Pinku-Enchanted Life

Dreams those wispy things much like our souls that run everything and yet you can’t put a finger on them. Touch them you can’t, forget them you can’t, hold them you can’t and yet they form and they also shatter. I know this sounds melodramatic but every time I have dared to dream, fate has had other plans. I can tell you I have worked really hard to ensure that my dreams are guarded against strong winds and the hot sun…that they have a cool and comfortable place to stay in, grow in and yet, yet each time they have got bruised and then broken. My last dream was one made of music, soft candle lights, cakes, coffee, red roses & tube roses and the nargis in winters. It was made of port wine, sea shells, mountain air, rhymes, films, books and long conversations that lasted through the night. That dream lies shattered now. I don’t have the luxury of sitting with the bits and crying so I move on. But as I walk the shards enter my feet and scratch my heart. This last dream ...

December has been a busy month for me. Training session in Ahmedabad, business trip to Kolkata, work pressures and home in a bit of chaos thanks to the regular maid being on leave and mom in law not doing too well. In the midst of this came our 5th year anniversary and also the partner's birthday. Each trip, each occasion made me want to write a few words on the blog.....mark it for posterity so to speak. And yet it didn't happen. There was a time when the blog used to be my bestest friend, my confidante . Now I dont have the time to come back to it even when I want to. Things change, not always for the better but we have to accept that change and we have to move on. This is life. I had made it a practice to always at an year end jot down a list of things I would want to do in the coming year. This year even that inclination is not there. I am planning to take each day as it comes. I am planning to enjoy the small joys. I am planning to blog less,...

I told my Mom that she need not worry while I went out for a three day trip with college mates and she replied “wait till you are a mom” I objected to her objecting about my late night partying and she said “wait till you are a mom” On the basis of a good interview I decide to move to Bombay and tell her that she need not worry for me, she replied “wait till you are a mom” And then finally on 24 th Feb 2011 I became a Mom. The tiny little red bundle with big eyes and a crop of shockingly black curly hair was all mine. My home production as I fondly called her. I was half proud, half awed and half intrigued by this thing that came out of me and yet was a complete thing in its own right. My pact with my Mom had been that I would carry the baby for nine months and then go back to my job and career while she was responsible for the baby. She had agreed and we had planned the baby. I went back to work within two months of the baby being born. She was too youn...

Old sayings abound of how the ordinary and the mundane are ignored for the more exotic until that day when suddenly they disappear from your life. And that’s when you stop, look around and then get into acute agony over the loss. Recently I have had two such incidents which brought this fact home to me. The first was sudden loss of hearing in my right ear soon after my flight took off from Bangalore. I was travelling on work and alone and having my hearing reduced by half and me trying to lip read and second guessing people feels funny now but then it was quite an ordeal. In Delhi I waited for a couple of days hoping the blockage would go off on its own. It didn’t and then a visit to an ENT specialist gave the scary news of fluid buildup inside my ear drums which if medicines didn’t help might need surgery also. Suddenly something which till now I had laughed off as a stupid irritant grew to worrying proportions. As the medicines continued for the next two weeks I suffered f...

The virtual world has given me many friends. Some whom I have met and others who continue to hold my hand and heart over internet connections. Most of my virtual friends came through blogging. Years back when I first started penning down my thoughts on this blog and someone would come along and empathize, criticize or generally comment. My happiness and thrill knew no bounds. With time some of those visitors became friends and while writing you almost wrote for them. You knew which line would elicit a smile from whom, you also knew which friend would frown and tell you to take a re-look at whatever it was you were discussing. Not meeting these people, never seeing them didnt dampen spirits at all. Infact the fact that they were faceless, distant at time gave you the courage to discuss many a n intimate issue you would rather not discuss with real friends for fear of being judged or worse still bitched about in the immediate circle. Over the years I have had the chance to meet ...

A trip to Oh! Calcutta  is usually greeted with a lot of enthusiasm by the team at work. So today was no different when on a whim I asked a colleague to join me for lunch at the Nehru Place restaurant.   Oh Calcutta the specialty restaurant with multiple awards won over many years is a name that almost all gourmets in the city recognize instantly. We walked in hoping, nay assuming that good times lay ahead of us. A hilsa /eelish festival was on there,though we didnt see anyone ordering the same. Most patrons chose to stay with the buffet spread and having had decent food the past few times, we too chose to stay with it too. I tried the Dal shorba and found that while it was nice - it did taste suspiciously close to the kind of dal we have at home with alu bhaaja and saada bhaat  (rice). They also had alu matar tikis and chicken cutlets for starters.we tried the cutlets - they were ok - just about. The main course had fish pa...

The bangla word for a relative is aatiyon . What it really means is someone who is close to your aatma, your soul. Someone with whom you feel a sense of solidarity, wholeness. Pishi, my father in law's eldest sister was someone I heard about a lot through stories relayed by my in laws and husband long before I had the chance to meet her in person. I also tasted some of her awesome cooking from the portions she would thoughtfully bring across for her brother whenever she visited. My first introduction to her happened about three years ago, when finally my father in law chose to tell her about my existence. It was a moment which I had both dreaded and anticipated equally. Comparisons, remarks, judgement all of it would have been natural and to be expected. Yet the complete openness and ease with which Pishi met me allayed my misgivings and gave her a special place in my heart, for keeps. My subsequent visits to her place on various occasions only helped streng...