Presani - my dear Pre…

She is silent at first, that’s how she is every day. I start dumping all my stuff into her, sometimes a little more than she can handle, rather most of the times. But I know I can trust her more than anyone … I mean "anyone".

Then she slowly starts. But I don’t taunt her, not the least. She’s more important to me than my morning coffee or even my better half!

Some days she’s quick, like the son grabbing hold of the TV remote before anyone else and yet other days she’s cold and grumpy like the daughter waking up the night after her dance performances, taking hours to heat up and ages to cool off. 

Well, she says it’s her night before that sets her up for the morning. Well! who’s to argue.

She starts off with her last night’s story. When he came, did he eat or not, their fight and well a lot more and then the pressure builds up and up, and no more can she handle... that's when she whistles it out, until she finally fizzes out.

I go about my chores hearing to all her stories or rather waiting for her stories to wrap up and the pressure to release. 

This is our daily morning routine with my dear Presani or rather "THE Pressure cooker".  I hear her out and she helps me with mine.

But today she was murmuring a little more than every day. As always, I couldn’t make out the direction of the sound… was it the mother in law grumbling or the daughter whining.  Being directionless with sounds, I went close by, feeling a little crazy, towards Presani.

 Yes, it was her. I touched her whistle and asked “What’s it now? Aren't we done for the morning?"

She said “D, I am going on a date tonight 😉, please handle the pressure coolly!” [It was my maid’s day off]

 

Mute… Unmute

She had waited for this day for the last one year.  She had prepared for it all thru her cooking, bathing, cleaning, and during her drive to office. The most awaited talk show was scheduled to be shot on the Mar 23rd 2020. The fateful day when the world-wide lock-down began due to the unprecedented Covid situation. The organizers had promised to get back to her.

 

Reena, was the CEO of a leading company based in Australia, “happily-settled" mother of two and all the baggage that an India wedding that weighs the woman down. She was no different to the lock-down blues. It had brought in several new challenges. Her parents had flown back to India just weeks before the lock-down had started. With the schools closed and working from home being the normal, she was also adjusting to the nuances as was her husband Virat, of 15 years.

 

Finally, the meeting was scheduled for the 14th of May. A co-incidence, it was her 15th wedding anniversary. She was supposed to have mock interview a day before the actual meeting. Ms. Lee called her to discuss the on-goings. She had a beach background setup as her virtual background. 

 

Something about the background Ms. Lee had… Reena felt a strange nostalgia. In between mute and on-mute she was battling her emotions, the old memories kept flashing before her eyes. Her thoughts went back to her hometown in Mangalore, a quaint little village near to the beaches of the Sasihitlu. Her childhood, her college and how she had met Virat on the way to her first interview in Bangalore.

 

Her thoughts were coming to the present when she would unmute, her present - her children, work, how she had built herself to the current role as a CEO. But then silently she would slip into her own world when she would mute herself. What had gone wrong, why were we the way we are today. In between her maiden speech of raking up her accomplishments, she felt a strange loneliness. She was viewing a lot only from her point of view, oblivious to Virat's feelings.

 

Ms. Lee repeated - "Ms. Reena are you able to hear me? I think you are on mute; can you please unmute yourself? “

 

She was brought back to the present, trying to mute the voices in her mind, she unmuted herself. She saw Virat answering the doorbell. He walked past her and laid out something on the dining table. The kids were giggling silently in the background. A glistening smile and she finished her call, as fantastic as ever.

 

The kids were happily setting up the table, giggling all the while. Virat was silent, like he has been from past few years. She sensed a familiar smell. Virat had ordered a special fish curry made from the finest "kani" fish sold only on the Mangalore beaches, Reena's favorite, and a bottle of champagne. They enjoyed a good meal, mute in some sense, but loud, happy chattering from the kids. 

 

Once the kids slept, Virat opened the champagne, they had few silent moments, like how they used to have during their early days of courtship, with several relatives around them. She lent out her hand to him for a dance to one of their old fav …I want to grow old with you…

 

Maybe things are only as bad or as good as our imagination, why live in the virtual world after all. Just unmute your true self to the see the world. And she went to bed with a peaceful smile on her heart.

Festivals of my house

 I was teaching my daughter about festivals of India - national and religious, from her class syllabus. The next day was 5th September - Teacher's day. I felt a need to tell my daughter about festivals of my house also!! 

Growing-up, I had seen my mother celebrate different festivals, in different ways which is not considered normal in any religion albeit humanity and daily-survival. My mother was a high school teacher and the 2 days that I vividly remember are 5-September - Teacher's Day and 14-November  - Children's day. These 2 were the festivals of my home. 

On 5th September , my mother would get dressed-up in her best attire.  Even her old students from across that entire area would come to wish her. There used to be a grand celebration at her school and the teachers would get to see their students role-play their favorite teacher. That evening would be stories from her school. She would get so many flowers and bouquets. We would pull out all vases and augment it further with glass tumblers to decorate our entire house with the flowers and gifts she would receive. What a sight!!! This day is so etched in my memory. I  ensure that my kids wish and thank their teachers at school with some lovely rose flowers and my mother's favorite 5-star chocolate bar.

Now the other important festival was Children's day - 14th Nov. This day was a little opposite in terms of preparations! My mother would prepare some sweets, and also take lots of chocolates for all her students. She would think of small class room games, host a flower decoration - IKEBANA competition and also be the delightful judge. Again, we were all ears for the special day's stories. 

The other set was what I would call as the survival festivals!  Now that  I am a working mom, I can relate to these holidays much more than ever before.  There were 2 important holidays that mother would get in the month of September - Shab-e-baraat and St.Mary's festival. They would fall in and around our Ganapathi festival. These were days of preparation if Ganapathi puja was upcoming or days of clean-up if the festival was over. She would meticulous plan this day and not a moment would go wasted. Adding to her glory was, my sister and me would have full-day school! Cleaning-up the house,  safely packing back the silver vessels used for the puja. And the house is back to being spick and span. 

None of our preparations were elaborate, they were simple. We would celebrate all of them, we had pujas, savories everything associated with it. 

But 5- Sept and 14-Nov were truly "The festivals of My-House." They have left a deep mark on me. 

Common Sense near me

Even to this day my father has all rights to scold me and these are the opening lines " ಅಷ್ಟು ಬುದ್ಧಿ ಇಲ್ವಾ ನಿನಗೇ " (Don’t you have an ounce of common sense)

Last year I did my son's head tonsuring ceremony. I am standing near the ceremony hall, fixing up the caterer, photographer and ah! I need a barber. What's a "choodakarma" ceremony without a barber!!!

The techie me pulls out my phone and starts typing "barbers near me".

A loud voice, " ಅಷ್ಟು ಬುದ್ಧಿ ಇಲ್ವಾ ನಿನಗೇ " (Don’t you have an ounce of common sense)" … I ..I am...err... Yes it is my father scolding me, rather my common sense. He says turn to your left and there you see the hair salon, our very own barber!!! It's basic common sense that these kind of ceremony halls always have their own barbers!! Common sense my darling!

We head out to a family wedding. Car fully loaded with my father, both my in-laws and my kids. DH starts the map and I start searching for a "bouquet shops near me". Aah ... again!

The conversation starts off like this - 

MIL: Isn't this where they got married? (Yes, THE wedding hall were we got married!)

My father jokingly tells to my daughter, you know what, your parents got married in this very wedding hall.

DD: Is it? Then why is Appa checking the maps? 

Father: Now, they are checking the fastest route and your mother has left her common sense in the wardrobe! Won't she get flower bouquets right outside the wedding hall?!!

This is the truth of our generation and also dangerously so of our future generations as well. How many times do we bury our heads into our phones, while all that we have to do is to just look up, I mean in the literal sense (;-))?  And talk to people, I mean real talk and not "Whatsapp". In this era of "Near me" are we losing our quintessential "common sense"?

I took a bus journey of 3.5 hrs from Bangalore-Mysore on a late Friday evening and I did (oops, sorry) a peek-a-boo on the phones around me. All head-phones plugged-in, mobile lights glowing (not fireflies) and only Scroll Up, Scroll Down, Zoom-In Zoom-out !!! The only body parts alive and active were the thumb finger and index finger and eyes wide-open and occasionally ears!

My neighbor looked up at me for a brief second when she had to answer her dad's call - "Sweetie, where are you, shall I start from home now?" I did understand that question mark look and I said aloud - Where am I? or rather  "What, is near me?!"

Searching for my lost common sense 👀👀👀👀