Pragya and her friends - Update

Sweetie pies! Got an update from Pragya and her friends.... Met Pragya on way back from work a few days back. She seems to be on a diet ... Well, who is not on a diet these days!! And you got branded diet like GM Diet, for example!

On chatting with Pragya, came to know...well....she IS on a GM diet...and it was showing! Though I liked the earlier Pragya, marriage is SUPPOSED to bring about changes in anybody's life. I had noticed Pragya used to wear so many bangles..white, red...gold when she got back from her wedding.....four months later, I find the number of bangles have come down to a reasonable and manageable number!! Marriage DID bring in a change, once again, I guess. Oh! But this post is not just about the sweeeeeet Pragya but about her friends and how they have set up their HOME in Trivandrum, gradually.

They are proud owners of a television and cable connection! Phew!! Which meant unlimited streaming of Hindi programs, English news, English Films and all entertainment our girls have grown up in! I felt very nice hearing they could now watch programs in their mother tongue! :) This has also brought about a social change in their midst...the mightiest wins :) Whoever gets hold of the remote is the Queen of the Moment ... :) Is this any different from yours and my home! :) And of course, when you have more than one person watching the TV, choices to happen to be more.... BUT Pragya and her friends are happy!

They are happy taking turns cooking, cleaning, keeping their home neat and tidy on weekends, going shopping for vegetables and dividing the expense according to the vegetables they have consumed....according to the number of meals each had at home. They are also happy to have a chef in their midst who experiments with cooking....they also have a friend who is a almost a touch-me-not but all of them support her and are happy to do so! It is indeed a great pleasure to hear Pragya talk about their lives....they are no longer college recruits to the organisation ... they are no longer girls to the society, they are grown up girls..... BUT ask their parents....for them Pragya and her friends are still their doll-like daughters - Gudia (s) - (Gudia means doll in Hindi)

:-)

Undivided attention from Happiness - A Myth

Aha! So am in knots again .... hmmm....Well....nothing new, I guess! (This is my Happiness' typical reaction when told I am in knots!)

But this time...it is a bit different. It is regarding my Happiness. And how much undivided attention I seek from Happiness. It is so true...people only want your happiness and love to take a share of it .... and what you are left is just 2% (if you are quick enough to save even this much!) Else, even the 2% would get divided and maybe....because you were born under a very luck star and an extremely strong Zodiac sign...might be able to salvage .09%! You should title it as an achievement, if you do get to keep any of your Happiness.

Countering this Happiness can turn around...or even call you from behind...or just nudge you from your left or right side...else speak from the above...(Happiness is every where, right...or at least supposed to be!) and ask you ... Am there with you, as much as possible! Now that's a completely unfair answer! I am not looking for Happiness as and when it is possible for Happiness to be with me...I want it to be with me as and when I WANT Happiness!! Makes sense? Selfish sense? Why cant I get undivided attention from Happiness? Why am I being asked to SHARE Happiness? In which case it makes Happiness not just mine...but everybody who shares my Happiness!!! Not fair!!

This is also because of a traditional rule...set in by my ancestors, society and NOT me.... Yet am chained to this rule of the past - Share Happiness!

Happiness is also selfish. Happiness also wants to be everywhere.... not just mine. Happiness wants to please all. Happiness thinks that's the best thing to do. And asks me to be content with whatever I can salvage of it. Happiness is also rude when asking me to be content with the 'windows' available through which it would float in on a pink cloud! Till then what should I do, Happiness? Quiver in the cold? Maybe! OR wait with a patient smile and welcome you with open arms?

Undivided attention from Happiness is a Myth! (So be it!) :-))

Pineapple - Yellow-Green (Colours of Joy!)

Again...it was a sight I saw on way to work .... a small private carrier on road..that runs on three tyres...has a tiny driver cabin and a open tin square carrier behind the driver's cabin. This is called the mini-auto-carrier in my land. All sorts of goods, at times people (in certain states) are carried from place to place for short distances.

This time it was a load of pineapples. Ripe pineapples. They were stacked randomly .... and were secured with the short iron railing on the top edge of the square carrier box ... but were loosely put into the carrier. This made the pineapples jostle against each other ... their green crown wobbling like heads in agreement who are in a heated discussion about world hunger! These are the ones in the top ... the ones underneath them looked muted and compressed like the opinions of a liberal speaker... that of a cynic. The ones under them are like any software development engineer... stay put where you been asked to and listen to all the big talk happening at the top!

But the wobbling green heads of the pineapples also brought back memories of two hair clips I had when in Class 2. They were not pineapples but yellow guitar which were pineapple yellow in colour. They were seen around till early this year but guess with my umpteen setting and resetting of my home space, they would either be somewhere in a recycling plant for plastics or if am lucky enough in one of the cardboard containers ready to be shipped to our own home in next two months.

Pineapple yellow....ripe pineapple yellow is a very joy-colour. And if it matched with the perfect green like the fruit has....makes it a carefree-combination :-) Happy colours!

I forgot my challenges...as I saw them speak..or did they 'speak'?

It was a very normal morning at a busy junction.....traffic coming fro m four regular directions, a haggard traffic police sweating in his tight-fitting police uniform, his two arms flying in all possible angles to drive some sense into the unruly traffic. My bus, in which I travel to office everyday with my colleagues, too was in middle of this jam. I sat in it, looked out of the window with a practised detachment to the chaos. Nothing unusual. The shops, the people at the bus stand...the school college buses...and my dry, boring thoughts of the challenges Nature/destiny/others have thrown into my life. My Happiness tells me I have this unique skill of killing my joy by conjuring up possibilities of tragedy in my life. I was almost on the verge of scripting a new tragedy, when my eyes caught something unusual....I saw three gentlemen communicating to each other. Two of them were nodding in affirmation...as the third gentleman....used sign language to communicate to the other two gentlemen. I thanked the traffic jam .....

All of them were talking in sign language ... not sure who had a challenge to speak....but as I leaned forward towards the window and watched them 'talk', one of the gentlemen caught my gaze. He gave a faint smile and got back into the discussion. They looked serious. I was not sure if the discussion was heated or not. They smiled and the next moment knitted eyebrows, nodding in affirmation and all the while using gestures, sign language! They were cut off from the din around, they were cut off from the melodies of sound, they were not gifted to hear music, they could not express verbally .... YET they were taking CARE to communicate. They managed to overcome their challenge and were grown-ups, managing their lives!

And here I am....gifted to hear....gifted to talk....gifted to express my feelings....yet...yet mulling over my so-called unfairness thrown at me by destiny/nature/others around me. I fail to SAY no, when I was supposed to...I do not care to SAY 'I like you' to my dear friends...I forget to SAY 'Take care' to my parents when I leave home....I do not care to SAY 'Life is beautiful' as sun rises everyday....I only SAY 'This is unfair'...which is not what I should be SAYING, with all gifts from Nature!

I thank the traffic jam, as we inch forward....and give one last look to the three-GIFTED and BLESSED gentlemen, wishing them a good day and a great life ahead....and a big THANK YOU! :)

Eloping with My Happiness!!

And I would ask you not to go by the headline word by word .... But it is true that I want to elope with Happiness! :-)

So what is Happiness? Or WHO is Happiness? Do you think it is a book I love? A dream I have? Or is it somebody I met recently? It could be with any of the three OR maybe it is all of three. Yet, Happiness is a state of mind, triggered by either a book's title...a fragrance....a smile....a touch....a fleeting image....it could be triggered by anything! I met happiness. I feel happy. I smile because am happy. Now you may wonder WHAT triggered happiness in me? It is definitely a VISION.....it is one intense look when my eyes met my happiness that triggered happiness in me. And know what....trust what I say next --- I failed to see this happiness was just an arms away for EXACT 12 months.....on the 12th month, Nature rolled up its sleeves, smiled at my 'blindness' and decided to make me meet my happiness. And the meeting too was very much dramatic....designed by somebody who I never liked before yet played a major role in ensuring I meet my happiness...and when I did....it was pure bliss! Sure guidance! Sincere approach! No agenda dreams! And all this makes to ask from Nature - I want to elope with My Happiness! (If not this lifetime...maybe in Next!) :)

Thank you, Nature! Thank you My Happiness!

Four Generations and a sewing machine!

Hope Karthikyean would come today, said my mother looking expectantly at the gate. And who is Karthikeyan? He is the handyman from Usha sewing machine company.. and my mother own a sewing machine which is around 35 years old. Usha sewing machine company has come a very long way from the hand machine days which my mother owns proudly. In between the 35 years, many a times, the hand machine went in for an exchange for a new automatic electric designer sewing machine, but the emotional connect mother had with the machine, ensured it came back home every time mother took it for an exchange during the festival seasons.

This sewing machine was bought by my maternal grand mother when she was in Bombay in early 70's. Grandma was a complete housewife and I will write about her very soon. She was very popular for her byriyanis, painting, embroidery work and pickles! She loved the way the Punjabi's and other North Indian friends used sewing machine to stitch their clothes and got one Usha sewing machine for herself. While moving out after her marriage, my mother opted to take the sewing machine with her. My father recollects how his old shirts, faded bedsheets etc were designed by mother as tiny frocks for me...he says, I try to guess which of my lungi or the bed sheet would you be wearing in the form of a frock as I walked back home from the bank! :)

I recollect my childhood days when my brother and I would very excitedly fill the bow pin of the machine with thread ... this was an easy task given that the machine had to be rotated in the opposite direction...my brother, being the muscle man between the two of us, would rotate the handle with all his might and I would direct the thread to fill the bow pin...at times we would fill the bow pin with multi threads in our excitement of having got the sewing machine for ourselves!!! Mother would realise this only when she uses the machine on a later date.

But for the past few years, mother had not touched the sewing machine. It would come with us every where we shifted home. At times, mother thought it was an added luggage but brother and I were sure, we will not sell it at any cost. And then came the fourth generation - my little one. Seeing her grow up, mother was back into her designer mode! She would look at the sewing machine lying idle and loads of clothes like my cotton dupattas, cotton bedsheets and other 'rags' and would sigh...telling my little one, If I had this machine back in shape, you would be getting to wear clothes fit for this climate!! I would cringe at the thought of seeing this 2 1/2 feet tall 3 year something wearing the black cotton duppata as a knee-length-round-neck-with-no-buttons dress as I walked in home from work. But mother was working towards making my fear come true. She searched the newspapers for sewing machine repair shops, through them got the details of Usha sewing machine shop and from them their service handyman. And as she had set her mind to put her 35 year-old sewing machine back into action, got it converted into electric machine with a few plug-ins here and there but retained the same iron-body, faded paint, same wooden handle though she does not need to use it as it is now connected to electricity. This helps mother a lot as she just need to press the pedal and the machine works, thus no need to rotate the handle.

On February 22, 2009 the Usha sewing machine was attended by Kartikeyan. This ensured the sewing machine got back into making small frocks out of the cotton dupattas, bedsheets etc, once again. Mother wore glasses as she measured, cut clothes, got them stitched and with such excitement made her grand daughter wear her designer wear! And the little one joined her in the excitement and does not allow me to go near it....its her grand mothers.....as it is my grand mothers too!!

As mother was engrossed in stitching a pink frock for my little one, I strongly felt my grand mother too joining us around my mother and her 35-year old Usha sewing machine! I pledge to keep this going .... and so will my little one, I am sure! :)

You were my senior 16 years back!!

I was in midst of ensuring all the shoes displaced in the BATA showroom, Opp Women's college Vazhuthacaud went back to thier place in proper condition, as my little one was on a trial-spree....shoes of her size as well as mine! As I was putting back the ones I had no mind to buy, I saw a family of four walk into the showroom - Man, Woman and two daughters...and as they were a bit on the heavier side compared to my skeletal frame, I heaved a sigh of relief looking at myself - Phew! I am so much better off than them...slim and can fit into any dress! Lost is such self-centric thoughts, I did not notice the woman of the family that walked in come to me. I looked up as I saw a pair of feet stop by my side...looking straight into my eyes, she asked, "Are you Karthika, who studied in LSN Convent, Ottapalam" .. before I answered in affirmative, I tired to clear the memory clog and tried to place her somewhere of the two years in LSN...was she my batch mate, or my senior...err..mybe a junior...and before I answered she helped me place her...and trust me, what she said was so unbelievable!!! " Am Amrita....I was in Class V when you were in Class X...and i remember you as you were part of Margamkali (A Christian festival dance) and popular in school".....Felt a bit dizzy at her recollection...she was talking of days which were 16 years back....and Amrita was a kid...in 5th grade and I was in 10th!!!!!

I did not wait to ask her why did she recollect me after these many years .... but was happy I was in her memory even after 16 years! And what a memory, Amrita! :)