Thanks Meghana and Ano for your posts – you inspired me to come out of hibernation.  No mean task.

1. Miss A will be 10 next month. 10. Double digits. Not really a baby anymore. And yet I kiss her butter soft cheeks when she is asleep and take in giant gulps of that little-girl-with-sunshine- in-her- hair scent. I love her as a person in her own right now, not just as my little girl. I think I would absolutely choose her to be one of my closest friends even if I were not related to her.

The thought at once saddens me and delights me like no other. It saddens me because she is the core of who I am and the stray thought of there ever being a life where I was not related or allowed to love her seems so terribly sad. It delights me because I love the person she is – delicate, beautiful, intelligent, hilarious, kind, passionate about her views, principled and with a largess that belies her years. And funny, did I mention that? She is the funniest person I know.  I think the funniness gets me every single time.

2. The more I read, the more I learn. I have so much to learn. My writing has so many raw edges. I need to work so hard. And yet, this admission makes me giddy with delight like I were cooking an elaborate feast for myself or perhaps organising a sumptous banquet to fraternize. Writing is what keeps me going, I have come to realise. It is my own delicious secret, my hiding nook, my happy place. I had no idea it meant this much to me, but I am glad it does. It makes things better.

3. Life has come full circle in that I find a deep contentment within the rooms of my childhood home. I do not want to go out or meet people or do anything else when I am at my parents’ place. The sleepy home nestled between overgrown trees allows me the ridiculous luxury of just being.  Placid lakes, those moments are, there are no ripples. There is not much we want when we like our surroundings, I have learnt this.

4. Over the past few years, I have gone from having a large circle of friends to a few close treasured relationships. The situation came about by part choice, part circumstance. I never saw myself as that kind of a person, I always saw myself at a crowded table with friends and accquaintances where there was much merriment, shared laughter, backslapping familiarity. And yet, here I am. I now know that sometimes you have to share tables with strangers. I now know that if all the relationships I believe in today were to fail, I would still pick myself up, dust the pieces and start all over again. It would hurt but I think I would be okay. We see ourselves through a lot, we nearly do not give ourselves enough credit.

5. I am more at peace with myself than I ever was. I am who I am. I believe in myself, my family, my child, my faith, my spirituality and the goodness of life, generally. There is a place and an age for doubt. No matter, what changes, I do not see these things changing.  I am built of these things, they make me. 

I also am short tempered and impulsive, yet prone to painful introspections.

“But that is just who you are, ” Miss A said to me the other day when we were discussing personalities. ” Otherwise you would be someone else. How dreadful would that be! ”

She is generous, like I said. A bit of generosity helps us accept things so much better. 

6. I am really good at what I do, professionally. It took me years to say that out aloud. To walk into a boardroom full of people and say “Look at this, I pulled off a tricky implementation,  I can handle the most finicky of clients, I can go the extra mile for them and provide solutions.”  For a long time, I apologised for my abilities or added them as an endnote because it seemed like such an awful thing to talk myself up. But. If I am not bragging, I am telling the truth. And everyone is entitled to the truth

7. I cry everytime Miss A performs on stage.  I become a sobbing mass of tears and tissues and then I end up video-taping the floor or a spot above her head. I do not see that changing – ever. She does roll her eyes at me sometimes. On somedays, she mouths a “I am okay,” from the stage. Which makes me blubber all the more.

8. I have an obsession with clothes. Sometimes it scares me. Then to cheer myself up, I buy some clothes. I normally feel better immediately. Sometimes it scares me.

9. I do not think I could ever go on a diet. I will eat the last piece of cheescake if you do not want it. I will eat the deep-fried goodies you daintily abhor. I need chocolate and martinis and deep fried food and mangoes and coffee and bhelpuri and kachoris and second helpings and third serves. 

I am Scarlett and I love my food.

10.Love wears a disguise. So does dislike. So does hatred. Sometimes they dress up as one another.

11. Rainy days, overcast skies, droopy trees, silent roads. My mind wanders to those days of the monsoons in India, to gumboots and wet satchels and to the warmth of sun-dried blankets on stormy nights. Everytime I think of those days, something inside my heart twists and turns and aches deeply. I hear my parents conversing in the hall even as I try to fall asleep. I hear the patter of rain-drops against the glass panes, the gentle swoosh of the mango trees against the steadfastness of the house. I feel the satin of the blankets, I can see the blue flowers on the bedspread, I almost blink my eyes to adjust to the night light in my room. And then I toss and turn and fall asleep and outside the rain hums and swirls and covers meadows and fields and town roads and village squares.

It is my most tangible childhood memory, the strongest one I have. It is also the most perfect snapshot of the idyllic childhood I had.  It still rains like that, my parents still talk in the hall on those nights. I am far, far away. Not a child anymore, nevermore. Under a different roof, a different country, a different sky.  The rain has moved on, the village square is almost dry. But in some corner of my heart,  I smell the damp earth. Still a child somewhere, still scared of the storm, still looked after.

In some corner of my heart, the rain lingers within the fences around my yard, and I watch from the windows, one more time.

The enormity of the demise does not register right away.

You never got to see your grandmother, your mother’s mother. She was always a photo around the home – a gentle sepia portrait, her eyes so much like your mother’s (and therefore yours), her smile warm and welcoming, her gaze on an object in the distance. Thus it was that you came to know and love a woman who you never saw but re-created through part memories, part legacy, part longing.  

You spent all your summer holidays with your  mother’s side of the family. Every May, you made the 3 hour bus trip, in a dusty red State Transport bus to your aunt’s home.  Your aunt lived in a rambling old building where your grandmother’s brothers including Uncle A also lived. It was an ancient buidling with endless nooks and crannies, creaky wooden staircases,  latticed balconies and a huge amount of people distributed amongst the eight individual houses that the old building house.  Every house had someone you were related to – it was a merry gaggle of aunts and uncles and second cousins and first cousins and great- aunts and old grand-uncles and everyone else that was somehow, family.

You could wander into anyone’s house around lunch time and they would set you a plate and you would eat. If you went to the neighbouring house, you would be fed lunch again, you did not refuse. In the afternoons, while your mother and your aunt and the extended family chatted, you wandered the large building, opening doors and discovering new and old worlds. It was the magic hour, the world lay suspended in a brief stupor, a humid silence coloured the world. And yet you played with stray cats, you hid behind the dusty cauldrons that housed the water for your morning bath and you played hopscotch on the blazing hot tiles in the paved courtyard.

“Come inside, do you not feel the hot sun?” someone would say. It could be anyone of the extended family, love and discipline and meals and treats were shared around here, you were looked after by everyone in the building, even the building itself.

You were a child here surrounded by a thick blanket of summer,mangoes, late night icecream and family that sat around and talked and drank endless tea. You stayed awake, bright eyed and revelling in these chat sessions, hugging yourself to stay alert under the whirr of the fan and the animated chatter. Your mother was a child here too, but you did not realise that till you were grown up.  Here she talked to her uncles and aunts, she sat at their dining tables and they made her tea and fussed over her. Her, the youngest daughter of the sister they lost so tragically, without any warning.

You would talk to your mother’s uncles and her aunts several times a day. They wanted to know important things about you like what flavour of milkshakes you liked and whether you were doing your times tables in school and how you liked your tea. They gave you little gifts, sometimes a crisp 50 Rs note in a plain envelope, sealed and fresh, brimming with the promise of everything you could hope to buy. Sometimes it was little lunch box or a book,  little gifts that you recieved with profuse thanks and then packed carefully to take back home. You had surrogate grandparents every summer, you never realised it till today, till you accepted that they were all gone.

They bulldozed the old building one summer. You had grown up by then and you had moved out of home. Your aunt moved away to a better and bigger place. Your mother’s uncles moved away too. Your summer holidays were still fun but you did not have the luxuryof a house anymore where you could open doors and find so many branches of family sprawled inside.

Then you heard the obituaries from your mother over the years. One by one, they passed away, taking with them their gifts, their promises of crisp notes, their steel lunch boxes, their friendly banter on the steps, their admonishings to abandon the afternoon sun.  One by one they became empty chairs around the communal dining table, mounted photos on aging walls, a past reference to a time now irrevocably eroded.

Uncle A was the last of the grand-uncles. 38 years after his baby sister, your grandmother, died in her sleep, he passed away in a town that was far away from the bustling house of the past.

“There is no one of that generation left,” you say to your mother. The greatest of absences. The simplest of truths.

“No, they are all gone now. All the siblings,” she says. She does not have her siblings left either. They are really all gone now, the old house included.

When you were a child, these people built a fortress around you, a canopy overhead that kept the sun and the clouds out. You are left with crumbling battlements now, the house is in ruins.

There is no canopy anymore. The mighty trees have been felled, there is an endless horizon as far you can see, a clearing where once there was a magical land.

The sun blinds your eyes now, there are not many people left to shield you anymore.

RIP Uncle A. And everyone else that left.

We are having a yum-cha night in front of the TV, watching “Arthur and the Invisibles” for the hundredth time. Actually, she insists it is only the second time ever, but we do a mean job of exaggeration around here. Makes cold and sullen evenings bearable and all that.

The sauce has a mind of its own. It clings steadfastly to the insides of the bottle and no amount of cajoling makes it edge any closer.

“It is the cold”, I tell her. “Maybe the sauce is too cold to move.” Outside, on cue, a banshee storm wails and hisses.

“Try again”, she says. So we do. Because there is the urgency of a half eaten spring-roll.

No dice. This way and that, we twist and turn and shake and roll the bottle, our efforts a glorious zilch, there is no sauce through the nozzle.

She goes back to the couch and I am left with an adamant bottle and a crest-fallen child. There are no simple problems on somedays.

I think of substitutes and excuses. Of why things are not the the way they should be. Of why we write paens on failing and yet success makes do with punch-lines and imposed brevities. 

I open the bottle top to see if anything is wrong with the nozzle. And then I notice that the cardboad air seal of the bottle is still intact, still holding back everything that should now be free. The sauce moved but could only get so far.

The seal is ripped off, the bottle top is re-instated and the sauce comes out in plump drips and gives the spring-rolls a new lease of life.

 ”This is good” Miss A says. 

“Very good”  I add. See note above for success having to do with meagre descriptions.

“So what was wrong with the bottle?” she asks. Nothing really, now that you think of it.  So I tell her the story of how I couldn’t even see what was stopping the flow. From inside.

  We carry obstacles inside us, every one of us.  The world is just an excuse.

Because the things that stop us – they almost always come from within.

“Bye Mum”.

I do not take the hint. I hang around the entrance and watch as she picks up her scripts and makes her way towards her seat. A group of “big girls” troops in after me.  Miss A has changed classes this term, she is now in their drama group.

They settle down a few seats away from her and start reading from their script.  She looks at them, then at her script and tries to find the right page. Alone in the second row, by herself. Dressed in a pink blazer, her hair pushed by a giant hairband. A bottle of water next to her.

I wave and ask her to join me outside for a second.

“Mummm, please go. I am fine.”

“A, do you know anyone here at all? Should I hang around?”

“Noooo. You can go. I need to get back.”

“Bubs, are you going to be okay sitting by yourself?”

“Yeah, of course. Because we are all in the play together. And I am new here – so, of course I do not know anyone yet.”

“Maybe Mummy could sit with you for a  bit.”

“Mummmm, please. That would be so embarassing”.  That is the thing about love, baby. It can be embarassing.

So. I bend down and kiss her. And allow her to push me gently as she goes back. To sit by herself in the second row. Alone, did I say alone? I drive back home and stare at the clock. All this while my heart is doing somersaults and sinking lower.

She troops out behind the other kids when I go for the pick-up. Outside the winds are howling, the night is cold and the sky is sullen and inky. I help her with a thick coat and hold her hand as we walk back to the car.

“Was it okay?”

“It was great.”

“Umm, did you talk to anyone?”

“Yeah, Mary talked to me. She said I had a nice hairband.”

“Was it bad sitting alone?”

“Nah, I forgot about it after a while.”

“Are the big girls nice?”

“Very nice Mummy. They let me read the big parts.”

She seems eager to go back the next week. Next friday,we go through the motions of kissing and reminders about water bottles. She sits alone by herself like the week before. I smile and wave. Why didn’t Mary (and which one is Mary) sit next to her? When she will have friends to giggle with? But she seems to be lost in her script and the doors are closing and Mr D, the drama teacher is already up on the stage. So I leave her to do her part.

And bit by bit, I learn to gather the pieces of my heart and take them with me when I leave. Bit by bit, I walk back a step and then another and yet another. Bit by bit, I learn to trust that she will take care of herself.

She is a child with a stuffed toy named Piggy. She hates runny eggs. She plays the viola. She doesn’t have a sweet tooth. Her best friend has just moved across the country. She smiles in her sleep. But. And yet. She sits by herself and reads her lines. She blends in a group of strangers and falls into place. She takes cues and share the stage with people she has not met before. Somedays, she is more than the sum of her parts. Somedays there is so much more to her that I do not know about.

Somedays my daughter surprises me because I forget to see her spirit, her heart, her art – all I see is a little smiley face, her warm hand in mine, a pair of footsteps following mine through streets lined with the produce of autumn.

“My turn to come up with an act next week”, she tells me as I pick her up. “Mary and Jessica are hoping they get a part”. New names and such old ease. The circle has widened. It always does, but you have to wait sometimes.

And just like that I know that if she is to act the best scenes, write the stories that will shape her, find the characters that will mould her – I have to let her go. And let her grow. I have to let her sit alone on some days. I have to wait on the outer while she find her way into new friendships. I have to wait till she fails because I cannot be the substitute to her experiences. Some things, she will learn on her own. Some things, she will only learn when I trust her and let her read the map.

“I am going to give you the road map. But find your own road”, my father always tells me. Somedays you got to hand those lessons forward.

My heart does somersaults again. But this time, it does not sink. I think they call this floating.

I have drafts to re-edit, a presentation to put together and a whole bunch of socks to wash. Acutally, the socks are more important at this point in time, but we will let that pass. The point of sharing my laundry details with you (note to self: resist puns about dirty linen) is that I have heaps to do and I should be happy that she has moved into her little tent for the day. But I am not. Already, I have crawled into her tent a few times and have been firmly and politely pushed out.

“Come and have lunch”, I say.

“Not now”, she says. “I am not hungry, Mum”

“Do you want a snack?” I ask

“I have the muffins”, she says. The muffins are from the bag she packed yesterday when she told me she was running away because I made her practice her viola. Yes, that is fodder for another post. It was raining and she kind of loves her viola, so she agreed to come back inside.

So, I call her on the fake phone. Except, she asks me to leave a message. Because she is getting ready to take the stuffed toys out for the the day and she cannot talk to me right now.

I follow her around the house, moping a tad.

“Maybe you could mind my house for me” she suggests. Because she is busy and stopping to talk to me every now and then is slowing her down.

I am the keeper of her memories,the guardian of her dreams, the keycode to her likes and hates. I am the official demon that makes her repeat her times tables and the homework nazi that makes her rub out words that are not spelt correctly the first time. Some days I am little else other than being the wrapper around her world.

One day she will have her own world with real doors. And I will have to knock. Or call. Perhaps I will offer muffins on these days in the future when my daughter is no longer camping out under the same roof in another part of this very room.

But now and here, when she asks to mind her house, I leave my drafts and my laundry and my Sunday lunch and offer to move into her tent.

“No, you don’t need to do that”, she explains with much genteel patience lacing her voice. “Look after the house from where you are.”.

And so, perched on the couch, alternating between work and words and things bubbling and hissing on the stove, with the May winds whipping up a gale outside, I look after the little world she has created for herself while she explores her surrounds. 

“Are you going to be long?”, I ask her.

“You can go and do something else if you like, Mum” she says.

There is nowhere else I would rather be. She doesn’t know it but that tent is my house too. Because my heart follows her around like that. One of those days when I am little else other than the wrapper that makes up her world. One of the good days.

On a side note, I have been on an extended break from work because Miss A is on her Easter break. The days are a blur of icecream, paintings (we have been buying canvasses and doing acrylics – the child has talent, I have ideas that I make her implement), walks around the hills and buying cutesy handmade jewellery. That last point there makes it almost certain that I have to go back to work (and writing) in the near future because expensive hobbies dictate that you keep your day job.

I am in the middle of two huge writing assignments and poor old Bloggy has been rather ignored. I plan to finish the “An Ode to Summer” series as soon as I wake up from the self induced sugar hit (read note about icecream above) and retail therapy. I plan on getting back to the blogathon sooner rather than later. Because I love you folks and all that.

Thank you for being patient and for commenting.  Makes my day, sincerely

Now excuse me while I eat some chips and watch daytime TV even as Miss A makes plans for a picnic in the garden.

And I thought we were friends too, all the rest of you :/

Why? 9:00 AM on a Sunday at the kiddy pool with a few dozen toddlers and kids running around barefoot in bathers. The floors are wet. The kids are either screaming their heads off or shrieking in delight. They do not see where they are going when they get out of the pool. So. PLEASE move away from them and wait outside in the coffee area. I am terrified that you are going to step on some chubby toes and unleash (more) mayhem. Also, if the owner of the said chubby toes pushes you into the pool after this incident, I will clap and cheer.  You have been warned.

PS: The stilettos are tacky. Metal buttons are passe. Just so that you know.

Regards,

The slightly paranoid woman sitting opposite you

Dear A’s Friend’s Mother,

No, my child is not a genius in the pool. She is good, but that is about it. Please, please do not keep telling me that she is doing superbly every time I look your way.  And, no, I am not going to return that compliment because your daughter looks miserable and you should probably wave to her instead of encouraging me. My child alternates between treating the swimming lessons as a torture test or a social outing depending on her mood. See how I didn’t use the word “Superb” or “So gifted” in that sentence?  Go on, try it now.

Regards,

The genius’s mother

Dear What-Were-You-Thinking,

I am an old fashioned sort of a person when it comes to kiddie fashions. I understand that swimsuit models look great in bikinis. Mostly though, they are grown-up women who get paid for sashaying and dancing around in skimpy clothes. Your daughter doesn’t look a day older than 7. WHY is she wearing a bikini? How about you say something about that garish nail-polish and lip-gloss? She is going to be a child for only so long, why would allow her to dress like an adult?. Childhood comes with a shelf date – did you know that? 

Sincerely,

Ms Very Concerned About You and Your Daughter

Dear Miss A,

Please swim. Listen to what your instructor is telling you. No, don’t wave to me and point out random people in the 4th lane on the right. Okay, you may wave but I really do not know why you are so excited about the swimmers in the far lane. Who is it? Is it a B grade celebrity from some TV ad – God knows you have great talent in spotting such folks.

Also, when did you learn to be so graceful? Perhaps, I should stop writing mental blog posts about the crowds and concentrate on you instead.

No, don’t wave again. Swim.

Love,

Mum

To A.

We are still friends. I am sorry. I guess I was very sad and hurt when you said I am mean. I am the type of person who needs time to get over things. Lets think positive then we will always be happy. Our friendship can never break. I truly didn’t step on your toe if I really Accidently did step on your toe I will apologise.  If you don’t want to play that’s ok. On E’s party we should Give her a surprise somehow. I hope we become Friends Again.

Happy Easter.

Love from your friend C.

The letter also had a picture of three puffles (you know what puffles are, I know you do) saying “We are proud for a reason”. Who are we to question such staunch declarations of pride!

Needless to say,  Miss A and Miss C hugged and made up.  When I picked Miss A up from school yesterday, she ignored me and walked past holding C’s hand.

“See that?”, the teacher said to me. “Things seem to be alright again, thank goodness”.

“It is all good now”, Miss A said to me. “Little girls have fights. Then they forget them.”

“Ahaa” I said. Mostly because I wasnt capable of a saner response.

“That is why we are proud for a reason”, Miss A added.

“How?” I asked. Again, see above note about not being capable of a saner response.

“Because, we are”, she said.

I am proud for a reason too. Words like forgivness, friendship, effort and reaching out come to mind. But I am not a green puffle (there are those that would say otherwise, of course) and hence I only smile instead of making such a declaration.

And my heart sings a little when I see two little girls who sit next to each other, in a corner at a birthday party, and giggle over their easter egg hunt.

The formula for peace follows us around.  All you need to do is walk slower and allow it to catch up with you.

So, as it were, last evening found Miss A and I at the Mall with a rather particular shopping list. We needed to buy dangly earrings as a gift for friend Z, a going away present for friend D, and a puffle for friend E. The puffle needed to be an Aunt Arctic puffle (do not ask, really). The earrings needed to be pink. The going away present needed to be something that would make D think of her every single day.

We found D a travel diary. Two felt pens. Miss A fell in love with a magenta coloured sheep eraser (named Woolly – we name things around here) and Woolly was duly purchased.  The small incident of opening the diary to see what “every page” looked like also happened while I was paying for the things. A little talk on not opening people’s birthday gifts, no matter how strong the urge, was delivered.

The original idea of earrings was ditched in lieu of a hideous fluorescent metal butterfly. Z likes butterflies, Z likes fluorescent. Sometimes life’s jigsaw pieces do not fit better than this. Kind offers to play with the butterfly were turned down and the butterfly joined the now open diary.

The Aunt Arctic Puffle was found amidst much squealing. The Puffle was hugged (how else would you know if it was good enough!). More gifts for the Puffle (not Friend E) were bought. Apparently, there is a rule that you can never gift a friend just a puffle. Against the decorum of friendships, such things are. So more bright green stuff was chucked into the shopping trolley.

“I am hungry”, she announced after this expedition. So off we went in search of a cafe.

Along the way, we pretended that the cafe would have walked away leaving a giant hole in the Mall. The cafe, however, had not. Walked away that is.

“This is such a successful way to start dinner”, said Miss A. I agreed. Something to be said for things that stay. When they could, mind you, wander off.

Miss A stared at the waitress till I nudged her under the table. No, I didn’t nudge the waitress under the table. Thanks for thinking that.

As soon as she had left, I turned to Miss A.

“What was that about?”

“The waitress was so pretty. I am going to tell her that.”

“Aww, that is so sweet. You should.”

“I will”

“What are you going to say?” Questions are important. Read on.

“That waitress would look so pretty if she didn’t wear those glasses.”

“Umm, A…”

“And if she grew her hair. No wait, if she combed it nicely”

“Now, A…”

“And if she smiled a bit more…”

“Well, we cannot really say all those things, A.”

“In other words, Mum, if she had a different face and was more cheerful, she would be so pretty.”

Like I said, questions are important. We managed to side-step the urge to give the waitress this advice about a potential makeover, when she came back with our meals.

And just as I decided to breathe again, a little voice piped up. “You are so pretty.”

The waitress blushed. “Really?”, she asked Miss A.

Miss A nodded back solemnly. I stirred my coffee.

“Very pretty”, Miss A said.

“Thanks”, the waitress said, beaming.  A few moments of awkward joy ensued.

Then the waitress left. And Miss leaned back into her chair and said “I decided not to tell her everything. Just the pretty bit”.

Just the pretty bit. Everything else can wait. On a Thursday evening when you are having coffee with someone who offers to play with metal butterflies and hugs green puffles. Just the pretty bit.