I realised that even though I was determined to keep writing notes once in a while, its been close to 18 months since I last blogged something. So I take this as yet another starting point – and I hope that I write more often!

Started the day with helping G to write hari sree ganapathaye namaha , as was the tradition for us while growing up, followed by monitoring her as she revised few verses from her music classes; her mom helped her revise her dance moves. Took her to her class for getting blessings from her art teachers.

I hope I get the peace of mind to read better, write better.

The joint family lived in a big house with many rooms; his grandparents slept in one of the rooms on the ground floor. His uncles, who were all bachelors then, in the hall/verandah. There were three rooms on the first floor too, and the boy and his parents used the small one at the far corner, overlooking the mango trees in the garden. He didn’t like afternoon naps; he would struggle to go to sleep at night if he took one. Nevertheless, during hot summer days he was usually forced by his mother to take a nap post lunch. His parents would give him a serving of summer fruits – oranges, skin peeled and deseeded, were frequent. Grapes, again seedless, also was served occasionally.

In those days, a fan was not a necessity, so a table fan was installed in the room, to be used when needed. It oscillated, trying to keep the room and the minds in the room, cool. Though he didn’t really appreciate the nap, he found some solace in that tiny bedroom on the first floor, lying next to his mother, his legs carelessly thrown on her body, listening to the music-like sound that the fan made, eyes closed, slowly drifting to a nap.

Years rolled, the boy grew up, and left them all in search of his life and got busy with it. He grew old too, and had a family of his own. On a vacation trip to his hometown one summer, he was sitting in a verandah, his mind wandering amongst the trees and plants that thrived around that house. A table fan was keeping the verandah cool. It made sounds in varied rhythms as it oscillated. The nostalgic sound of the fan took him back decades, to the days when he found solace in that tiny bedroom on first floor of his father’s house – lying next to his mother, eyes closed, slowly drifting to a nap.

But G thinks otherwise – spending two long years in Kerala during COVID, summers included, when the state is abundant with verities of jackfruits and mangoes, and literally every meal of the day has either of the two in one form or another, can make you a fruit-hater. The poor thing somehow started to hate jackfruits – the only thing that she likes, is the chips that is made of raw jackfruits (Yes! kids love anything junk!). She does like mangoes though, in all forms except the pulissery aka pazham manga koottan, that was also part of the lunch almost every day when ripe mangoes were available in the house.

Summer is also the time for school annual exams; during my school days, we had to learn ALL the lessons from the start of the academic year till the end, toil for hours together to prepare for the exams. These days, thanks to the educational reforms (yet to figure out if that is for good or worse), the syllabus is light, and at least in primary, they have only a few chapters to learn, even for the final exam.

I was given the honor of setting a maths question paper for G the other day. I have this habit of naming people and things familiar to us in her question paper to make it look a bit interesting – and in a word problem on mass, I added Kg and g of jackfruits and papayas this time, and gave her time to answer the paper. Sometime later, she comes back to me with an ear to ear wide grin and hands over the question paper, where she has replaced the jackfruit and papaya respectively with mangoes and apples!

I am learning tiny but significant lessons from G – one of them is the art of saying NO; looking back I have had innumerable occasions where I have given in and said yes; but she on the other hand, I notice, no matter how hard Mrs and Me try, if she doesn’t want something, it means she doesn’t want it – I feel a bit jealous sometimes, that I was not this adamant while growing up.

And I am also hopeful that some day, G would recognize the jackfruit for its virtues!

“I suppose in the end, the whole of life becomes an act of letting go, but what always hurts the most is not taking a moment to say goodbye.”

From Life of Pi.

I was a bachelor and sharing a 2 bedroom house with my good friends in a thickly populated neighborhood off (old) Airport road. We rarely cooked and managed meals mostly in the office canteen or places in and around the place. The small kitchen then was sparsely used, for the occasional tea during the weekend. A corner of it was, like any household in the city, dedicated for the inverted drinking water bottle. We ordered the refills from a nearby grocery store, run by folks from Malabar in Kerala.

There was this young chap who usually came to deliver the refill bottles when we ordered them, and apart from the Hi and bye, we didn’t converse much. One day while he came to deliver the bottle, I was the only one at home. After taking back the empty bottle and the money for the refill, while he was about to leave, he told me that he has got a job opportunity in the Gulf, and to please forgive him for any deed of his that might have caused discomfort or inconvenience to me or my mates.

I wasn’t familiar with, or wasn’t prepared for such a situation, so was taken aback but wished him luck nonetheless and in a way consoled him, partly due to my negligence. I later came to know that this was a way of saying goodbye in that part of the country; it kind of brought about ‘closures’ in their lives, when they moved on.

I remember seeing the movie Life of Pi years later and Pi Patel, when the tiger left him, exclaimed, “I was weeping because Richard Parker left me so unceremoniously.” That was something that I had not thought about ever, the importance of ‘closures’ in our lives, and how much they help us to let go and move on.

We have all seen people leave, after knowing us for years, without even a simple warm good-bye. Is it because they are confident of keeping in touch later throughout (something that rarely happen), or is it because they do not want the closure yet? The optimist in me would like to believe, it’s the latter.

I hope the water delivery boy is doing well now, wherever he is.

A particular one that G, and all of us will never forget, is a feline that was around, until recently. It was a stray that just appeared one fine day. We started feeding it snacks, and it stuck around. It knew when its time for its meal, more importantly, ‘where‘ snacks are stored, and it will stay around until its fed some – it was fond of anything junk – crisps, mostly. After it gets its share, it would just go away until its hungry again.

It was a Mummy cat, as G puts it – and was soon having a ‘big tummy’; three kittens soon arrived but they were all short lived. Mummy got over its sadness faster than we thought (do cats also feel sad, I wonder). Within a couple of months, her tummy was big again. This time only one baby was there, and we set up a safe place for it to survive. The mummy was around for few days feeding and taking care of it, but suddenly went absconding, leaving the kitten alone and crying, inside the Amazon cardboard box. There was no sign of the mummy even after couple of days, so it was on us (Mrs, rather) to feed it. We got fillers and even a syringe to feed it few drops of milk every time it started wailing. G was unhappy that the mummy had left the tiny one alone, and we were struggling to make up stories to console her. We tried to get someone to adopt the baby but no one was interested. So the days passed and the little one started to outgrow the carton and started jumping off, and roaming around within the small enclosure behind our house, wailing all the while. G was also growing impatient and kept asking often, what we can do with the poor thing.

Then one fine morning when Mrs went to feed her, the kitten was nowhere to be seen. We searched around the house but found no sign. G was still fast asleep so we cooked up a story, and convinced her when she woke up, that the mummy came back and took her baby away with her while we were all asleep. That brought a smile on her face but she still had her doubts – we convinced her that there were paw prints of the mummy, and that it was indeed she, who took the little one away.

I find it strange how nature sometimes work; I find some of its ways difficult to perceive. But sometimes there is no choice but to accept things as they are, to maintain sanity.

I really really hope, that the kitty is indeed safe and sound with her mommy; I also wish G to have learnt, that hope leads to sanity and bliss.

[The pic above is the kitty on the evening before it went absconding]

No. I did not score a maximum in any examination. I just realized that I have, over the last 15 years, managed to build a collection of a hundred books. This excludes few that I bought digitally; I am an old school, and am particular about the scent of books I read.

I was seldom a reader. And I remember my parents (mostly Mom, being a teacher of Literature) often telling me that they did not read much during their childhood – they did not get the opportunity, rather – and that I shouldn’t tread that route, and should try to read as much as I can. They did their part of encouraging me by helping me out with those children’s classics (Adventures of Tom Sawyer, David Copperfield, Treasure Island etc.), a subscription of The Reader’s Digest and Champak that went on for years while I was in school. To be honest, I think I took them for granted, as I had easy access to them. But I never turned out to be as good a reader as my Mom wanted, though I did try to read some things once in a while. The first book I remember reading cover to cover, was The Lost World, borrowed from the municipal library, while in class 11/12.

Time flew, and soon I found myself away from home to pursue post graduation. I was lucky enough to be part of a circle with couple of good readers. They would discuss about their reading exploits, and I would hear it through one ear and let it out through the other!

My roomie and a bestie, Mr V happened to be one of them, and he did influence me – I took to bit of reading, and blogging too, once in a while for time pass. Blogging was kind of show off, I should admit. (How do you expect to write, unless you read?!)

It was after being employed, that I stumbled upon Robin Sharma’s The Greatness Guide. It was suggested by a colleague, and I went on to read three or four of his other famous books. I started searching for, and ended up buying few of the titles that he has cited in his books – Tuesdays with Morrie is one such, and I still do not hesitate to read it when ever possible. Once I like an author, I end up buying two or three of their other titles (of late I collected many by Ruskin Bond). The Alchemist, was suggested by many of my classmates, but I never tried to read it then; I bought one to gift to Mr V, thought I will glance through it once, and ended up keeping the copy to myself (I did buy another one for you V, didn’t I?)!

I had read somewhere about the idea of building up a personal library – for your own sake, or for the sake of your kids; Mr V was also a catalyst, as he too desired for one. Quietly I started collecting random titles which are cited at random places, or those I read reviews about on the Internet. Gradually, I was buying more books than I was reading, and Mrs often pulled my legs when she saw me occasionally staring at my dusty bookshelf.

Time again flew, I stopped reading and stopped writing. Monotony took over, G arrived, and most of both of our time was spent entertaining her. I did try to keep up to blogging once in a while, but I was becoming more lethargic by the day.

Few years back, I decided to put up an inventory of my collection – mainly to keep track of the count, and was surprised to see that I had collected a number of books, of which, I had read, or attempted to read, only a few. The pandemic gave me the time to pause, and reflect, and I was perusing and jolting down more often, than I did in a whole decade.

Come 2022, I am striving to read a bit everyday; and I hope to read and re-read (fingers crossed), and continue building my library, book by book!

This is the story in most of the middle class Indian household. Parents will be busy making ends meet when their children are young; it is only in their twilight years, when they have nothing much to do and plenty of time to kill, that they reminisce, and realize what they might have missed – the little things which they wish never ended – precious time spent with their little ones.

Due to the covid season, my little one also get to spend quality time with her grandparents; there is nothing in this world that they won’t do, to keep her bubbling. She is the boss, and they are bound to obey her; they tolerate her little mischiefs, and sometimes when she gets too much to our nerves, it’s they who shield her. And this sometimes is sometimes quiet often, as the little one is locked-down inside during her summer vacation, and the courtyard, fresh air, greenery and a host of birds that she enjoys watching (apart from her daily dose of long TV time hours!), fail to cheer her up.

Am sure when I get to my own twilight years, my heart will be heavy with regret – to have rebuked her for her tiny, unharmful persistence, when I could have just let her be. I hope she would comprehend, when she become a parent herself.

So the other day I was giving her IT support (though she’s capable of handling almost everything alone) during her dance class. I was chatting with her uncle in an adjacent room, when she called me in between. I went inside to find that the teacher has sent her out of the virtual classroom. And she was away to answer nature’s call. After some time she returned and rejoined the class. Since it took her long to request via the app to join back the class, her teacher was little upset and criticized her assuming she was being naughty, and warned her not to repeat the mistake.

Once the class ended, I asked her what had happened. She had apparently informed her teacher before taking the break, but somehow her teacher missed it.

Both of us convinced G that she has to call her teacher, and apologize, and let her know her part of the story. Usually she is reluctant to do such things, but when we offered her a bar chocolate, she obliged. Although I felt she was not convincing in the way she explained to her teacher (probably the chocolate was all that was there in her mind!), the latter seemed to have understood the situation and let her off.

We are happy that she understood (hopefully!) what we wanted to teach her – one, that you must always be truthful to yourself; two, that you, have to stand up for yourself.

We hope these would stay with her for the rest of her life.

On one such walk the other day, I thought of showing G my first school. I haven’t been to the place ever since I left it in class 3! The intention was to find out if the ground is accessible for a little driving/cycling practice for missus and the little one respectively.

The road that leads to the school has transformed over the past 3 decades. Numerous houses have popped up. Every step brought back memories of the morning and evening walks I made with friends, up and down from school. Finally when we reached the school playground, it felt nice. I’ve slipped and fell many a times on this ground, while trying to splash the muddy water, after heavy rains. I showed my daughter my first classroom (the one on the extreme left in the picture). The building looks almost the same after all these years, except for the addition of a new block, and the upstairs on the main building. The slide in the play area, which I never put my foot on, was still there (I was not quite excited back then to climb that high!). So are the same old swings. The little stage in front of the main block where cultural programs used to be conducted, just the same.

I still remember my first day there (and my first class teacher too!). Amma had accompanied me, and promised me that she’ll wait outside, while I went in to UKG class, reluctant, and with a heavy heart. Soon I made new friends and happily got lost playing with them; only when one of them pointed out did I realize that Amma has left the place, but somehow by then, I didn’t bother. Wish I could preserve that innocence!

Though I only spent the first four years of my school life here, the school still holds a special place in my heart.

Relishing memories seems one of my favorite stress busters.