Short story – Page 5 – Nourish-n-Cherish

The Wind in the Reefs

We are enjoying Wind in the Willows sort of days of late. Every so often, I crave for some comfort reading and fall back on Children’s story books. The Wind in the Willows is one such. I still remember my best friend walking up to the front of the assembly and saying nervously, “The Wind in the Willows By Kenneth Grahame. The Mole had been working hard all morning spring cleaning his home …” She had me sit in the first row so she could look at me for moral support, and I gladly obliged. She had brushed her wavy hair neatly parted at the side, and her nervousness was evident in the small shake in her voice. She looked at me and smiled nervously and I gave her a large blooming-flower-kind of smile that encouraged her to go on and she carried on heartened. She finished her recitation to much applause, and collapsed on the chair next to me, and I assured her that she had been marvelous.

When I read snippets of the book on the train, I thought of her again and all the sunny balmy days of childhood play in the warm sun and pouring rain came back to me. Folks looked at me like I need to have my head examined, I grinned disarmingly at them. After all, Grahame described The Wind in the Reeds (the working title till it became Wind in the Willows) as:

“A book of youth, and so perhaps chiefly for youth and those who still keep the spirit of youth alive in them; of life, sunshine, running water, woodlands, dusty roads, winter firesides, free of problems, clear of the clash of the sex, of life as it might fairly be supposed to be regarded by some of the wise, small things that ‘glide in grasses and rubble of woody wreck’.”

There is something deeply alluring about animal stories. I love to imagine them talking to each other, helping one another in times of trouble and having their little adventures. I was similarly happy when I read another passage on Dolphins and Humans in the Cosmic Connection by Carl Sagan. These helpful animals probably crave a little intellectual stimulation and have often been friends to humans, and yet we have shown them time and again how heartless we are by going after them.

Carl Sagan writes of Elvar the Dolphin, who he had the pleasure of meeting during one of his visits to his friend, John Lilly. John Lilly was an admirable scientist who was involved in several researches, Dolphins being one of them. Lilly introduced Elvar-the-Dolphin to Sagan-the-Human, and seeing that they were getting along, let them to it. Sagan and Elvar came into playing a sort of game, and after being splashed thoroughly by Elvar thrice, Sagan refused to play a fourth time.

Elvar surveyed the standoff for several minutes and swam up to Sagan up and said in a squeaky tone of voice, “More!”.

Carl Sagan, justifiably flustered, came running to his friend and said he might have heard a dolphin say the word, “More”.

To which his friend asked him, “Was it in context?”

“Yes! “, spluttered the poor physicist, to which the neuro-scientist smiled and said that it was one of the 50 odd words he knew.

In all these years, we have yet to pick up one word of Dolphinese and yet, we boast about being knowledgable and go to no end to display our arrogance to Mother Nature.

The Wind in the Reefs — Why are we so quick so assume that a place like this will not be rife with little joys and strifes? Doodling by the Daughter

If we are so intent about looking for extra terrestrial life, maybe we should stop and let our own ecosystems thrive.

I am reminded of what William James said, about letting Nature teach us as she ought:

“It is to be hoped that we have some friend, perhaps more young than old, whose soul is of this sky-blue tint, whose affinities are rather with flowers and birds and all enchanting innocencies, than with dark human passions, who can think of no ill of man.“

What is Time?

The toddler son has always been a little preoccupied with Time. He buzzes around asking me the time every so often. Initially, of course, I did the square thing and checked the watch and told him. Soon, I realized that I could check the refrigerator, count my tomatoes, and just blurt out an approximate time. Then, I realized that he did not need the approximate time either – he just needed a number. (I tried time-to-sleep, and time-to-eat, but he did not accept that answer. He did, however, accept 14 o’clock, 14:52 – but not 14.)

The little fellow, like most children, is a question-machine. He asks why there is no half sun, why the dinosaurs died, how he came back to life to spend the day with Danny, why the flowers dried, why his sister came to the World earlier than him. What is dish – (You can eat a dish and put mammum (food) in a dish?), how to see if water reached a particular spot in the water-hose, what is before zero, how do tree roots drink water (Thank goodness, my biology teacher was not there to hear my answer.)

Sometimes, I give him an answer that is in essence correct, but otherwise useless. Like the time he asked me how to make water. (You take two hydrogen atoms, combine it with an oxygen atom and you will get water.) He looked at me puzzled and drank his water. So, I am drinking three water, but there is only one water? I never learn I tell you. After that rash answer, I spent a few trying minutes laying bare my ignorance in Chemistry for all to see.

One time, at the end of a 16-hour long day, we lay there savoring a children’s book together. I told him that it was his sister’s favorite book when she was a baby and he lapped it up. At the end of it, we both sighed contentedly and I told him it was time to sleep. That was when he crinkled his brow, and asked me what is Time. I must have looked perplexed for he went on: “You rember when I was eating applejacks cereal in the morning, you said Time is going? I want to go yesterday.”

If I wasn’t lying down, I would have gone. I am guilty of hustling the fellow when he is relishing his ‘applejacks cereals’ over breakfast, but mornings are a bit rushed in the household and my train won’t wait.

He looked serious and a bit frustrated to see that I had not grasped his simple question. “I want to go yesterday!” he repeated slowly and a bit louder than before. I know that on his timeline things that happened a decade ago qualify as yesterday, so I asked him why he wanted to go to Yesterday.

His answer to that was simple enough. He wanted to see his sister as a baby. I had to dash the fellow’s hopes. There were photographs I could show him, stories I could tell him of her babyhood, but no, he could not go back in time.

Then, he asked me why time only goes forwards and not backwards.

This is when you see me mop my brow. I tell you, I am no physicist. His questions are steadily chipping at whatever Science I have managed to grasp over the years, despite my teachers’ best intentions.

I barely understand time now. It is ethereal, and deceptive. I feel like I am spending enough time during the day enjoying the present, yet, here we are already confusing the Fall season with the sunshine that is Summer’s trademark. I seem to remember helping the fellow take his first steps and now here he is asking me for explanations that are dubious at best. If every day does not seem to fleet past, why do the years flit by?

How come I forget the name of the person I met yesterday, but remember the names of my friends from when I was 5 years old?

It is all most intriguing I tell you.
https://www.brainpickings.org/2015/09/22/the-quantum-and-the-lotus-riccard-david-bohm-reality/

The Hippoceres Giving-It-Nicely Service

I deposited myself fluidly through the doors in the last second before closure. The trains in the USA insist on closing the doors, thereby denying folks like us to use the hang-on-by-a-strand-and-heave self onto train later technique. I can’t say I was in a frightfully enthusiastic mood as I plopped myself onto the only remaining seat. I turned and looked at the person sitting next to me and saw I had drawn the stiff corporate pant.

I had to drop some documents off at a government office and then face a regular day. I sat contemplating the task ahead while opening my book to read. Nothing that a good book can’t fix I told myself sternly and set to reading.

Minutes into the journey, he (the s-c-p, the stiff corporate pant I mean) whipped out his phone. A purposeful gleam emanated from his glassy eyes. I moaned. I think I can figure out when my quiet commute gets thrown out the window. He called his team in India, and far from having a how-are-things conversation, took a piece of mud and flung it with whim across the seven oceans. Ocean beds shuddered as they transmitted the bits from him to the unfortunate team on the other side. He shouted at them, and then looked about impressively. Nobody cared. I scowled. It made not the slightest difference to him. He talked on. He promised to call them all separately and ‘give them nicely’ for not running a report or some such thing.

He sounded like one of those folk who make mental lists of jumping on people, telling them in precise language how they failed as individuals, and how they would improve in life if only they were to listen to him and follow his instructions alone. I heard a goodish deal of his side, which meant that the stuffed mushroom thought nothing of hogging conversations.

“Hello Kavya?”

She probably said Hello, and that was about all she was allowed to say. If I knew her, I could have messaged her directly and told her to put down the phone and continue doing whatever else she was doing, with no loss. He started with the I’ll-show-you-who-is-in-control early enough. “What did you tell Gopal?” he bellowed.

I rummaged around for some cotton, fake-coughed a bit and stuffed my ears, but it did not help. What was required was one of those vacuum shower stoppers, not cotton. I could still hear every word:

“He said that you said that,” and on and on he went how about she was wasting her time. The passengers near me felt a bit sorry for Kavya, whoever she was. Luckily for her, she had no idea she was being publicly shelled like this. I mean, if you are whipping the air out of someone’s lungs, at least have the civility to do so in private, what? I threw him a dirty look. It simply evaporated like a droplet of water in the Saharan desert.

Soon, the bore lost the fun out of ripping Kavya and I tried to read again. He played on his phone for a few minutes. War horses need rest and restoration between battles. A minute later, he called Gopal and started by telling him what Divya told him and how he ‘gave her nicely’. The train was too full now for me to move away from this spot of misery, even if it meant standing on a one foot.

Say what you will about the steel glinted glass, he kept his promise. He made seven different calls and in between every call, he logged back into his game and riled himself up a bit more and got on with his ticking-off. He told every one of them again that he planned on calling every other member who had not delivered something, to ‘give them nicely’. After throwing his weight about like a dancing hippo in the local discotheque frequented by rhinos, he disconnected the call, looked pleased with himself and treated himself to a long round of playing a game on his smart phone.

I almost cheered when his stop came and he went out with a triumphant stride. Clearly, the hippoceres thought his day started on a productive note.

I ruminated for a bit about the phrase ‘give one nicely’. A very Indian expression is it not, to give one nicely while doing the exact opposite? What a super-fatted-bore!

Maybe like Russell said:

Civilized life has grown altogether too tame, and, if it is to be stable, it must provide harmless outlets for the impulses which our remote ancestors satisfied in hunting.

If the s-f-bore had to fight off a few dogs and then run a mile before he leaped onto the train, and then was barely able to hang on, he might not have had the need to ‘give everyone nicely’.

It turned out that the document drop off at the Government office was an egg drop too. I was sitting there an hour after my appointment time, and fiddling my thumbs watching the videos of ‘Incredible India’ play over and over again. The guy at the counter before me was waving his hand impressively and making a lot of noisy gestures. I could not hear him of course(I preferred the music). There is something hypnotizing about those videos like ‘Mile Sur Mera Tumhara’.

My stomach gave a threatening rumble before I finally washed up in front of the clerk (Are they still called that?). She looked peeved. Maybe the guy before me gave her nicely, I thought. She rummaged through my stack of documents for a minute and then said she could not help me because we required another form with notarized signatures of all players in the game. I gurgled and tried asking if my signature alone would do. She shook her head firmly – It was a no-go.

My stomach squeezed itself with hunger, and I thought to myself savagely that now is the time for all loud men and women to come to the party and ‘give everyone nicely’: I wondered if Mr. Hippoceres would lend his services.

“Hello! May I speak to the Hippoceres Giving-It-Nicely Service please?”

“Yes Ma’am. Who would you like to give it nicely to today?”

Saudade for The Buried Giant

Every once in a while, there appears a piece of work so misty in its form, that you are forced to use your imagination rather more than you are used to, in order to fill in the gaps. To be scatter-brained and write like that is easy. It is natural. But to deliberately write about a mist clouding your memories, in a vague voice, while not losing your reader, is hard. It is what Kazuo Ishiguro managed in The Buried Giant.

The story makes you meander through the English countryside, centuries in the past, with a couple looking for their son. The land is filled with a mist which makes people lose their memories and live in a sort of vague, uneasy manner. A dragon is the cause for all this mist. The story gently nudges the readers towards varied levels of discovery as the mist clears in places, like little rays of sunshine sparkling through the clouds.

The couple is looking for their lost son and hoping that his reception of them would be as warm as they want it to be. It is beautiful when a single word can capture all that: Saudade

Saudade: a feeling, a longing for something or some event that one is fond of, which is gone, but might return in a distant future

It brought about the question of what we are without our memories. I had the same disorienting feeling when I read about a novel about a virile, active person who was diagnosed with early-onset Alzheimer’s. How aspects of her life went up as wisps of cloud.

It is our future that is often clouded in mist. Our future that we try to hurtle towards – doing things we believe in, and trying to piece it together based on random skills and interests in our present. We try to un-fog the future doing the best we can in the present and hope that it will be helpful in the future.

As I was reading The Buried Giant, I found myself wondering whether we have a complete knowledge of the past. Our past. Our memories comprise our past, which means that our past is blemished by our reactions to the events. What we see are our flavors over the years. People who are nostalgic for the most part, are those who have associated positive emotions with most of their memories. Choosing to enjoy the company of the happy ones over the less happy ones.

Could the same principle be applied for the future? Or the present for that matter? Maybe it could. Can we choose a happy flavor while living in our present, so that we can color our past happy, when we look at it from the future?

P.S: After this book, I sorely need a light, easy read.

Edit a few days afterward: I read this article about the ability of time and wanted to update the link in this post: https://www.brainpickings.org/2014/07/01/mental-time-travel-dan-falk/

The Art of Map-Reading

Vancouver is right across the U.S. border on the Canadian side, but rum, how it gave us a unique experience, just by not having access to our cell phones while out and about there. I’ve written about how our generation’s boon and bane is the smart-phone.

The simplest of things can bring on a pang on nostalgia. For instance, free Wi-Fi was not as easy to come by, and the first thing the husband did was pop into a store to buy a good old fashioned paper map of Vancouver and its surrounding areas. He was thrilled with this map and reveled in the joy of looking up routes, and roads. I was thrilled that he could not badger me to see if the traffic up ahead is red, or yellow, (2nd paragraph here) and could peacefully drink in the beautiful scenery.

While there, the daughter sat up front while her father drove and gibbered away at his ear.

It was time to figure out the best way to go from Point A to Point B and the task fell on the daughter. “I am no good at directions!” she moaned, but it held no water. With Privilege Comes Responsibility, we said and shoved the map in her hands. Her reaction was one her 16 year old self would have approved of.

We are all creatures of habit in some ways. I remember one time sitting for a Mathematics paper in school, only to find that the question paper drew a right angled triangle upside down. We are all used to seeing the right-angle in the ‘L’ position, so when drawn in the ‘7’ position, it required re-orientation and I chuckled at how our brain gets befuddled for a moment before acquainting itself to recognize a familiar Pythagorus problem.

Why drag poor Pythagorus into a post on Vancouver musings? I’ll tell you. Whilst on our vacation, we went to a lighthouse. Just a whim. Lighthouses have a way of looking welcoming to folks a-visiting and we made a beeline for it. This one let us climb a rickety staircase to the top and see a non-functioning light. Obviously, this excited the children to no-end and they took us on guided tours up the rickety stairs exhorting us like we were 82 year olds with a wobbly sense of balance.
* Step sideways! *
* Hold on to the railing! *
* Careful, you can fall down all the way down from here. *
I must say my 82 year old self would have been happy at the care and consideration.

Lighthouse : image Source: commons.wikimedia.org through Google Search

Inside the lighthouse, there was a museum of sorts downstairs and the caretaker inside was itching to talk to somebody. It was a glorious summer day outside and no one had bothered to come inside the lighthouse. He must have had a morose sort of day being couped up inside when folks outside were flying kites, running, jumping, climbing up slopes while letting the sea breeze rustle their hair. So, when we went in, he let loose a torrent that would have had his lighthouse forbearers proud. He told us about the different frequency lights, and the size of the lanterns, how far away they could be seen and on and on he went. My friends and I were reduced to “Hmm”-ing and “Aah”-ing. When he drew breath, we could say, “That sounds marvelous.” but nothing else.. He spoke to us about the different types of lights used in the days of yore and how the current lighthouse is not functional. A small voice in my head went off: If it is not currently functional, why have this poor man sit here and do nothing? I was not left to ponder on these thoughts for very long, for the sail winds had deposited me in front of a wall. The wall had a large map and on this map, the poor man pointed out three spots that formed a sort of triangle among lighthouses.

Thus far in the proceedings, I could not be classified as anything but blasé. I had been a polite head nodder and took in little of substance. I could not, for instance, hold fort at a lighthouse if the demand arose, in spite of the extensive information I had been given by the kind man. Yet, the map shook me. You see, the lighthouses seemed to be in a triangle, and what was worse, it seemed to be overlooking land. But that could not be right, since we were on an island.
“So, anyone trying to attack the Puget sound…” he went on, but I was not listening.
I stopped him, ”So, were there any land-based attacks?” I asked still fogged. I had to get to the bottom of this mystery.
“No…no. This was a Naval Base, and as such designed to protect us from attacks from the Waters.”
“So, when you say this was a Naval base and there could be attacks from the bay, how could these lighthouses have detected them?” I asked him totally unable to understand the whole thing.

The poor man. If he had had a day where people were agog at his work, he would have swept me out to sea then and there. But as it was, I was the only person who had shown the remotest interest and he sighed a bit and then adopted a kindly tone that was at once slower and louder. “You see this? “ he said waving his hand at the map. “This is one point in the triangle, and this is the second and this is the third. Only three points in a triangle.”

“Yes. I see the triangle.” I said stung.
“Good! Yes, so you see the Russians could not get to us.”

“But this is an island, right? How would the Russians coming on land be detected by the lighthouse?”

I could feel my friends inch away from me a bit. But I was intrigued now and nothing, not even looking like a fool, could stop me now. The man at the lighthouse mopped his brow. (It was a hot day), and tried explaining yet again. He had learnt his script by heart and had, apparently, not yet taken the Daft Questions Training. He simply repeated the whole thing. It was when he reached the great part this erstwhile lighthouse had done to protect the shores of this great land that I figured out something.

“Wait a minute! What is that brown patch? Is that the Puget Sound?”
“Yes it is. You see there is point #1 of the triangle, and there is point #2…”
I stopped the man mid-sentence and beamed at him. “No need to explain anymore my dear man! I have understood all! “ I told him. He beamed at me, thinking to himself that that script must be marvelous and that he only needs to repeat it multiple times everyday and all his problems and of those visiting his lighthouse would be solved.

We all know Land is depicted in Brown color, who depicts Water in Brown? I flashed back to this and narrated it to general hilarity in the car, and assured the daughter that she could not fail, and that if she tried hard enough, she could ensure we stayed on land and not plunge into the ocean near Vancouver.

There is something about humor that acts as a stimulant. She sat there figuring out which street we were on and by that finding out which road we needed to get onto and got us there without dragging us through the city unnecessarily. Which is more than can be said for some people who cannot bear to see the traffic back up for more than 2 minutes.

The Climax – Part 3

I had left folks off on a cliff hanger in the last post(The Lure of Fernweh & Veg..) We had arrived, with ample time left to eat a hearty evening snack, at the airport from which to fly towards Seattle. We were told by the crew, that forgot how to smile, that we had come to the wrong airport. Our flight, was to leave not from Oakland airport, but from San Jose at the same time, said one of the crew and the pair of them at the desk scowled.

I never knew what people meant when they said they were struck dumb. I now know.

On hot days, inside the brain, it feels like ice cream is melting and spilling over into the Broca’s area commonly known as the left frontal lobe.
Weather Forecast in Brain: Snow avalanche

The Broca’s area is the part of the brain that controls speech and having melted ice-cream over it renders cohesive speech delivery impossible. All that is manifest on the face is an advanced level of ogling, noisy gulping and impressive eyes opened in wide disbelief. Some people can then say, “Eh?”, but most like me, just continue with the ogling, g-ping and eye-strengthening exercises.

About a minute later, I found my voice. “What? I mean how? How could Alaskan Air send the flight notifications for Oakland then?”

The husband, was having a pretty tough time reigning in his Broca’s area too, but he coerced his left frontal lobe into speech. “I set up the alerting. I mean, we are flying back from Seattle to Oakland, so I must’ve gotten confused. The flights from San Jose and Oakland are at the same time remember?” he said.

“Well, the airport is pretty empty, so the flights must be quite empty too, who not ask them if they can put us on the flight from here?” I asked simply. It was a reasonable request I thought, but the flight crew taking in our plight did not seem to think so.

“We cannot do that. Call the reservations number. There is a 1-800 number on the website.” she said petulantly, like we were badly behaved, very naughty children, making mischief for her by arriving at the wrong airport. I could have told her that playing games with her apparently absent sense of humor was not exactly my idea of a vacation. But something about her face and mine, made the husband step in. Using his omniscient diplomacy, he held my hand. He had sensed the loosening of my left frontal lobe and he knew, it would be quick in making up lost time. His hand held back that sharp rebuke hovering near the tongue. He then asked her, politely, if there was anything at all that could be done, and she said “No.” (I mean there wasn’t even the perfunctory ‘sorry’ that most crew members throw in without meaning it.)

The husband tried yet again, “If there is a change fee or something, I can pay it here. “
“No. Please call 1-800 line Sir.”
“You cannot do anything?”
“No.”
There was no denying it. Alaskan Air had missed a golden customer service opportunity. For, we are easily appeasable folks and would have gladly taken any help they could have given us.

We had flown Southwest Airlines before and though, this was a first when it came to airport bloomers, there have been many occasions when we have arrived early and had been delighted to find that Southwest could accommodate us on an earlier flight, or on a later flight if the security lines were horrendous, and we would have a mad rush getting to the gate on time. Every time, their proactive customer service was exemplary and better yet, unceremonious: It was handled by the crew checking or printing out your boarding pass.

Why then was this so difficult? Maybe, that is why Southwest was exemplary, because it was out of the ordinary.

http://www.brainpickings.org/2014/02/05/oliver-burkeman-antidote-plans-uncertainty/

But, of course, life is in the uncertainties and given that there was no help forthcoming from the airline staff, the husband called the 1-800 line and was listening to some music on their hold line. A thought struck me as I checked my watch: there were another 35 minutes in which to make it to San Jose if we caught a cab quick enough from here. The drive time at current traffic rates showed 40 minutes.

Time for a climax nourishncherish household! Time for a climax.

Say what you will, during moments like this, some people, like the flight crew above make you want to throw your hands up in despair; while some others make you want to congratulate their attitude and spirit. It just goes to prove that attitude is everything. Intelligence, rank, position and everything else seems secondary. The taxi driver arrived and within moments had the situ. surmised.

Here was a man who was determined, and sorry for us. He caught the high occupancy lane and concentrated rigorously enough to get us to the San Jose gate at 6:10 p.m. The flight was at 6:55 p.m. San Jose airport was empty too. We tumbled through security, raced past the terminals and ran into the aircraft. Then, we stood around choosing convenient spots in a half filled aircraft, and taking deep breaths, before giving ourselves congratulatory high-fives. The children were marvelous throughout the adventure and we made it. Just about.

Before switching off my phone for take-off, I checked Facebook. The results of the Vegetable Quiz were out. It turned out to be Cauliflower Paneer and Vegetable Biriyani with this helpful photograph to tide us over.

vegetable pulao — vegetable biryani with cauliflower pulao

http://www.iflscience.com/health-and-medicine/science-hangry-or-why-some-people-get-grumpy-when-they-re-hungry

We are not angels. Neither are we yogis. I found myself irascible. We had not had time to buy food, we had barely time to catch the flight. This photograph was too much.

Weather Bulletin in Tummy: Strong thunder storm.

I weakly waited for water, while my stomach rumbled loudly and frequently. The flight crew handed me 36 ml to sprinkle into the thunderstorm.

“If we had stopped at their house on the way, we could have had that excellent biriyani and paneer!”, said the husband and I moaned.

Weather Bulletin in Tummy: Hailstones & mild rain
The tiny packets of airline honey roasted peanuts landed like hailstones and more water rained down.

We bought a cheese platter from the crew, and waited. In our hungry minds, the fruit & cheese platter grew in dimensions. There were water melons jostling with grapes, and blueberries were complaining about the lack of space. The oranges tried to mediate the fracas, but got hit by the cantaloupes. The cheese just tried to get in wherever it could. The platter came, and well….see for yourselves:

By the time we landed in Seattle, the hunger pangs had quietened down somewhat, apparently given up on the idea of anything substantial.

That is why our hosts at Seattle saw us demolish the food laid out on the table like that. I always enjoy my friends’ hospitality, and the meal was doubly enjoyable given the circumstances. There was only munching for the first 10 minutes. Then, we sighed contentedly and gave them the lowdown of our journey there and they were suitably impressed.

The after dinner fruit platter showed us what fruit platters should look like and we retired happily to start our short vacation in Seattle & Vancouver.

The Lure of (Fernweh & Vegetable Quizzes)

In my last post, I set up the mood and setting for what it feels like prior to starting off on a vacation. We are smitten by Fernweh every now and then. https://nourishncherish.wordpress.com/2015/07/16/the-eye-of-the-storm-televisions-other-things/

I participate in the enjoyable task of selecting a vacationing spot, and then graciously withdraw from the actual booking. The days leading up to the vacation, I spend drooling on the side trying to determine spots of interest, planning our days there and so on. As the vacation nears, I am all in, plunging my oars into the waters, packing, repacking and running around till the last minute. In short, like this: Tea please!

The husband, in the meanwhile, after my gracious bowing out, makes a pleasurable study of options available for our vacation. I am grateful that all the research is now online. I cannot imagine how a paper trail of booking a vacation would grate at my nerves. Starting with the ticket booking, he will find everything that is in the databases of all travel sites and airlines. He will have, at the tip of his hands, enough irrelevant information to fill a miniature book.

He knows better than to regale his process with me, for I have picked up a tip or two from my mother’s technique of shrieking with agony. When he started the last trip, the filtered down version of 62 pages worth of travel information was:

Flight Departures:
Oakland to Seattle at 6:55 p.m.
Available Airlines: Alaskan, South West

San Jose to Seattle at 6:55 p.m.
Available Airlines: Alaskan, South West

San Francisco to Seattle at 6:25 p.m.
Available Airlines: Alaskan, South West

Home to San Jose: 25 minutes
Home to Oakland: 30 minutes in the opposite direction
Home to San Francisco: 50 minutes
San Jose to Oakland : 45 minutes (You need some apparently useless information given too!)
Oakland to San Francisco (this is where you use S-with-A)

Return tickets:
Seattle to San Jose at 5:05 p.m.
Available Airlines: Alaskan, South West
Seattle to Oakland at 3:05 p.m.
Available Airlines: Alaskan, South West

He did try to add another destination & airline to the mix, but I employed S-with-A and vetoed the idea.

With me so far? The day of the trip dawned, and all day long, flight notifications buzzed reminding us of our upcoming trip with Alaskan Airlines from Oakland to Seattle at 6:55 p.m. (I set up notifications so we will be absolutely sure we will get there on time, said the husband looking very proud of himself.)

Flight notification: Flight is on time.

In between all this, there was Facebook to check during the day and any intervening minutes we may have had at our disposal, we dithered at this spot on the web. One friend of ours, having done his share of vegetable cutting for the day’s meal, took it upon himself to post pictures of his labors on Facebook.

Flight notification: You may now check in.

On the carnival grounds of Facebook, however, the picture of the vegetables was garnering interest. People poured in with their compliments on a job well done, and wondered what his wife must have done to deserve as able a helper as him. With vegetables like that, it was expressed, that any dish could be a success. His innocuous picture had turned into a sort of an online quiz as to what the dish was. I did wonder how a person so intent on cutting to specifications, did so without finding out so much as the dish name, towards which his labors were contributing. Maybe, that is the bane of all of us who contribute to projects without fully comprehending the greatness it can help unleash, I thought to myself philosophically. (There were no doubts, this was heading towards a great dish)

Flight notification: It maybe a good idea to leave.

We piled into the taxi and left in what was termed a comfortable span of time. The taxi ride inched us closer to the airport and the online quiz inched closer too. The latest hint was that paneer was involved. The answers made the stomach rumble when people, somewhat insensitively, bunged in Chinese Noodles and Vegetable Biriyani. Our own fare that afternoon had been slim pickings for I had gone in for the left-over technique, so as to leave an empty fridge while we were away.

We reached with the bags, ruts and tots at Oakland airport. After bidding our taxi good-bye we entered an almost empty airport and washed up in front of the grumpiest crew on duty. Maybe, they too were hungry, I thought to myself charitably. It was after all, inching towards the evening coffee time.

Flight Notification: You should now pack up and leave, or things could get sticky.

Ha! We are already at the airport – take that Flight Notification! I thought grimly. It is rare that we are in positions of ample time to kill, and I was thinking of hitting a good eatery once past the security check gates. All that face booking and quizzing and vegetable-guessing had me jotted down firmly in the ‘hungry’ category.

Imagine our shock then, when the crew that did not know how to smile, said our flight left, not from Oakland, but from San Jose at 6:55 p.m.

I never knew what people meant when they said they were struck dumb. I now know.

To be continued….

The Eye of the Storm, Televisions & Other Things

Update: This article was published in The Hindu Open Page dated 20th May 2018.

Watch me while I tilt my head to a 45 degree angle, glaze my eyes and yank you through a storm. We will have to rekindle some childhood memories. Let’s give it a good two or three decades shall we? Good.

Event: To buy a television.

Life has always had its share of amusement and drama, primarily because of the characters in it. When I look around in my life, there are very few placid characters. I have the boisterous ones, the catch-life-by-horns-and-dance-till-dizzy ones, the energetic ones, the sort of people who make observations that make you laugh or admire the speed of the repartee, but seldom dull.

Most households, for example, after deciding to buy a television would take the money available, go to a store and buy one. Mine, on the other hand, well read on.

After making the easy decision of wanting to buy a television, the drama would begin to unfold like a small storm whose eye is coming slowly and surely towards your home. Gaining in strength and fury.

It would all start disarmingly simply. The father would aimlessly drop into an Electronics store to see the different models available. Then, slowly, he would inundate the house with pamphlets from different stores, price comparisons, model evaluations, and cut-outs of advertisements from newspapers and magazines. Anything that had anything about a television: Philips and Samsung would jostle with Dyanora and Whatever-else.

The glossy pamphlets would pile themselves on the tables, couches and side-tables for weeks. All visitors to the home could not miss the mess, and within days the whole community knew that a television purchase was imminent in the home. We lived in a small hillside community where everyone knew everybody else. So, of course, every body weighed in with their advice. There is a certain joy in knowing that people are concerned about you and your doings, and we enjoyed it for the most part.

Storm Status: Brewing and gaining in force. Now visible over horizon.

Of course, every time somebody walked in, we would be embarrassed and apologize for the mess, but it did not bother the father. He was rather pleased with his research and freely boasted about the pains he took in stewing the house with this garbage. “Everybody’s house is like that!” he would say airily when accosted and things would go on.

Storm Status: Momentum building up. Eye of the Storm approaching.

People (read my mother) wanting to sit on the couch at the end of a long day would first have to bite down the sharp words that rise at having no seat available, and then shove all the pamphlets onto the floor before sitting. This was the physical aspect of it. The emotional aspect of it was worse: you see the father was so carried away by his own researches that he would regale all features with gusto at the dinner table or over coffee. CRT tubes, antennae size, screen size and voltage stabilizers, was served with cake and coffee to visitors and family alike.

After a few weeks of this agony, the roof would lift off with the mother’s shrieking, because she can’t bear the mess and the talk surrounding televisions any more.

Storm Status: In the Eye.

To this hair-shrieking response, the father would calmly ask his beloved why she was getting tense, and that she must learn to relax and enjoy the process. Asking somebody to relax while not making any change to the circumstances can be a tricky thing to do. It is an interesting social experiment well worth observing from a distance. I would strongly advocate it.

Storm Status: Spent.

Then, as if nothing had happened, he would head out one day to buy onions and come back with a color television. To quizzical looks from family and friends, he would unveil with a flourish, a brand he has never researched or heard reviews about before. He would have just fallen for the salesperson’s glibbity. Even though, the television matched none of his carefully researched specifications over the past weeks, we were all glad to have the thing done with, and settled in to have a good time with it.

Storm status: Passed.

Take a deep breath and come back to the present.

That’s approximately how the husband books a vacation.

Buddha in a Lotus

International Yoga Day is approaching and consequently there was an intense discussion amongst our diverse group, that involved yours truly foraging in the murky forests of my Indian-not-at-all-devout-Hindu upbringing and serving up dubious explanations. As we leaped and scoured the real and mythical worlds alike, the venerated Vanars would have been proud to see us. We started with lofty enough topics, but ended up – well, see for yourself where we ended up.

The discussion started with Yoga-in-the-park for International Yoga Day. Why must it be so early? said a colleague and I sympathized. Regular readers of this blog know that I am not at my brightest in the mornings. I am best left alone to peek out from behind my coffee and quickly pull myself back into the cup, peek from the c., pull back in, and then slowly, like a snail, venture out into the world.

I deplored the state of affairs in India and how we deify the early-riser and leave the poor late-risers feeling somewhat inferior and catching up with the early-risers for the rest of the day. We traipsed around early morning rituals and temples and why meditation in the first place.

Just as I was patting my back on the spiritual plane the discussion could reach from the lofty stepping stone of Yoga, it slid straight down the slide to idlis, dosas & sambhar. It was like playing Snakes & Ladders in the thick Madhuban forests, I tell you. From the spices of the foods, it was but a natural stop at yogurt.

After moving to the USA, I like flavored yogurts such as strawberry or apricot yogurt, but I also told them about the slurpilicious plain-yogurt and rice. There was a sticky moment when folks could not see the appeal of plain yogurt against the Apricot yogurt, but I scored a goal by bringing up mango pickles.

When you bring yogurt and rice up to a South Indian at lunch-time, she can’t but help talking of mango pickles. Other colleagues of Asian origin chimed in with durian and jackfruits, and we all sighed collectively at the exotic fruits and tropical vegetables of the East. Some bright person then said something about lotus roots and another said that Buddha sits in a lotus.

Spiritual-plane-wise, we were getting back up from the hard fall into dosa, sambhar and curd rice territory, so I felt I had to wade in.

“For some reason, the lotus holds a special place in Indian Mythology”, I said.

I turned and looked at the awed expressions on my co-conversationalists, and this gave me the confidence to plunge on. It is a knack. When people expect something profound from me, as if they are making up their mind to see whether or not I am intelligent, I say something like this and dash all hopes.

“Most goddesses I know like to sit in one. Although the lotuses I have seen are pretty small – I don’t know how goddesses sit comfortably in them. “

“Really? Goddesses sit in lotus too? I don’t know much – I have seen some pictures of Indian Goddesses, but never saw that – maybe hard to make out from the saree and all, but Buddha I know.” said a colleague who has taken the Myth of the Mystical East to heart.

I summoned up the picture of Saraswathi and Lakshmi in my visual eye. I don’t remember seeing their saree flowing over their lotus seat. I mean, they were caparisoned in beautiful garments and jewelry, but the lotus was apparent too. I have never seen the saree flowing all over the lotus hiding it from view. Have you?

Somewhat befuddled, I prodded on. “No, I am pretty sure the Goddesses sit in lotuses. I do remember seeing some stylistics paintings of Buddha in a lotus, but mostly he is under a Bodhi tree, looking happy, right?”

This must have been interesting to watch, if it wasn’t me, sinking deeper and deeper into the mire. Anyway, neither of us backed down, and both of us were equally sure of our lotus occupants. The birds stopped twittering to watch the great philosophical debate. Apricot yogurt or plain yogurt with rice: Which one would emerge the victor?

“Really? I don’t know. I have always seen Buddha in Lotus Asana – except for some statues in Pier 1 Imports, of him lying down.” said she.

Wait a minute. I knew what was going on. I observed, deduced and felt that faint feeling of relief and comprehension dawn on me and the birds twittered again. I asked, “You mean the yoga posture Buddha sits in? Lotus Asana?”

“Yes! Isn’t that what you have been talking about? “

“Oh when you said you couldn’t make out the lotus in the Goddesses, you meant, you couldn’t make out whether their legs were truly crossed in Lotus Asana with the saree and all that?”

“Yeah.”

And then, I laughed as I told her that I was talking about the seat in which the goddesses sat, although, I conceded they may have been sitting in lotus asana too.

So, both of us were right. You can have apricot yogurt or plain-old-curd-rice-with-mango-pickle. Yes, in the Lotus Asana, if you like.

Maybe that will remind us to be truly humble while talking of Lotuses or anything else. We are, after all, a fraction of the small blue dot in the Cosmos, like Carl Sagan said.

http://www.brainpickings.org/2012/12/10/pale-blue-dot-motion-graphics/

Now, if you will excuse me,I need to practice my half-lotus position for International Yoga Day.

Divine Intervention of the Gardening Gods

If there is a Gardening God, I am curious to see where he would grade me on various aspects of his or her domain. I think he would view me like a benevolent, brilliant professor regards his loyal, funny but idiot pupil. ‘See thee down there’, he shall boom to his godlings, ‘there goeth the very example of exemplary gardening intent. If ever you want to know how to admire a fallen leaf, thou can gaze down at her. She and her progeny are always bending or squatting and looking at something marvelous. Sometimes, when I am bored, I send out the snails to see the enthusiasm thee here summoneth up. But send her lobelia, geraniums, petunia, primroses and violets together, and she will still, after all those years, not be able to tell you the difference.’

“If you pusheth me, I may give her a pass with the planning, but will send to Earthly Exile the next godling who suggests she gardens well. “ This is where he shakes his head and the clouds above spatter a few drops of rain on the Earth below, and the parched trees in my backyard gulp and send thanks to the Gods above, for I forgot to water them for a few days.

Why, you ask, do you assume that a Gardening God talks like someone escaped out of a badly written 17th century book? I don’t know – in my mind, this gardening god looks like a gnome with a long flowing beard, a brown hat that looks like an upturned nest, a booming voice and language like he was happy to not be written into one of Shakespeare’s books.

Anyway, back to the point of our garden. Very near our backyard is a marvelous tree. Home to thousands of leaves, hundreds of twigs and branches, and scores of birds and squirrels, this tree offers shade and respite to a person who wishes for a few quiet moments. But every time the tree so much as shivers or flutters in the breeze, it sends ten thousand leaves straight to the narrow strip of garden in my backyard.

This is where the ex. intent plays its trump card: I declare, rather grandly for one who has failed at this task for almost a decade, that I shall gather up the leaves and have a clean backyard. I say this vehemently for a week or so, as though the sheer force behind the voice will collect, bag and compost the leaves. When that plan fails, I wait to see if anyone in the house will be gallant enough to say, “No, no. You rest. I shall shovel and clean the backyard.” But of course, everybody in the house is too wise for that. This is when I start shamelessly sighing and dropping “hints”.

Ahh! I wish I can do those leaves, but these allergies of mine, they just don’t let up you know. AAAACCHOOO!

Nothing. A brief silence and then I hear the jarring song to which the husband and children are dancing rise in volume by a few decibels. This goes on for another few weeks, by which time the sycamore tree’s leaves have figured out that the best place to fall is our backyard because they don’t have to flutter on to hard earth anymore and can simply cushion their fall on their already fallen brethren.

Next up: I try the guilt-tripping with the make-it-a-jolly-family-activity technique.

Rake, rake rake your way merrily through the leaves. I sing as I rake. (The Lyrical God joins the Gardening one above and they observe the specimen below to see where they went wrong with this model)

I manage to pile up the leaves with my enthusiastic, but equally unskilled helpers, the children, when the sneezing starts. But of course, I don’t stop and soldier on. The husband is tactfully finding himself outside tasks to do – service the car, go to the bank, grocery shopping, clean the rooftop. Anything at all but gardening.

At the end of it all, the day is ripe and getting on. There is a huge pile of leaves, weeds tumbling over one another all over the backyard waiting to be removed, no lunch, three cups of tea and sneezing enough to rattle a herd of elephants. Meanwhile, the wind hears about the gardening action in our backyard and comes a-howling. The leaves spatter yet again and I curse using some very imaginative phrases, making the toddler look up in alarm and say, “Stupid is a bad word!”

By this time of course, everybody is fed up with me and will gladly let me dangle like a wind-chime on the apricot tree. Enough, I say to myself and make a call to the kind soul who helps out every once in a while. This narrow strip of garden is home to some trees, a jasmine creeper and some flower bushes. The gardener makes it generally known that he is doing it solely because he views it as acquiring some good karma: Help thy helpless, share thy green thumb or some such.

He comes with his pal in his pickup truck, and I kid you not: the pair of them clean up, de-weed, plant new flowers, prune the roses and hose down the garden leaving the patch looking beautiful and well-nourished in about an hour.

I think it is divine intervention: for how long can even the most tolerant Gardening God behold our garden’s plight?

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