Bye Bye House

In his customary annual byes byes, my darling grandson included a new one: bye bye house. He must have overheard some of our conversations regarding rebuilding my now rambling home. Even though we had not shared this with the little one, he knew it would happen and hence the bye bye to the house he knew. How right he was!

My precious house will soon be brought down and a new one will come up in the coming months. I guess this is the last rite of passage life has in store for me. Many may think that I am emotionally shattered. I would have been but the  Gods were kind to me, and before the decision was taken, they made sure I was placed in the right head space. Let me share how.

It all began with a message from am old friend to meet someone. I did not. Another message came and I was compelled to meet this soul. The rest is history. I was pushed to attend a workshop on high frequency energies and was propelled into another dimension. All the things that one held on to obsessively were placed in perspective and I was freed from the weight of past and future and taught to live in the perfection of the now with the belief that all that happens, happens for the very best even if it takes us time to understand, and where is the need to understand.

So instead of a teary walk down memory lane, I embark on a joyful one, celebrating all the wonderful years spent in this home and the ones to come when it is rebuilt anew. Let the party begin!

So her I am, packing half a century of things and memories. Clearing up all the things accumulated over the years with a smile and many forgotten stories. Actually I think the next book is on the anvil.

The decision to rebuild was heralded by the house itself. Large chunks of plasters falling time and again, deep structural cracks, terrible seepage that made the house damp and mouldy and thus unhealthy. The house was talking to me. I had to listen.

So in a few weeks we will leave the house and move to a transit home. I know it will also be perfect. Today I am blessed to be able to be an observer in this new chapter of my life.

I could not resist going back down blog memory lane and looking at the blogs that retrace the story of my home. There is one that retraces its genesis should anyone be interested: The house I am growing old in! Reading from my new head space brought a huge smile on my face!

Then I came across another blog that showed how the house has nothing I ever bought: memories aren't stored in the heart or the head!

And then came the one I wrote in response to a friends remark:  As much as I love this picture, it is the background that draws me - what a warm home you have; much lived in, slightly worn, each piece with a story to share. I love your house!

Yes I love my house. But what I love are the memories that warm the cockles of my heart. And these are not brick and mortar. These are immortal and will stay with me forever.

I am ready for this rite of passage!

A rare love story

This is a rare snap of precious lovebirds Ram and Kamala a.k.a. my parents! Actually it is one of the very few where Papa is smiling. They would have celebrated their 67th wedding anniversary today. Actually they celebrated only 41 together. 

They may not have been your regular loving couple as Ram had a terrible temper and could blow a fuse at the drop of a hat.  Kamala on the other hand was calm and rarely showed her anger. At best she would retreat to a corner waiting for the storm to blow over. It would with Papa often making a treat for the one who had been the object of his wrath. 

My memories of them are countless but somehow they all seemed linked to me their child. I cannot recall any lovey-dovey ones barring those I triggered!

They remained discreet almost to a fault. 

So it was a surprise and also reassurance to know that they had been madly in love when I discovered a bunch of love letters. Somehow I never read them to honour their memory. I guess and hope my kids will. 

Theirs was a unique love tale. Kamala was reconciled to die an old maid as she was determined no to marry unless her country was independent. In those days 30 was considered old. Ram was entering his forties and still a bachelor. Both lived thousands of miles from each other and the likelihood of their meeting was close to non-existent.

Met they did courtesy a family connection. He courted the small town girl with European flair and she fell for his strange but loveable ways.

They would leave for unknown lands and he would make her discover new sites and experiences all coloured by his own passion. 

She followed him and imbibed every thing. 

Together they bore the pain of losing a child and the joy of having one. Their love for each other was demonstrated in unique ways: if Ram managed to grow vegetables for his vegetarian wife in the dead of Prague's winter, Kamala would surreptitiously learn French and surprise him on his birthday. 

This would go one till the end of their life when Kamala in the throes of cancer would swallow the fish he fed her as he had read that fish could beat the dreaded C and Ram at the age of 80 would sit up the whole night on a tiny stool holding her hand and waking her up every 45 minutes as she dreaded dying in her sleep. 

He let her go one sizzling June night, honouring the promise she had extracted from him on their wedding day: that she would die before him.

He outlived her by a year, the time needed to ensure that their only child was strong enough to carry on.

I am sixty four

I must have been fifteen when I first heard When I am Sixty Four by the Beatles. It was in Ankara and I had just got my copy of Sgt Peppers Lonely Hearts Club Band. In those days sixty four seemed so far away. Time does move slow when you are young. I runs at the speed of light the older you grow. Anyway the song them was amusing and above all peppy and one did not pay much attention at the lyrics. It is said that Mc carney wrote it at a very young age and back then I guess 'sitting by the fireside' and 'digging weeds' was what young people thought old people do.

Today I am sixty four and perusing the lyrics there is not much I really do. I may have lost some hair but that is about it. My Vera Chuck and Dave is my grandson Agastya and by sunshine boy Utpal. What a blessing.

In his lyrics Mc Cartney states Who could ask for more? I mean more than the weeds, the walk, the knitting of the sweater and the Sunday mornings ride.

I do as I have so much more. From a partner who feeds and needs me, to children who love and care but above all my Project Why family that has allowed all my dreams and aspirations to come true and  given me a reason to live. I am blessed.

The little girl in the antic pram could not have imagined what life had in store for her on the other side of fifty. Thousands of beautiful children who entrusted their dreams to her, a huge network of beautiful friends that became family to this only child. I have never felt so loved and wanted and needed. I feel humbled and small and elated and euphoric at the same time.

I want to thank each and everyone who made this possible.

God bless you all.

Today I lose another friend.

The neem tree next to my house

The house next door was broken down a few months ago to be replaced by what is knows in Delhi as builder's flats. This is the plight of numerous houses like mine, built in the sixties when one family or at most two lived in villas with a courtyard in the middle and a small garden in front. Since as demand increased and maintenance costs too appeared the ubiquitous builders flat. The builders lobby has ensured that they be allowed to use maximum space. The authorities insist on parking space on stilts. So bye bye garden, greenery and flowers. Cement vies with marble and glass for space. 

In front of the house being erected stands a majestic neem tree. It has been there for more than 4 decades and provided shelter and shade to many. Though not directly in front of my house, its sprawling branches caressed our home and the rustle of its leaves when the wind blew was welcome as I sat outside reading a book of watching my boys play. 

This tree became part of my life and a much loved friend. Its branches also covered the patch of garden next door and thus became a threat to the new structure that needed that space. The battle was unequal: the tree was destined to lose.

 From the very first day I lived in fear of the moment when the axe would fall wondering how many branches will be sacrificed to the alter of urban living. The dreaded moment dawned and as I write these words branch after branch are being felled mercilessly. It will stand mutilated, robbed of its majesty and grandeur. 

I lost a friend a dew days back. A human one. One I had know for decades. Today I lose part of another friend and I feel a pain I cannot describe. This tree has been witness to every moment of my life from the time I was a college student to the time I became a grandmother. It made me feel protected and safe.

I have often compared myself to a tree when I decided to lay down my hat for the last time. My rather nomadic life had left me exhausted and I needed to set my roots deep. Trees meant being safe, secure and loved.

That the tree is being truncated in front of my eyes brings to mind the ephemeral and transient nature of our lives and the reality that nothing is truly secure.

My tree will reinvent itself as Nature is nothing short of miraculous. It will probably looked skewed to many but to me it will be the indubitable truth that it won the battle.

Someone wrote: We say we love flowers, yet we pluck them. We say we love trees, yet we cut them down. And people still wonder why some are afraid when told they are loved. 

How true this is

Au revoir la haut; until we meet in heaven

Au revoir là haut Etienne. I would have much preferred have him say these words to him and yet it was not to be. Etienne left this world last Sunday leaving us stunned and lost. Etienne was my father's best friend's son and we knew each other from the time we were both in our teens. He was two years my junior. He often said I was a role model. I guess we both were rebellious and non conformists to the despair of our rather conservative parents. This was in the sixties and we were true children of the sixties. I had happily embraced the flavour of the times donning my torn jeans and flowered shirts with gusto, my fringe practically covering my eyes. We lived in Ankara and Etienne who must have been 14 came for a holiday. We bonded at once and spent hours listening to the Doors and Dylan and remaking the world. Whereas I would return meekly to the fold, Etienne the tall dark good looking man, with deep brooding eyes remained a free spirit at heart and would go on to conquer the world of music and showbiz with success.

We lost touch for a while but did meet again and each time we did it was as if time had stood still and we are picking up the conversation of yesterday. In 1985 when I made a short visit to New York, Etienne took us to a magical dinner at the Riverside Cafe. The memory lingers on and fills me with immense warmth as that was what Etienne was a warm and kind soul.

He lived his dream and lived life to the fullest, at times even recklessly. But could it be otherwise. That was who he was. You cannot contain a free spirit, the world as we know it s too small a place.

I woke up this morning feeling that somewhere along the way the tables had turned and the mentor had become the disciple. The lessons of freedom and liberation I had once brought to him had been not only learned but perfected and never abandoned. 

We talked sometimes and it was always a joy. In January this year Etienne took my grandson and the husband to a grand lunch in Paris. I was happy to know that they had met. 

I will miss him. I will miss his smile, his booming voice, his warmth and his presence. He was a part of my life, a kindred soul. No wonder his birth day was one day after mine.

Au revoir là haut Etienne

Th best place in Paris

It is always difficult to chose the one place one likes  in the magical city of Paris. The choices are mind blogging. For me it is often the mood and memories that decide the Parisian flavour of the day. I just follow my heart. Another little bloke did just that last week. The difference is that he did not hesitate one bit as I often do. My grandson spent his holidays in Paris with one set of grandparents. He dutifully followed them from parks to museums and went on long walks. He was to the manor born, a far cry from the bundle of energy running through our lives every summer! But all that would change as his other grandpa, my better half decided to go and spend a few days with the boy in Paris.

Plans were made by one and all though no one asked the two main protagonists. It all boiled down to more walks, this time along the favourite haunts of the Indian grandpa. The later even took his walking shoes! I guess the walking shoes remained in the suitcase as my two favourite lads had other plans.

When they met in the hotel room, no one could have guessed that it would become the best place in Paris for these two souls. Agy spotted the big flat screen TV and the deal was done. It would take a little coaxing and wooing to get mom to agree that this would be where they would like to spend time, the little dude with his cartoons and the old one veering between book and screen. So for the past 3 days, barring meals and a few visits that need to be made, granddad and grandson snuggled under the comforter in the cosy hotel room and indulged in their favourite pastime, one that is not on offer in the little one's home. I guess he is gorging on unchecked viewing. The next time will be when he comes home to us.

So for my boys the best place in Paris is the warmth of a comforter and the big TV.

Enjoy boys!

The first man I fell in love with

It was on a cold April night that he came into my life. He was the first face I saw as I entered this world. It was love at first sight. As he  gently took me in his arms. I clutched his finger tight and knew I was safe. For the next 40 years and 8 months we would live a perfect love story till on a cold November morning he would breathe his last, me still clutching his finger. He was my father. I called him Tatu.

From Prague to Delhi we travelled across continents as I discovered life in its magnitude with the most incredible teacher anyone could have.

He was my father but also my pal, my guide, my mentor and my anchor. His arms were the one place I felt entirely safe. He loved me unconditionally. True we both had short fuses that resulted in angry words and banged doors, but minutes later a gentle knock at the slammed door made it all go away as he stood with a treat he had conjured that would wipe all the tears of hurt and rage. His unique way of  asking forgiveness was food, a pêché  mignon we shared as is amply proved by our escapades to restaurants that began when I was 5. He took me to Maxims in Paris for a three course meal serenaded by a violin. That was the first of many meals together in restaurants across the globe. But he was also the one who taught me to savour the simple of foods and eat with the simplest of people. A hot roti dipped in raw mustard oil with some salt was as titillating as a lobster or a bowl of caviar en tête à tête My greatest joy was when he fed me with his hands making that special bite. I must confess that I enjoyed those even as a gown up woman and a mom myself.

I took my first hesitant steps in life again clutching his hand and learned to walk alone with a confident stride knowing he was always just behind me in person or in spirit. He made sure I never fall. It was though his eyes that I discovered the world and he gently taught me how to look beyond the visible and see the essential. It is he who opened the dormant eyes of my heart and coloured my world with compassion and humanity. With him I discovered cities and countries and many other wonders but somehow everything was imbued with values and that 'je ne sais quoi' that made the most inconsequential place or object worth a king's ransom.

The 40 short years of this incredible journey had its difficult moments, most of them when I came into my own in my rebellious teens and we clashed. He wanted to keep me locked in his love and would have got me the moon had I asked for it and I wanted to break free and discover the street next door on my own. To the young teenager, the portly man was a far cry from all the long haired singers of the sixties, and a child of the sixties I was with frayed jeans and short skirts. I now smile with indulgence at the battailles royales we had as he frowned upon my attire and I held my on.

But the world without him may have meant freedom but everything seemed pale and faded, deprived of all the hues only he could put. It is only when I realised that and returned home as the prodigal child that I lived again.

Tatu was there at every moment of my existence and steered me through every peril and pitfall as I grew from child to woman. He made every hurt go away and every tear turn into a smile. He was the sunshine of my life. When he left he took my sunshine away. Life could only be a poor ersatz of what I lived with him. Only memories provide little slivers of light.

The real legacy he left me was not in the shape of things you can see and touch but in the most unexpected words of people that remember him, be it the woman who sold him vegetables and calls him 'the men with a hat', or his meat vendor who talks of him with gratitude for some legal work he had done or in the memories of a woman who was but a child when we lived in what was then known as Saigon.

To the world he was an Ambassador, a jurist, a man of letters, a connoisseur of wines and food, an orator, a humanist and above all a man as defined by Oriana Fallaci: kind to the weak, fierce to the arrogant, generous to those who love you and ruthless to those who ordered you around.

To me he is simply Tatu, the first man I fell in love with and still love with the same passion.