Rajmata Gayatri Devi, RIP

 

She had been named one of the ten most beautiful women in the world by TIME magazine but that was not when I saw her. I saw her when her elegantly coiffed hair was a helmet of silver, those doe eyes had got hooded over with folds of skin, her porcelain skin had wrinkled gently into comfort and spotted with unforgiving years, but vestiges of the beauty were evident to everyone in the crowded venue at the five star hotel in Mumbai where the royalty of Rajasthan and the rest of India had gathered for an event. I was there, of course, in my capacity as a lowly hack sent to cover the event. I could only stare at her open mouthed. She outshone every single woman in the room, without a fringe of a doubt. And it was not just beauty. It was her presence. She was in a pale pink chiffon with a single strand of pearls, and she outshone every loaded to the gills with jewellery socialite flitting around. Her back was ramrod straight. Her tilting of her chin imperious, yet not arrogant. Her gaze direct and unwavering. It was the gaze of a woman who had lived her life to the fullest, who was aware of her beauty and the effect it had on the onlooker and was unapologetic about it. It was the kind of self assurance that us lesser folk could never even imagine having. It was the kind of assurance that made this, then 24 year old woman squirm and feel totally inadequate, like a gawky teenager straight from the village. But she was gracious with me. A little sharp with those who hovered around too much for her liking or those who asked inane questions. The regality came from within, it didn’t depend on externals of clothing and jewellery, though those too, were understated but impeccable. Her passing is the passing of an era, one feels the same sort of indescribable vacuum one felt when Lady Diana passed away, the feeling that something truly beautiful has gone away and the earth is that much lesser a place for the loss. Here is wishing her a peaceful afterlife.

Touching money is the best painkiller

So says todays TOI. On page 13. The page I turn too after I check the obituries. It has the kind of news that the news papers should be full of. From Page one to Page 24. Or whatever the last page is of the newspaper you read. The Hindustan Times has Life, Universe and Everything, or something of the sort. It used to be the first page I read before I decided to check out the temperature of the previous day gone by and cluck at the oven levels the city had reached.

Today’s page for instance has many articles that I suspect were tailor written for middleaged, overweight women like me to gloat in hope over. Allergy drugs to fight flab, blood sugar, says one article. On the exact opposite side of the page, to balance the happiness I derived from the joyful prospect of popping in allergy medication on the sly to slim down to sylph levels is the little snippet that tells me an iced coffee has more calories than a steak and chips dinner, thereby ruining one of the simplest pleasures of my drab life, namely sitting with friends and gossiping over an iced coffee. Now I know I will stare at said iced coffee and feel sweat beads form on my forehead in the knowledge that Ive knocked down dinner and not even felt satiated enough to pass out into dead sleep. And yet another article talks about an astronaut commenting on how the polar ice caps have shrunk. I so want to see the polar ice caps from space before they shrink altogether. That makes me sad. Ive even done the lasik now so I dont need to wonder where my contact lenses will float off in in zero gravity.

But this header feature, titled Money is the best painkiller drew my eye to it instantly. Especially since them migraine attacks are becoming more severe, longer in duration and more frequent these days. And what is worse, given the run around of the past couple of weeks, I havent even had the luxury of retiring to a darkened closed room, shutting out the world and languishing in my own misery.

The study, the article says, appears in the journal Psychological Science. The results state that thinking about bills paid and touching money affected participants physically and emotionally. They did some tests by having one group count paper and one group count money. The group that counted money were happier and reported less pain when their fingers were dipped in hot water.

I know just what I’m going to do. I’m applying for a job as a cashier. Maybe them damn migraines will disappear with all that counting.

Of medical tests and such like

I am convinced there is a conspiracy out there to draw out all the blood from the members of the Manral family, and have vile blood drinking rituals. Yes, its them simple, sober looking women in lab overcoats, supervised by stern and forbidding looking doctors who supervise the proceedings who are indulging in these heinous acts or perhaps drawing enough supplies to power a jet plane given the way fuel prices are going in this century. In the past two weeks, the child and the spouse have given in toto, enough blood ostensibly for testing, but in reality, and I know it, for a blood bank being created so that aliens from Mars can come down to earth and replicate our DNA and take over our bodies and such like.

Yes. I have also been watching a lot of thrillers over the weekend. Rainy days do this to me. The husband was dragged for his tests on Saturday. He insisted he would go alone and tried to shake me off his foot as I hung on, determined to accompany him. I achieved my goal by some nifty biting of trouser leg and clawing in of nails into denim, ensuring that if he threw me off he would be stripped of trouser in public situation. ECG, the good doc had said. And sonography of abdomen. (Anyone else married to man like mine, who forgets to mention chest pains and sweats, and fainting spells and abdomen aches for months, and only decides to go public when he almost passes out in the loo? Yup. Shall we hire goons for collective bopping on the head for sheer insane negligence. Yup, I thought so. We might get cut price on hire charges too!).  There was I sitting in the waiting room while the good man I married and promised to be by the side of in sickness and in health, clutched his tummy, and was ushered in to be gelled up and electrode strapped and heart beat monitored. I chewed off my nails and spat them discretely into my handkerchief. He emerged by the time I’d reached my knuckles. He barely sat down when they ushered him inside for the ultrasound of the abdomen. He had been asked to overdose on the water to get the bladder full. It was a cold rainy day. The airconditioning in the laboratory was on at full blast. It was not an enviable situation to be in. Much crossing and uncrossing of legs was happening. I mentioned about how the last months of pregnancy were exactly the way he was feeling. I dont think it was an opportune moment to try to lighten the situation. I also mentioned that he would have to get a grip on his inherrent distate of gels and creams being applied to skin. He mentioned it might aggravate the need to hit the washroom or the nearest available deserted wall.

I am a veteran of all sorts of medical tests. I have been scanned, xrayed, probed, poked and such like so often that I am immune to it all now. The husband is still a novice. He needed me around for support I told myself. It didnt help that I jumped on the ECG technician’s back as soon as she emerged out of the room with a strip of readings in her hand yelling loudly, “Show it to me, show it to me.” Yup. I’m also an expert at reading tests and reports. Thankfully, the ECG was normal. Blood tests are normal. (Some alien on Mars is probably injecting himself with the supply as we speak, preparing for a hostile landing on earth and take me to your leader situation). The right kidney is swollen and blocked. Which means we go in for more tests today. And I will accompany the man, no matter how keenly he assures me that he is perfectly able to go get tested on his own. And how he insists I sit at home and supervise the child rather than let the child go haywire on two hours of extra unsupervised television time. Me thinks going for tests with paranoid wife doing prayer beads in the corner of the waiting room is not exactly consonant with macho man image. Okay, I think I will slink in and pretend not to be accompanying him. And not accost the technician for the results immediately, or else, with a concealed under the handkerchief penknife.

Edited to add: Hey Ron, good meeting you. Sorry about my distractedness, I was all caught up with kidney reports and such worst case scenarios.

Of writing a book…

Since an entire busload of bloggers are now Officially Published Authors (including my dear friend Parul, who has written the delightful Bringing Up Vasu, which you must must go right now to a bookstore and buy and read), I’ve been deluged by a slew of mails asking me when a) am I ever going to write a book and b) will I dictate it from the grave.

Knowing meself and my industrious efforts at maximising what needs to be done in a single day, I must confess the latter seems more likely the more I think of it. Maybe, I can set up contact with someone who can see through the veil and have that poor person do some auto-writing while I continue to live my current life as worthlessly as I have done so far.

Seriously though. For one, I am flattered that so many folks think I have a book in me. I dont think I do. I’m like the comic who is good at stand up for a five minute gig but would be hardpressed to impress an audience of dour face business heads for a 10 minute skit. First I sweat. And then my tongue goes dry. And my heart begins the kaboom palpitations. Or the writing equivalent. And then, comes the fact that doing professional reviewing work has rather sucked the joy out of writing, especially when I see such brilliant writing coming out of some newly published authors that I feel like digging my hole, crawling into it and pulling it in after me. Seriously though. I am lazy. Dog (or the female gender of) lazy. I am the writer who sits on a deadline till it is due within the hour and then scurries around in a frothing at the mouth panic until she hammers it off. And never learns from her laziness. I dont have that Very Important Factor which distinguishes great writers from hacks like me, namely Discipline.

The only arena where I possess immense Discipline is that of applying sunblock, washing and cleansing my face at night before slathering on night cream on the mug and foot cream on the extremities and pulling on the socks. Yup, a lady’s got to do what she has to do to ensure that the feet dont give her date of birth away.

As far as writing goes, I barely get any time at the computer that I put to real writing. Blogging yes. That tops the list. Tweeting and facebooking follows. And replying to the incessant emails that float in through the day probably needs an assistant to be hired in order to reply to each.

Enough excuses I think. And enough procrastination. I am now determined to write A Book. And Find A Publisher. (Since, sadly enough, no one is coming shrieking with contracts to be signed and pen aloft in hand towards me). And I must stop Hiding My Light Behind a Bushel. Given that I find that damn bushel behind which I have been supposedly hiding said light. But then Publishers are scary people. They demand manuscripts or at least a couple of chapters and something called a synopsis, which in effect means you need to know where your story is headed, and which given my foresight and astuteness, I clearly never have any clear idea. On most good days, I am lucky to get from Point A to Point B without a clear idea of where I am supposed to be headed, given that invisible threads yank me into coffee shops and shoe stores. And then you have to be strong and emotionally resilient about rejection slips. I sob when my son tells me I drew Batman wrong, so wrong candidate for them rejection slips too. Something just tells me I am so going to not be a published author in this lifetime.

And of course, finding my own voice, not one which channels the great Pelham G Wodehouse. Thats the biggie. Once I find my voice, I think I will start. Put finger to keyboard in earnest. Once I find my voice, and find a story, I will start. I promise, cross my heart and swear to die. Or maybe, once I find my voice, and find a story and find a publisher, I will start. Promise. Scout’s honour. Signed in blood, and such like. Maybe I should first find a publisher and work backwards. Like the features. With the deadline in the same manner. Like yesterday. That might be the only way to actually get a book out of me. And grim faced editors mailing me every hour on the hour to ask about the status of said book might help in accelerating the pace. And an assistant to bring me innumerable cups of coffee. And the spouse to give me a tension headache headmassage. Ah okay. I’m never going to get round to it.

Am back, sort of.

Yes. I am. Sitting at my desk at the office. In front of the computer. Keying away furiously. I have a pile load of deadlines which are long overdue, and no mental bandwidth to get to work. It has been a rough couple of weeks. It started with the child throwing up violently in school, almost passing out and needing to be admitted into a nursing home for dehydration. He came out, went to school and promptly had a seizure in class, throwing the entire school into a tizzy. He was rushed to the ICU at a near by hospital. And there he stayed till the end of this week. And he was discharged, and returned home but is now half his size pre illness, with every rib on full display. And a bad cold came home with him, so one has been babysitting him, terrified that the cold doesnt flare up into a fever again. Yup. And the hairline has greyed up. Overnight. I splashed my face with water in the tiny hospital bathroom and wondered who the crone was in the mirror, before realising it was me. The husband was down too, with stomach upset, aches and sweats. He’s been asked to get a sonography and an ECG done, the thought of which, and the implications of which had me passing out in a cold faint on the floor. I mean, you could tell me I had two days to live and I would be fine. But nothing should touch my son or my man. I hyperventilate. And the man is usually a rock. I’ve never seen him have as much as fever in the almost 20 years we’ve been together. I am scared.

Its not been a nice couple of weeks.

To add to the general maudlin atmosphere is the eerie wind blowing through little slits in the window panes and through bathroom slats like that of a haunted house, the wind has been killing strong. The iron grille of our park area has collapsed. Thankfully no children were swarming around that area at that point. I sometimes fear at night that the wind hitting the glass frames will shatter it and the glass rain down on us sleeping within. In sheer self preservation instinct I find myself sleeping back to the balcony. Covered head to toe with a thick blanket. Turns out I’m not being paranoid, hutments at Versova found their roofs being blown off yesterday, thanks to the gale force winds which have been rattling our eyeballs in their sockets.

I came into work yesterday. Got a call that the child is complaining of severe stomach ache, fled back home. No work got done. He was fine by the time I reached home.

Today is the day of the great high tide in Mumbai, and doom and gloom has been predicted by the BMC Disaster Management Cell, but I did have to come into work. Thankfully, the weather gods are being kind and it is pretty sunny at the moment. I think one should read weather predictions from the met department in the reverse. That is the only logical explanation. Lets hope I get in some constructive work done, apart from updating my blogs, before I run home again.

And yes. I really am so overdue on that bout of mindless shopping.

I’m not a jewellery person

And that’s the barefaced truth. When friends compare the size of their rocks, I edge away from the discussion in shame of having nothing to contribute. The husband too, darling as he is in most cases, last indulged me with jewellery as a surprise gift when the brat was in utero. My jewellery collection is the sort that is apologetic about being in a locker. Of course, the elderly relative buys enough through the year for two people so it evens the score out.
For a while what I have been eyeing is a large oval emerald in a prong setting, with diamonds. I would look at such rings in jewellery ads and sigh deep troubled sighs. I would gently drop hints to the husband on the lines of “I wonder what would be my lucky stone” and he would play his mild deafness card to the hilt. Or go out and buy himself a huge oval blue sapphire set in gold, wear it for a month and then retire it from service last week after it was proved (a breakin and robbery at the office, legal issues and a double hospitalisation of the child, the second time in ICU no less) that all the scary tales surrounding the stone are true. I would continue to look at rings with huge emeralds and rubies and sigh. Until this morning. Visited the mater. Who fishes out a square box. Of a jeweller no less. Surprise, she says, her careworn face breaking into a smile. I open it to find the most gorgeous deep green oval emerald flanked by four diamonds on either side. I collapse in a thud. I revive myself before smelly shoes are pressed into service. I put it on my finger and prance around in demented manner. I stare at my finger in reflections. I feel like the queen of the world. This from a woman who never had more than two small gold studs for most of her life.
You must indulge yourself now, while you have the desire, she said grinning like a Cheshire cat. Ten years later would be too late. Did I tell you folks I have the best mom in the world?

And if you didnt know it…

I am a Kreativ Blogger. So declares Priya Iyer. And who am I to disagree.

(And god help me, I am not able to cut paste the badge here, I should probably find that spoonful of water to drown myself).

Therefore in all humility, and thanking all my family, my parents, who hand held me through immense tantrumming before I found the spouse to take over, the spouse who hand held me through my tantrumming before I discovered the blogs could take over, and the child who took over my tantrumming and has proceeded to live up to the high standards I set, and even better them, and my readers, who continue to read me even on days when I am absolutely sure I have done the equivalent of blogging harakiri and recycled old material like the ageing comic I am, I accept this award and proceed to list out seven things I like. Which I do think is not fair, because what is a life if you have only seven things to like. So I will make my life more complicated and divide it into categories. Say, like seven things I like to do (and I assure you this blog will not dip into PG rated category, though I am sorely tempted to be honest), seven things I like to eat (though strictly speaking eating would be one of the seven things I like to do, right!), seven things I like to wear, you know. Whats life without a little complication?

Here goes:

Seven Things I like to Do:

Read

Sleep

Eat

*unmentionable or will bring the search word brigade*

Shop

Walk

Read

Seven Things I like to Eat

Butter chicken Naan is the current favourite

Tiramisu

Pani Puri

Boiled ground nuts (by the kilo, cracking the shell open)

Any form variety and size of pastry

KFC

Biryani

Seven things I like to wear:

Black

Denim

Wedge Heels

Stilettoes

Make up

Sunglasses

Diamonds

and finally

Seven of my most prized possessions:

• My son
• My hubby
• My mother
• My body in working order
• My sanity
• My ability to laugh at myself
• My belief in another day

And seven friends I would like to pass this award to

Cee Kay

Sue

Chandni

Parul

Aneela

Dotmom

Itchy

Haffun..

Why would…

the most used search terms leading folks to this blog be the following:

Aunty

Aunty in saree

Hot aunty

Mallu aunty

Aunty in Kerala

Pliss to explain. I have no connection with Kerala except that I visited Cochin and Munnar for my honeymoon.  And assorted combinations of the word ‘Aunty’ paired with permutations and combinations that I dont care to repeat on a public blog… I think I have kept this blog squeaky clean thus far and find this very unsettling. No, cross that. I find this puke my gut out disgusting.

All ye who have landed here hoping in the pursuit of such search terms, kindly retrace your steps right now. This is a family blog. Purely U rated. The only thing that sees the most action on this blog is my credit card.

Since I have been a good girl…

…and not shopped for myself in a very very long time (A pair of shoes bought over the last week does not count, of course, what is one measly pair of shoes), I am doing the second best thing I can and am window shopping. Given the fact that it is pouring cats and dogs and a couple of cows outside, the next best thing I can do is to turn to net-a-porter and sigh. And sigh some more. And click. And fill out a wishlist, which, given the current state of brokedom is destined to remain just that, a wishlist. Then I move on to style.com and sigh some more. The amount of sighing emanating from me makes the spouse cast a curious eye on the computer screen.

Having tucked my salivating tongue inside my mouth, I get back to the dour business of trying to earn a living, seeing as I’m not doing much to earn my keep as a kept woman these days. Which is also probably why the husband is looking suspiciously at the computer everytime I sigh deeply. He will probably never understand the twist in the gut that happens each time I gaze on that salmon Marni pump.

The Five Best Things the Spouse has done for me

This is a tag that comes hot of the post by Dipali on her wonderful SRE, and having had the pleasure of meeting the both of them I can safely say a more darling couple would be hard to come by.

And since by the very nature of the title, this requires said tag to be soppy and barf inducing, I put the barf alert notice right up front so those who want to spare themselves the agony of heaving out the contents of their stomach are free to skip this post. Also, I need to touch the husband for a rather heavy emptying out of his wallet in the coming week, so I am hoping this will sort of smooth the way and force him to live up to the reputation I am broadcasting all over the www.

So without much ado, here are the five nicest things my spouse has done for me. And some more.

1] Come with me for every appointment, every scan, every test during my infertility treatment and my pregnancy. Considering he wasnt keen on having any children and I was the one on hormonal wanting overload, I guess he decided he’d better see me through it or I would implode.

2] Not insisting I cook. But then I guess that is not just his niceness, but also his self preservation instincts.

3] Always being there whenever I’ve been stuck in a situation. Riots, power blackouts, floods, you name it, and I’ve been secure in the knowledge that all I need to do is call him and he will come (rather like some superhero without the costume and the cape) and get me home safe and sound.

4] Pampering me. Even when he could ill afford it. He is a generous husband. The best watches, sunglasses, bags, clothes, perfumes, jewellery, he insists on buying them for me. He is not so generous with himself. He buys stuff for himself rarely, but is very giving with me. Truth be told, he is generous with everyone.

5]Always supported me 100 per cent in whatever I’ve chosen to do, whether chuck up jobs, or start anything new, or decide to be a lotus eater, he never says a word. Or maybe he would rather not say a thing and let me make my own mistakes.

And some more:

1] He never notices when I pile on the kilos. Or if he does, he chooses to keep it zipped until I look like I’m ready to be kicked into a goal.

2] He never ever expresses a strong opinion on what I wear or what I do with my hair. Nor does he encourage me not to wear any particular kind of clothes. Any modesty in my dressing is totally self imposed.

3] When I chickened out of driving after a couple of particularly gruesome crashes, he hired a driver.

4] He has unhesitatingly bashed up eveteasers for me. Without being asked to. Way back in the days when we travelled by bus and train. That makes a girl feel really safe.

5] He accompanies me to every doctor’s appointment and surgery still and does the post surgery care to the best of his ability. Post LASIK, he ensured my drops were put in, the eye patches worn every night and no excess eye strain through sitting at the computer or reading done.

6] If I am ever ill (he knows I really am ill when I tuck myself into bed without washing my face, creaming it, and creaming my hands and feet), he takes over the child completely. Feeding, changing, homework, putting to bed.

7] If he hands me over some cash for spending purposes (I am a kept woman, remember), he will never ask me what I spent it on. Or ask me what I need money for. Or be niggardly about handing over some spare dosh when I run out of the greenbacks. Which is ever too often.

8] And he continues to make me feel like the sexiest woman on earth. Despite the triple layers of cellulite, the extra tyres, stretchmarks, balding head, jiggly belly pouch, pigmentation and morning dog breath.

And I tag

Maggie

Rohini

The Mad Momma

Poppins Mom

Cee Kay

Asaan

Get to it, girls.