the next time I see you

I guess I'm at that stage where I'm telling random people that my mom died.  As I was checking in my luggage at the airport, the desk attendant asked why my suitcase was so heavy and I told her it had my mom's saris. Then I started sobbing. And then to make it less awkward, I explained that my mom had passed away. Super awkward. This young person who couldn't have been more than 25 touched my arm and said gently: "It might seem like she's not here anymore, but she's always with you. So I helpfully cried harder.

I saw the same attendant at the gate too, and when she came up to me, I bashfully said something like--hi, look I'm not crying anymore. And she said "Ma'am, the next time I see you, you'll be strong and happy." I was so moved by her goodwill, I asked for her name.

It was Lakshmi. Mom's name. 

________

Pic: My mom's favorite sibling, her only brother, gave me this life-size blonde, blue-eyed doll who shut her eyes when you laid her down when I was a baby. I didn't play with her much, but "Sofia" became quite famous amongst my friends... for instance, the kid who's in the first photo with me wanted to take a photo with Sofia. My dad thought it would be hilarious to use my sister in the next picture as a switcheroo.

Another one from mom's archive.

I guess she doesn't live here anymore

The morning's Hindu ceremony for this 16th day was very serious. I was terrified of messing up something small like tying a knot wrong in the darba grass or making an offering in the wrong cardinal direction and endangering my mom's welfare in the next realm. So I extra loved the part when my mom was entrusted to her mom and grandmother for the journey, with the priest calling out their formal names and clan names.

This afternoon was the celebration of her life. It was a party mom would have loved, except for the fact that she very certainly wasn't there. If she doesn't live here anymore, I wonder where she is. And also, although I was the one who came up with the idea of "celebrating her life" I ended up being a very wet blanket--the kind who cries all the time.

It was the first time I was seeing people outside of family, and every time someone said something kind or I spied a sweet picture of her face on the slideshow, I was a puddle. At one point I was clutching neighbors I hadn't seen decades and sobbing into their shoulder. (They meant to visit dad on Wednesday, but had hurried down to say goodbye to me as I leave at the end of the day and they didn't want to miss me. So although their words were fairly standard--"we all lost a good friend"-- it seemed so fucking poignant in the moment.)

My mom's cousin with whom she had a lot of adventures made me laugh when she said an old (male) colleague of my sister's was a "rugged beauty." We got a lot of mileage out of that for the rest of the afternoon. Another cousin was addressed by a completely different--and made up--name by the security guard, and we all used that name for her for the rest of the afternoon as well. I guess, we all needed to regress/recoup a bit. 

Pic: A picture of the celebration a friend shared with me.
 

It's a serious business

Chelli and I spent hours poring over the many options we could go with as Amma had a serious sweet tooth and we went with a little bit of everything. It's a serious business gathering all of Amma's favorite treats.

We finalized the slide show, signed off on the caterer menus for tomorrow, okayed the centerpieces from the florist, and found the perfect photos for the seven small tables. Mom would love this party. The person who made tiny cakes for tomorrow started crying when she delivered them this evening because she said she was looking forward to making mom's 80th birthday cake and instead she was "baking for this." 

Pic: This looks like an ad for globalization what with the homemade treats up front and everything from Coca Cola to CheezIts and fusion snacks at the tail end of the table.   
 

siblings

So grateful for my sister who is so amazing at caregiving. When not with me, our parents have been with her for at least the last 15 years.

Amma has four siblings, and although she'd always say she loved her only brother the most, she's super close to her sisters. It has been such a relief to be held by my aunts, to know I'll fall asleep next to a protective and comforting aunt tonight. 

She was telling me that she and Amma had been arguing about a T.V. series called The Promise. They couldn't seem to agree on whether the lead actor was handsome or not, if he was tall or not, if someone was sus or not, they couldn't even agree on the basic plot line... "I kept rewatching episodes because I couldn't remember anything she mentioned," my aunt said. It turned out that my mom had been watching the Turkish series called The Promise and my aunt had been watching a Korean series that had the same title (but was a completely different show). Ha.

Pic: I vaguely remember being posed at the end of a school day with my sister in those giant planters as *growing kids* by my uncle, who doted on us. (Also, apropos of nothing, at least three of my teachers back then were flirting with him.) I have no idea why our catholic school uniforms are so grimy--my sister may even have been in a fight? She must still be in kindergarten, because their uniforms were sleeveless and you got sleeves only when you got to first grade. It was a cute 'fit: cement green with contrast binding in a green-and-white check... I'd wear that mod-looking frock now, given a chance. And I'd happily go back to that childhood.

found

Of course my sister and I started crying even as we walked towards each other and collapsed into each other when she picked me up at the bus stop.*

When we got home, my dad seemed so much smaller inside my hug and also grizzlier--in the traditional way, he won't shave until Sunday's ceremony.  He wouldn't let my hand go for hours. 

He wants me to take all my mom's things as some jewelry like her bangles, rings, anklets will fit only me. Ditto her shoes. Her clothes are not my size, but he kept telling me the sweaters and blazers would look nice at work (umm, no). I can see I'm going to return with so many of her saris. 

The true treasures are all the photo albums. She was so obsessed with At, photographing nearly every moment of At's infancy with whatever blurry camera she had back in 1999.

Pic: I found this 56-year-old photo of my parents from when they were just married. I'm noticing the slight lean away in their heads. In my dad's case, it could be because of the way his body aligns because of his polio... my mom is probably feeling shy? In any case, this photo makes me smile because dad always joked about how there was so much symmetry between his tie and my mom's braid.

*[My flight got into Bangalore at 3:20 AM, and I didn't want Chelli to make the 90-minute trip to the airport so late at night, so I refused to tell her when my flight got in. I stayed inside the airport until it was no longer dark and then took the bus home (it seemed safer than a taxi--there are always such horrendous stories of violence against women in Bangalore).]

On my way to work today, I heard Robert Redford died

... and it made me smile 

He had been one of my mom's celebrity crushes and what if there was some party for the newly dead where she might finally meet him? I don't know how many times we watched Redford and Fonda in the film adaptation of Neil Simon's Barefoot in the Park...

I leave tomorrow for Bangalore, and I guess I have mortality on the brain, because I've been saying earnest goodbyes to everyone letting them know how much they mean to me... TBF, it is a long journey and lots of things could go wrong... and I've thought of at least 500 of them.

Pic: I miss her everywhere, even on FB, where she was sometimes quite prolific on my page.

still present

I'm still using the present tense when I talk about mom a lot of the time, and I guess that's ok. Every time I receive a condolence message, I go through a moment where I'm like--LOL, no! my mom's not dead... before I realize no, that message really is for me. 

They say a loved one's spirit is near when a cardinal appears... I've been woken up by a cardinal almost every day since Amma died...

Could it be because when A is at work, I've been sleeping downstairs with Max and Huck?

Mostly... no regrets

I wasn't always the best kid. 

I broke her heart when I tried to die. And during my teen anorexic years, I wielded a sort of malicious power over her at mealtimes. But both those things were over a period of 3-4 late teen years and outside of that--to her, I seemed the best kid. 

Every thing about me--my grades, my stories, my smiles, my book recs, my kids, my home, every award, every publication, every tiny hair tweak, every plant hack... every stupid thing brought her so much joy... as she never tired of telling me.

I'm glad we went for a long visit recently, and that we got to see her this summer, I'm glad I got to take her to all the places she wanted to go to, made her fabulous meals and very simple ones (the last thing I made her was the Parsi omelette sandwich we ate at picnic style at the Detroit airport), made sure the kids cleared their calendars and spent enough time with us, did the professional family photo shoot she wanted, sang all the songs she wanted me to sing to her, took her shopping at all the discount places she loved.

I let all the small things go. Her main parenting rule was that she would love me no matter what. And in the last twenty years, that became my reciprocal rule as well. I stopped trying to convince her about things that were important to me... she had her own list of things that were important to her (mostly At, Nu, my sister, and me). And things got real easy after that. So... despite the pain, at least there's peace in knowing I don't wish I had done anything differently. 

The day before*, she wished me for my Boss Day, then we talked for a bit. Our last words were: 

"Love you, Kanna" 

"Love you, Amma"

No... No regrets... If I had known those were to be our final words, I would not have changed them.

But I would have changed the time. My grandmother and great-grandmother lived into their nineties and I expected my mom would too...

Pic: I recognize my lovely mom. The gremlin in her lap is supposedly me. 

* It was the 6th in Bangalore, but it was still the 5th when I got the call. I keep replaying the words I heard my sister say through her sobs ("Akka, Amma passed away this morning") in my head as if they'll make sense this time.

tribute

India won independence from Britain in 1947. Or according to tongue-in-cheek family lore, my mother was so powerful that the year after she was born, the British left India. Our dad was sincere in calling her our family's Dhairya Lakshmi--our Goddess of Courage. I can't believe my vibrant, beautiful, lovely, funny mother is not in this realm any longer. I feel enveloped in her presence and love still.

I can't put into words how amazing she was or how hard she loved me and my sister. When other Indian kids bemoan their strict upbringing, I'm extra grateful for Amma who diligently used the copy of Dr. Benjamin Spock she acquired in college; her two primary parenting rules for my sister and me were 1) Love your kids no matter what 2) Say yes more than you say no. As the eldest in a family of five she received extra corporal punishment from her father: "if the first wheel is straight, all the other wheels will follow." So she was determined that she would never lay a finger on her kids--that was one of the many generational cycles she successfully broke.

As a child she was hilariously blunt (to her grieving mother--"mom, don't cry! All your powder [make up] is getting washed away") + a terrible liar (after being told not to tell her grandfather they'd been to the cinema "Thatha, we didn't AT ALL go to the cinema"). And she continued on with those traits. She loved so fiercely and was unfailingly proud of us. It's no wonder she was adored by her two kids and grandkids, her four siblings, her niblings, and several of her kids' friends. Also, she loved her only brother extra and didn't care who knew that. I love that she and Aaron were each other's favorites. He was even better than I was at deciphering her 2:00 am texts--typos, Telugu colloquialisms and all. And she blissfully took my dad for granted. "Even if God himself came down to tell me, I'd never believe your dad could have an affair," she told me once. And just as I was awed by the trust that seemed to exist between my parents, she added: "He really hates to spend money." That still cracks me up.

She was irrepressible and fun-loving. And that line in _Bend it Like Beckham_ "Don't smile, Indian brides never smile" didn't apply to her; look how radiant she is in that B&W picture as a bride. She loved people and parties and travel. The week before Spring break this year, she texted me around 2:30 am to suggest she, my sister, and I should go to Istanbul. We could share a suite, her treat! We didn't do that, but two months ago, when she was here, we threw a huge garden party together, and she adored book clubs so we went to one at Jan Shoemaker's, and we got in lots of cuddles with Atulya and NuNu who were even more precious to her than her kids ("the interest is more precious than the principal" she'd say.)

Today a cardinal at the window woke me up. This is wonderful as they say cardinals are a sign of a loved one's spirit. But also, I have a feeder at that window and also I didn't have to wait to feel my mom's presence. It is always with me. I can't stop loving her and Amma won't stop loving us. I will always love her; she will love us forever. Om Shanti, Shanti, Shantihi.

birthday footsteps

Mom's birthday is on the 8th

Mine is on the 4th

my sister's is on the 22nd 

She always says the numbers in our birthdays (4 + 2 + 2) add up to hers (8).

My birthday is on the 4th

At's is on the 2nd

Nu's is on the 11th

I love that the numbers in my kids birthdays (2 + 1 + 1) add up to mine too!

Pic: One of her favorite photos of my sis and me.

is it even "going home"?

The date for the formal "Kariyalu" has been fixed for the 21st of September, and I'm going to make a quick trip to Bangalore. 

My mom always scoffed at this ceremony as a cipher and merely a signal to visiting family that the mourning period was over and that they should go home now. But that's her irreverent wit. 

I think it'll at least be healing for me to see my dad and sister and for us all to hold each other and cry. 

It doesn't feel like "going home" in any real way. She was the heart of the family--partly because she had such a huge personality and partly because she was a stay-at-home mom and always there. Not that anyone could take her for granted, I love that she always demanded full attention.

Pic: She kept this photo of me (at 6 months?) in her wallet.

I'm not the only one...

As the condolences come in, I'm reminded that so many people I know have suffered the loss of at least one parent already. I'm kind of in a lucky subset to have enjoyed the love and shelter of both my parents for so long. I feel extra sad when the condolences come from friends who lost their mothers before they were mothers themselves... Or when a young colleague mentioned that she was familiar with the pain of knowing how this felt--it totally took me out of my own grief for a while. 

I made it through this teaching day by not making eye-contact with anyone outside of class. The classroom feels like a natural place for me to be, but I cannot with in-person condolences, hugs, and talks right now. I feel like if I engage with anyone, I'll be a mess. I think I walked past a some people trying to talk to me because I was in my own head.

And while we laughed and cried and held each other through the ceremony here on Sunday and it felt meaningful... I can finally articulate even if only to myself how heartbroken I am that the cremation in India happened so quickly that I wasn't able to say goodbye to my mom. I can rationalize all night that it was just her physical form and all that, but it would have meant so much if they had been able to delay for a day or two. 

Pic: Amma's Wedding photo

where it hurts

Today would have been mom's Boss Day. 

I bit the bullet and informed HR at work and FB on the socials today. I hope this means I won't have to go over the details with everyone one by one, because I don't think  have it in me.

Writing up a reflection of Amma was easier than speaking, which I still can't do without breaking down.

It hurts everywhere. Some of it is from a record number of bumps and bruises over the past few days. But it also just hurts all over. 

I don't have the wherewithal to find it, but I heard a snippet on the radio before all this went down about how fibromyalgia (which is what this feels like) never shows up alone, but is always pinned to depression, of ACEs (Adverse Childhood Experiences), or traumas.

Pic: My mom treasured this photo because her name was Manu and I took this for her on a 1998 trip to Hawaii. 

life is dukkha

My dad spoke to me kindly and firmly and mere hours later the cremation has already taken place. There will be a celebration of life in December when I can take the kids to Bangalore. I saw my mom garlanded and looking different on a video call... I haven't been able to stop crying. My whole face hurts from crying and every part of my body.

Everyone is at my sister's house. Aunts and uncles, cousins. A lot of neighbors. Friends. I'm beginning to get a bit overwhelmed here as well. I am grateful for the love and care, but also just want to curl up in a ball. I've cried snottily on too many people in the last 24 hours. Typically, that's an honor reserved for Big A. 

For someone who usually loves being around people, I'm realizing that this is one moment I want to be alone. I've done stuff like pretend I'm not home and left people on read. I know I'll have to tell people at work and then probably on Facebook so I don't have to tell the story (and cry) hundreds of times, but I'm dreading that.

Pic: Mom on her 75th birthday. I love that my sister and I both picked the SAME photo for our altars!

celebrate good times

It's my dad's birthday in India... I'm there in every way except in person... And in the meantime, over here, I'm celebrating with JL, DV, and EM, whose birthdays are this week.

When I dropped something off for Nu this afternoon, they wanted to take me out to lunch* and then we kept talking, talking, talking until it was four hours later and I had to reluctantly say I had to go. (* They wanted to take me out to lunch, but the bookstore where we ended up did not take their college "munch money," and I insisted on paying so they said they'd take me out another time. I didn't plan it that way, but this means we'll get to hang out again soon. I'm feeling fairly Machiavellian and celebrating this too.)

Pic: Birthday morning pic of dad, sis, mom. All the hearts. 

Glimmers

It's Ganesha Chaturthi today; my first time celebrating without At and Nu here. I talked to At and Nu, chatted with my mom and sis, gave all our Ganeshas fresh kumkum and flowers, ate the mango, coconut sweets, and bananas myself, and then took myself off to book club in the evening. 

I refuse to be sad today; some glimmers on this auspicious day:

*The news of Taylor Swift's engagement made me happy. She's written about disappointment and heartbreak for nearly two decades, and it's lovely to see her with someone who seems to honor her.

*I wish I could exchange places for at least a day with someone who'd never heard of Donald Trump. But Rebecca Solnit pointed out that people are doing so many amazing things to right the wrongs of this administration.  "The ACLU is super-busy. Lawyers are suing like crazy. Democratic state a.g.s are talking every morning about their collective lawsuits. Protestors are in the streets, maybe 5 million at No Kings, there's lots of interference with ICE, 50501 was created expressly for this, Indivisible is growing by leaps and bounds, I'm seeing so many photographs of so many signs on overpasses, people are stepping up to help immigrants in all sorts of ways..."

*Although this study is a quarter century old, I just learned that instead of "fight or flight" women usually "tend and befriend" under stress. Women are inclined to nurture, protect, promote safety and create social networks instead of fleeing or fighting--brilliant! The paper is here. 

*Not that this is something anyone who's benefitted from being loved by puppies needs proof of. But an Emory University study using MRIs by Dr. Gregory Berns indicates that dogs brains light up more actively for praise (i.e. human interaction/affection) than food. Our canine friends and babies love us!

*Pic: This morning, Big A takes off for the five-day DALMAC bike tour as he usually does this time of the year. I think Jeanie may recognize his bicycling club jersey. Since he's been so sick this year, we weren't sure he'd make it through all five days and were determined to take it day by day. I didn't know that I'd be rescuing him from Dewitt after half a day. Ok, the glimmer: He's off for the next four days, so he gets to rest and recuperate. 

sleepovers and playhouses

When we asked Nu how their first night away felt, they said it still feels like a sleepover... I'd concur that's how it feels for me as well--like they're just away at a friend's place for a while. And that's how one of the advisees I met today described their first week of college too. 

Describing college life as a sleepover seems such a Gen Z thing though. I mean, can you imagine one of those hardy, manly, macho writers from the mid-20C like Gore Vidal or Truman Capote describing college as a sleepover? Ha.

Pic: Nu (on the right) entertaining on their side of the little playhouse in Yellow Springs (the other side was At's) that I furnished and finished using the dollar store + thrift store. The other kids in the photo, whose mom is still in my will as my healthcare proxy in case Big A can't, continue to be dear friends. I have B's early notes with the sign off "I love you No" (I chuckle at that misspelling of "Nu") saved.

So apropos that this photo should show up in my feed as Nu settles into their first place away from home. On family chat, everyone joked about how much Nu has grown in the last five years (the caption says "5 years ago"). Actually, the photo showed up as "five years ago" in 2015, so it's circa 2010. NGF's photo.

Mixed, Mad, Mellow

Mixed: Back on campus for a full day of Fall conference today. It's delightful to see everyone after a summer of being away. And every year I find myself missing people who aren't here. Some of them are happily retired, some resigned unhappily, some moved on to other places, + a significant number of jobs were cut last December. There were a few absences today that were unexpected and I don't know if they're gone, are quiet-quitting, or just playing hooky. 

Mad: I'm upset that the funds I wired via Western Union in a hurry to help with my mom's medical bills last week were put on a hold. They didn't bother to tell me until I called them and then asked me a bunch of annoying questions to "protect me from scammers." You know what seems like a scam to me? Quietly sitting on my money for over a week when you promised it would be transferred in 15 minutes. I chose Western Union over a bank transfer precisely because it's supposed to be available in a matter minutes rather than days, but here we are ten days later. Ugh.

Pic: Mellow: An ice cream treat with Huck and Max. I get the chocolate part; they get the vanilla.

going back where I came from

I could  lose  myself 

in much lonelier ways 

wandering on between 

no and now and nowhere

but then you tell me to go 

back where I came from 

I understand your animus

curled tight like my fist  

but I pretend confusion

& enact comic indecision:

all the way back to heaven
or just up my mom's vagina?

________________________________

Pic: Baker Woods looking magnificent. Walk with L.

and other stories

I think I told a story that wasn't entirely mine to tell yesterday. I may have to scrub it soon; I'm sorry. 
*
Overall, a better day today although I did cry--once when the Chappell Roan song "Casual" played on the radio. A few months ago, At and I had joked about how I'm probably like the mom in that song who has no chill and invites the person her kid is casually dating to her house after only two weeks. SLE and I got serious about each other pretty quickly. I can't believe or get over how I will never see her again.
*
Nu and I took Max and Huck to the vet for their yearly heartworm shots today. The books we collected for the waiting room made me chuckle--it was the latest Hunger Games book for me and the collected works of Audre Lorde for Nu and not vice versa as one might reasonably expect. 
*
It was the 101st birth anniversary of James Baldwin this weekend, so I read some Baldwin and lit my devotional candle. And it was my Boss Day today, so I took myself for a long walk, bought myself some perennials that were on end-of-season sale for fall planting, and got Thai food for dinner.
*
Pic: Huck likes to climb on furniture because she's the shortest in the family. She wasn't happy to hear the vet say she may have been exposed to a tick bite (blood test results will clarify tomorrow). But she's happy to hear that big sib At will be hanging out with her and Max this weekend and they don't have to go to "boarding school" as she calls it.