I'm back; it was bad. At least I don't have to do it for another year. I have little recollection of the past 36 hours. I woke up so weak, wobbly, and very sad from my fever dreams.
I would have liked to start the new year with all my household chores completed, but I think I'm going to be easy on myself.
Pic: MIL's sister posted this picture that was taken in 1922 (so over a hundred years old!) of their dad--he's the toddler bottom left. The young boy beside him looks so much like Big A! I think this is the most number of people I've seen in a single photo... I wonder what the occasion was.
#LaterPost
a lot like a bit like Christmas. CF, my dear friend who moved to South Carolina sent us a beautiful Christmas centerpiece, JG sent us treats from Sunnyland Farms, AK sent a blooming amaryllis, SV made a donation in memory of Scout. It seems my girlfriends are into sending things that are more like experiences, and I love it.
Counterbalance: My uncle told me that there had been a fire in my sister's office building in Bangalore. My sis then sent me a video of the 20-story fire. Scary. A student whose poetry I love received a rejection. Sad. One thinks we'd be able to protect the people we care about from harm or disappointment, but we're so limited.
Pic: CF's centerpiece--I lit the candles to send her a thank you photo. Bonus peek of Nu snacking in the kitchen.
After krampus-ing hard yesterday, JN declared this a DND (do nothing day). I guess it works as a "Do Not Disturb day" as well. I love it. I'm going to use it. Someday.
Final grades are due soon, so it wasn't really an option to do absolutely nothing. But I built lots of nice stuff into the day--I got a massage, I went on a ramble with L, a long walk with Big A, then family dinner with At.
It was DND lite.
Pic: Goodbye from the puppet theater. My parents gave the kids this puppet theater when they were little--I think Nu was less than two years old. It showed up to lots of birthday celebrations and we accumulated quite a collection of hand puppets and finger puppets all put to great use by the "narrOator" (At's version of "narrator" 🙂💗). It lived in the rumpus room for a long time and then in Nu's Room for years. But for a year now, it's been hanging out in the upstairs hallway because no one wants it. I've known it should go to another house where some other kids can love it, but it was a bit difficult letting go as it bears so many memories of the younger versions of my kids, my parents, me...
Anyway, when At came to dinner this evening, I got a few last pictures of them together at the puppet theater. I'm lucky my kids are so indulgent.
What would my childhood self think about grownup me?
I've been thinking about it since Nance mentioned that she keeps her kindergarten picture on her dresser to remind her "of the little girl who wanted to be a teacher and a mom. I look at her often and think about how so many of her dreams came true and then some. It helps me stay grateful."
I'm five in this picture, and my favorite thing was to line up my sister, our ayah, and the dolls in my playroom to play school--with me as the teacher. So I think five-year-old me would be thrilled that I grew up to be a teacher and tickled to know I have kids and puppies of my own--I think they'd find that part really hilarious. Back then, the expectation to be "good" was intense--I wonder what five-year-old me would think of my daily quest to be a better person, to keep learning... When I was little, I was always afraid of being orphaned (I read too much even back then), so I wish I'd known my parents would know their grandkids...
Like Nance, I too am grateful that so many of my dreams have come true--even dreams I did not yet know to have for myself. I can see myself at ten or eleven lying on the terrace looking up at planes and wondering (not even wishing, really) *if* I would have a job, if I would fly on a plane (only my parents had flown at this point), and if anyone would fall in love with me.
Pic: An old B&W portrait of my family (dad, sis, mom, me). I remember so clearly that my dress was a very pale pink and white with a soft collar and square white buttons with a pink inlay; my sister's dress was a hand-me-down from me, it had been a favorite until I grew out of it--I called it the "peacock frock" because it cascaded in overlapping "feathers" and had a deep blue embroidered motif on each. I'm pretty sure my mom's organza sari is orange with white polka dots. When the square belt buckle (buttons and buckle were all purely decorative) on my dress fell off, I used it as a tool at my art table to scrape excess crayon off the paper and even out the colors. I wore a school uniform to school, and "play" clothes at home; I had a very small collection of "fancy" clothes to wear to parties, the club, and so on and I remember most of them quite fondly. My sister was wearing a corrective leg brace at that point, which is why my parents are holding her hands on either side. No one is holding my hand... I wonder what I seem so pleased about... Wow. I did not expect to remember so much. And look at my HAIRY forehead!! lol
And although I started out by merely going through the motions, each interaction refueled me in big and tiny ways. When I called my mom this morning, I could hear the hubbub of the hundred+ guests at the family celebration of Navaratri in Pondycherry and then I got passed from mom to aunts and uncles and cousins--each a little rush of love. My dinner--a colorful chopped salad and a fluffy frittata inspired by Seamus Mullen's Real Food Heals was beautiful and filling. (Fun fact: Big A went to college with Seamus, and our friend CC dated him.) My garden walk with HK was lovely, and I also got to go on a long ramble--geographically and conversationally--with L. Lots of mutual check-ins and chats with JG, EM, JL, and BL... Nu's very serious demeanor during our impromptu dermatological consult made me (still makes me) smile and they gave me products from their own stash of K-skin care to help with my recent acne outbreak.
These are all blessings I am so, so lucky to have in this imperfect and difficult world.
Pic: Water Lilies at MSU Horticultural Gardens with HK. I thought about cropping out the clump of weeds and gathered gunk, but it is what it is...
Our straightforward heart connection bypasses the complicated family tree. When we lived in New Jersey, we saw each other every day and I always feel very, very loved by her. When morning sickness laid me low, she hand-fed me. And I don't mean spoon-fed--she scooped up the rice and rasam into little balls and fed me with her fingers like a proper South Indian mama would.
I'm so glad P came for a visit despite all the stresses of her high-powered job, and illnesses in the family. And of course we plunged into chattering the day away. At my request, RR came by to give her a massage and then At came over to say hello and we all sat down to dinner together, FaceTiming various other cousins.
There's a family reunion planned... for 2025... I can't wait.
Pic: Cousin P, Nu, At, and Cousin K2 (on the phone from the U of Maine).
If we'd been the least bit interested in American football, we'd have known that MSU had a home game today. After a summer of basically having all of campus to ourselves, we were startled to see a football stadium's worth of people pouring out of every street and building. I mean, it's their campus, not ours--but it didn't stop us from feeling somewhat affronted. Ha.
And then I decamped to go do things with friends. As Nu hugged me goodbye as I was leaving, they dolefully asked if they were having dinner without me again (I got home late after student activities yesterday too). I felt momentarily guilty, but Nu and Big A take any evening I'm gone as a mandate to order junk food they love, so I know they actually have a great time.
I had a great time with two sets of girlfriends too.
Pic: We're pretending to be mannequins because we were all dressed up and there was this empty storefront. It's too bad the glare ruined the concept a bit, but I still love how fabulous the voluminous salwar suit my aunt gave me when I was in India looks.
A month ago, my old advisor at Oxford posted a sweet photo of herself at the door of her office on the socials. It reminded me of all the times I'd shown up at that office excited about an idea or terrified about exams and seeing her open that same door with that same welcoming gesture. I "loved" it obviously. She mentioned that a visiting cousin had taken that photo and I asked her privately if that cousin was from my part of the world (the name didn't sound like it was from hers). The cousin was indeed from my part of the world, and my advisor mentioned that her husband's aunt had married a South Indian cricketeer named Murugesh.
Now Murugesh is a fairly common name, but the first time I heard it was because the person succeeding my dad at this one position in Vizag four decades ago was named Murugesh. And the only reason I've remembered that was this: Murugesh and his family would soon be occupying the beautiful company house with a full house staff and fancy furniture after we left. There was one table though that had turned a bit rickety, and we had shoved a trunk under it to stabilize it... but of course we'd be taking that trunk with us when we moved away. My dad made up this song about all the stuff the new family would enjoy in the company house, the final line of the song was "but, Murugesha, Murugesha; do you have a trunk?" (For the rickety table, LOL.) It had a catchy tune and we thought it was hilarious and over the decades, we'd sing a snatch of that song and laugh when it came to "but Murugesha, Murugesha; do you have a trunk?"
Back to the present: I asked my dad if Murugesh had been a cricketeer; he had. I asked my advisor if her cousin's dad had worked in Vizag; he had. It was the same Murugesh! (My dad had added an extra syllable to M's name for some old-timey flavor.) And then a spate of emails via my advisor about memories of that house, neighbors, romances that had transpired between the new family and our old neighbors, and then sharing the famous (in our family) song. (And yes, it was summer, but my advisor is a very busy academic with talks to give and books being published and whatnot... she was so kind to facilitate this discussion.) And because I happened to be visiting my parents when my advisor was emailing back and forth about this, it gave us so many nostalgic things to recall and enjoy.
When I was six years old, I did not know that I would connect with the protagonist of my dad's song over 40 years in the future...
Pic: I couldn't find a pic of Woodroffe House in Waltair Uplands. But this is a picture of Waltair Club home to many childhood shenanigans and whose verandah kinda looks like Woodroffe.
After work, I was in and out of the house all evening taking soup to AD and pastries and presents to EM (whom we celebrated over dinner last week). Many folks do all this commuting everyday with their kids' activities and sports and... wow. It's a lot.
Our rakhi days are different from everyone else's. This year, only Nu is wearing their rakhi on their wrist; At is wearing theirs on their ankle (work doesn't allow bracelets), and Huck and Max are wearing theirs on their collars. The kids--human and canine--have been tying on rakhis and promising to protect each other for as long as I can remember. But the years are distinct. This is Max's first; we missed Scout. I looked back at last year's celebration, and it feels like a different pandemic world!
After dinner, we called my dad to serenade him with birthday songs and then went outside to look for the blue super moon. My city kids (pointing at a distant streetlight) "Is that it?" (Face palm.)
We finally found it later and higher in the sky--so, so lovely!
Easy does it.
Unrelated: I can't stop thinking about the food situation with my parents, sis, and BIL. I knew they had let some household help, including their cook, go during the early stages of the pandemic. What I didn't realize is that now everyone just orders food online and then they eat separately and at different times. So all they're eating--sometimes even at breakfast, and almost always at lunch and dinner--is restaurant food. Each one according to their own schedule and by themselves.
The worst part is that the food is frequently limp, unappetizing, and unsatisfying by the time it arrives, so it seems people eat more than they would otherwise. My BIL won't even enter the kitchen, my sis is too busy with her job, and my parents are too old, so this isn't a problem with an obvious solution. I made soups and stir-frys while there (for the kids mainly, but there was enough for everyone) and everyone acted like it was the most amazing food in the world (although it really wasn't!). My sister takes such good care of my parents and I didn't want to be a dick; so I didn't say anything. But mealtimes were such a time of togetherness growing up and I feel so, so sad that it's not the case anymore over there.
Pic: Look! A medieval-looking turret on our way to get Big A some coffee at Biggby!
Back home, it's inauspicious to say you're leaving--you're supposed to say, "I'll go and come" (meaning I'm leaving now, but I'm coming back later). "Poyi-Ostha in Telugu; "poyitu-vaaren" in Tamil. Guess I've left and come back to one of my homes.
It felt so good to see Big A's dear face when he picked us up at the airport, such a shriek I did shriek. Max is huge and can now bark, Huck is her crazy-dainty self, everyone was just so excited to see each other.
I've since watered the zillion plants; cleaned the things other people don't care/know to clean; unpacked our suitcases; refilled the hot tub; cleaned the tiled floors (the big vacuum is tomorrow); cleaned the space around Scout's memorial, etc. etc. I'm not sleepy in the least. Might read and/or do some laundry next.
Pic: I brought some of the old vinyl records from my mom's collection back with me. She loves music and used to have shelves and shelves of records--now only a couple of suitcases since my parents moved in with my sister some years ago. Some of the albums have numbers pasted on the corner: This is from when my mom organized them into genres and had my sister and me help by cutting numbers out of an old calendar (this was before home printers) to catalog them.
Yay!
And just in time to travel back...
My kids and parents are quick (and so sweet) to reassure me that although things didn't go according to plan, they're really happy to have had so much time together. We've spent a lot of time watching movies, swapping playlists, and telling old stories these past few days. Not as raucous as when we first arrived, but nice in its own way.
I wish we were being safer--as a better Maya said, when we know better we should do better--but we haven't been doing that.
Pic: A pic of Nu, mom, and At from my sis. Sis and I finally got some one-on-one time together and she encouraged me to come back without the kids next time. 😆
You won't find Nu in this picture because it's late and they'd had their fill of social interaction.
And you won't find At in this picture because their fever had spiked and they're in bed after we went to the hospital earlier in the evening for a consult, tests, and antivirals. (There's a chance it could be dengue, although we haven't been bitten by a single mosquito, and of course it could be Covid--either of which could complicate things by a whole lot.)
I've had some lovely conversations with my dad on this trip thanks to his amazing new hearing aid. This morning he was telling me about a sib who died in infancy and their family dog who died from grief soon after (that's the family story, anyway), and I started to cry about Scout. My dad was upset about making me cry, but actually, it was such a relief to be able to do any of this--talk to my dad, talk about Scout, hear a story I've heard 10,000 times before, etc.
Pic: Part of my loud and lovely family. The sheet of paper in VM's hand is a blueprint for the big family reunion being planned for next year. (Bangalore)
1) Trip to Ikea with Nu this morning. Our plan was to blast our Indian (Hindi, Telugu, + Tamil) playlist and I would translate key parts of ...
