Bulwark
A blog in 3 to 4 parts - snapshots of the weekend.
We are bonded - bonded for life. We are different. Night and day with a million shades of gray. I bask in attention, especially yours and you stand back and smile. I jump for joy and sulk days away and you balance me out. You give me perspective. I am naive, eager to be pleased and give in to doubts. You weather the storms with solemn grit. You fear for my grace and I for your strength. Everything I learnt, I learnt from, with and around you. You laugh at my foolishness. I am foolish cause I am secure in the knowledge of your presence in my life. In everything I do. I stay a kid in your indulgent shade and I take you back to that carefree life with me. We will always be children.
~
It's amazing how a simple word, sight, sound or smell can trigger off a stream of memories. Like today, as I was in the car with C, I noticed that my lip balm had mango butter. And it smelled a little like it. Mango. Summers in India. Home made mango pickle. The blue and yellow striped, worn bag that Dad would bring mangoes in from the market. The smell of mustard powder. Juicy, full mangoes at the dinner table. Eaten with gusto. Yellow and golden. Sweet. Wonderfully, wickedly delicious. The tiny fibers around the mango seed that got annoyingly stuck in the teeth. Guarding the mango trees at my grandparent's place. This is a fun anecdote. My mom, brother and I would spend our summer vacations at my maternal grand parents' place some years when I was little. Our cousins would be there too. There were a couple of mango trees in the front yard of that house and one summer we had a couple of random kids stealing mangoes from the tree. My grandpa would have none of this. So, us kids - 3 or 4 of us, were convinced to spend hot summer afternoons in the mildly less-hot shade of the trees, on a little cot, guarding the mango trees. I don't remember too much about this other than the fact that it happened, that we did see the boys who were trying to steal the mangoes, that we hollered at them and a vague memory of the prickly, humid heat of the afternoon and the drowsiness that came with it.
~
I have been musing. On still afternoons. On clock ticks. On clean carpets and sharp shadows. On long, lean blinds that cut the light into shafts. On empty vases and water drops on freshly washed dishes. On dust on wood, and sunlight on the dust. On unopened mail and a neatly made bed. On the beauty and peacefulness of a quiet weekend.
~
Happiness is mine. It is the color of turquoise, texture of soft cotton and utterly beautiful.
And with that, I have now completed the rite of passage of womankind - wanting and obtaining an accessory for no real reason.
~
And now to bed where I need to figure out where all that tiredness and sleepiness that overcame me after my 30 min bike ride at the gym and the long drive home has now gone ...
We are bonded - bonded for life. We are different. Night and day with a million shades of gray. I bask in attention, especially yours and you stand back and smile. I jump for joy and sulk days away and you balance me out. You give me perspective. I am naive, eager to be pleased and give in to doubts. You weather the storms with solemn grit. You fear for my grace and I for your strength. Everything I learnt, I learnt from, with and around you. You laugh at my foolishness. I am foolish cause I am secure in the knowledge of your presence in my life. In everything I do. I stay a kid in your indulgent shade and I take you back to that carefree life with me. We will always be children.
~
It's amazing how a simple word, sight, sound or smell can trigger off a stream of memories. Like today, as I was in the car with C, I noticed that my lip balm had mango butter. And it smelled a little like it. Mango. Summers in India. Home made mango pickle. The blue and yellow striped, worn bag that Dad would bring mangoes in from the market. The smell of mustard powder. Juicy, full mangoes at the dinner table. Eaten with gusto. Yellow and golden. Sweet. Wonderfully, wickedly delicious. The tiny fibers around the mango seed that got annoyingly stuck in the teeth. Guarding the mango trees at my grandparent's place. This is a fun anecdote. My mom, brother and I would spend our summer vacations at my maternal grand parents' place some years when I was little. Our cousins would be there too. There were a couple of mango trees in the front yard of that house and one summer we had a couple of random kids stealing mangoes from the tree. My grandpa would have none of this. So, us kids - 3 or 4 of us, were convinced to spend hot summer afternoons in the mildly less-hot shade of the trees, on a little cot, guarding the mango trees. I don't remember too much about this other than the fact that it happened, that we did see the boys who were trying to steal the mangoes, that we hollered at them and a vague memory of the prickly, humid heat of the afternoon and the drowsiness that came with it.
~
I have been musing. On still afternoons. On clock ticks. On clean carpets and sharp shadows. On long, lean blinds that cut the light into shafts. On empty vases and water drops on freshly washed dishes. On dust on wood, and sunlight on the dust. On unopened mail and a neatly made bed. On the beauty and peacefulness of a quiet weekend.
~
Happiness is mine. It is the color of turquoise, texture of soft cotton and utterly beautiful.
And with that, I have now completed the rite of passage of womankind - wanting and obtaining an accessory for no real reason.
~
And now to bed where I need to figure out where all that tiredness and sleepiness that overcame me after my 30 min bike ride at the gym and the long drive home has now gone ...
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