God’s creation, can sometimes set to naught your little worries..  So learn to enjoy the little things in life.  For what is this life, if in seeking pleasures that are unattainable , we lose sight of the woods for the trees?

Down Memory Lane

I remember I thought and thought and   thought  again, debating over names.  You were my first born, and I wanted a name that no one had yet thought of. But in the end, I chose Prem.  Not an uncommon name, but a simple four letter one, meaning  love.

Much water has flowed under the bridges since then.  Today you stand tall, taller than me.  Six foot plus,and its hard to think of you as a babe in my arms.  But I remember.

I see you rusting in my arms suckling at my breast.  And when you had your fill, you would gurgle up at me , and a million stars of happiness exploded in my heart, enveloping you in a warm cocoon of maternal love.

I see you crawling over the place, crawling into the fabric of our existence of our love.And I see you, a toddler  with chubby legs and curly hair,plump and sweet. You even had a dimple on your cheeks.(where has that  dimple gone ?) You pulled at this and that, and led me a merry dance,and you also pulled at the strings of my heart,and the music it produced was love.

I see you a sturdy little fellow, plodding along to school.  I did not reckon then that, step by step, childhood days would pass and you would walk away from me , into your own adult world.  Then you needed me to hold your hands to cross that bridge . Now you cross  your bridges, but you don' t  hold on to my hands

I see you a boy of ten or twelve, with the sap of  exuberance in your veins.  Those were the days  when I had to keep on filling the snack tins, for you could empty them with speed and gust that would put a battalion to shame! But I did not mind the toil., that was a labour of love, and if your stomach got filled with food, my heart was replenished with love.

I see you gradually shooting up, but with every added inch to your  height, was there a widening width between us ?

I remember seeing you with a start of the tell-tale  shadow above your lips.  Yes boyhood was slipping away, and you were stepping across the line.  Your voice started cracking too, and I felt the stirring of a strange kind of pain in my heart. For, I could see the writing on the wall.

All these  years , I had held in my hands the key to your childish happiness. For happiness then lay in little things , like toys and sweets, and in pranks with your friends and your parents’ love, given and received.  But in manhood,  the same key does not open the same doors, for your happiness  now equates other things and the key is not with me.

I remember standing at my window one day.  You were standing  in the garden outside and you did not see me.  I saw you lighting a cigarette and the flame that you struck to light it was  a flame that seared my heart.  For I knew then that childhood indeed was a lost Atlantis, and you were no more child, no more boy, already a man.

Of course I had seen  it coming, when you stood head to head with me, and when you started using your daddy’s razor and blade and we had to get you your own set.  I knew it even earlier  , when an invisible barrier  of reservations crept into  your attitude to us, when you rebutted any sign of affection, I knew it was a part of the age of adolescence. 

On the sounding board of adulthood , you were trying to sound out the feel of independence.  You no more hugged and caressed me  as you used to.I let it pass, for I knew you were wandering  in the bewildering realm of No man’s land.  Not yet a man, no longer a boy,but a few steps away  ,the point of no return.

I sometimes think , If I could asked Time to be still, when and where would I have willed it when you were a babe in my arms , warm and sweet a precious bundle of love ? Or would I have willed it when you were an endearing  little mite, with laughter  in your eyes and mischief in your hand. Or would I have willed it when you were a scamp  in shorts and knickers , that always needed  to be mended, the way you got them torn?

Today the rend is not in your clothes, but somewhere in my heart, that knows the  time has come when I cannot fence you in, even  though the fence be made of maternal love.  You are like a bird flapping its wings against the cage seeking freedom.  Freedom, even from love that perhaps seems to you a yoke! For,  you stand tall, taller than me.  Did I say it before?  Well I say it again, proudly.  But is it because you stand tall that you cannot now see eye to eye with me?

But, come to think of it, why should I regret that you have grown as it is only proper that you should?No, let me not regret the times that  have been.  But let me realise that the time has come when I must untie you from my apron strings.  I must give you the oars to paddle your own canoe.  If that realization hurts, let me also remember that I did not  cry when they cut the umbilical cord.  Should I now cry when you cut yourself from my apron strings?