Recovered

Yesterday when the son and I came back from dropping Subhash off at the bus-stop I was very pleasantly surprised and happy to see this lady from further down the street taking a walk with her older daughter in law helping her. Last year at the time my mother in law was in the ICU, I used to also see her daughters-in-law there and used to wonder what brought them there. Later, I learnt from my house-hold help that the mother in law was in a very bad shape and was admitted there. Some operation lead to complications which caused her to be bed-ridden - not very sure about the detail. She was in the ICU for many months before they could bring her home and P used to tell me that she was hardly able to do anything for herself and so on. Often I have wondered how this aunty was doing, when I walked past their house. So I was very happy to see her on her feet. I stopped the car, got off, and spoke to them and told her that it was so nice to see her this way. And how I came to know since my mother-in-law and she were in the same ICU etc. They then asked how my mother in law was - I told them she did not survive. Wished them well and they went on their way.

It was really so good to see her - don't know why, maybe it reinforced a lost hope.

The other day Subhash and I were looking at something my mother in law had stitched for Rohan and exclaimed how nice it would have been if she were still around, albeit healthy. She was waiting for her retirement many years in the hope that she could pursue her many passions - knitting, tailoring, and above all, her homeopathy practice. But destiny had other plans. I really feel sad sometimes thinking of how nice it would have been to have her around, healthy and active as I remember her from the first year of my meeting her. In vain though :(

AND

The latest designer that I have taken to is Anita Dongre. Not only are her collections nice and classy, they are vivid and bright and also a pleasure to shop! I hope she keeps up the creativity ;)

Re-cycling

Yesterday I was unpacking a pickle which we had got from Hyderabad - the packaging is a recyclers' worst nightmare. All that oil and plastic and it won't wash off.

Which is when I realized, I never updated my blog with all the SWM stuff we do at home now. We were doing this to a certain level even earlier - maybe about 60%, now we totally segregate - after the Bangalore-wide initiative. Well, so to say, it was a BBMP initiative, but I hardly trust them to do their job, so instead I trust the raddi-wala shop (waste store) in the neighboring street. We generate very little organic waste now and give BBMP maybe a bag in 10 days or so (I want to eliminate even that, by composting, but that is for a little bit out into the future, when we have a little bigger garden etc). Every week the household help takes out the plastic and paper and sells it to that store guy - it gets her a pittance like maybe between 5 and 10 rupees but it is still in expert hands and I have reasonable confidence it gets properly re-cycled. Normally I take care to clean out the plastic waste and properly dry it (which is why the pickle packaging is a pain, see) before I keep it aside to dispose.

Then we also started re-using the waste water from the water purifier for washing the cars and watering the garden-patch and whatever clothes need to be washed by hand. So all in all, water wastage has also gone down considerably in the past few months!

It does feel good to live responsibly by the environment :)

It has been the fulfillment of a life-long desire to be conscious and waste-free. There is still a lot more that can be done, step - by - step. Little-by-little.

Shutdown

Another year another shutdown. I was looking forward to the break and spending some more time with the son. But it started off with him falling sick:( he came home with a runny nose on Thu and after a long fight today it finally led into fever and throwing up just before bedtime. He has been without incidence of sickness for the past several months which made me lose the edge on handling it. In the past few hours, mood has been pretty upset. Hoping he will wake up and be ok after a good night's rest [-o< And that we will have a good holiday after all.

D's husband?

A while back, Subhash had pinged me while at work. He asked if I knew this one person from his workplace, I said I did not. Apprently she had come up to him when he had gone to heat his lunch and asked him "Are you D's husband?" and he was quite pleasantly surprised. She follows my blog (so I know you are reading this :) ) and guessed that he was my husband ;) Time and again, I am surprised when people recognize me (outside of people who already know, of course) from the blog!! And I feel very flattered too! ;)

Gujarat results

I can empathize with Chidambaram. He seems to have been in the same frame of mind as I was before the elections - I had not expected the Congress to win more than 20-30 seats in these elections. When I saw that they won 60+, I was actually disappointed - so much so that it tainted the happiness I derived from NaMo's win! I was wondering which set of people this is, that is still voting for Congress after all the debacles. But that is besides the point. So when PC saw the results, I am sure he was so happy (I would be if I were in Congress, given my state of mind and expectations!) that he can be forgiven to declare a win for Congress!!

A month of many milestones

Last week on 15th and 19th two very close friends celebrated 10 year wedding anniversaries. I still remember closing out all my semester exams three weeks ahead of time and traveling to India for their weddings. It has been 10 years already! Here is wishing them many more.

Today, it's been four years since we had the house-warming for this house. This house has seen a lot of things since then. Two significant life-events too, Rohan being born and my mother in law passing away. It also means, my parents have been living in their current home for 10 years.

Next week, it will be 15 years since we started our engineering course. We were a much delayed and much put-upon batch and as if to make it a symbolic start in 1997, we started on December 29, 1997! Only to have the next two days off. It also means, it has been 15 years of knowing Subhash - although we both don't agree on when we met first ;) He says he saw me a lot earlier than that bus ride (which I claim was the first meeting) when his friends were ragging us juniors in a classroom.

Back

After 8 hectic days in Hyderabad - got back into town this morning and rushed to work and routine. A great many things happened over the past week.

My sister migrated to Vadodara - and they seem to be enjoying it so far. Our first brush with all that we hear about Gujarat and its development :)

My Dad has gotten back to work. Although I am sad because it will mean no more long visits from them anytime soon, I am very very happy for my Dad - he will be content and satisfied doing what he loves :) All the best Dad!!

The biggest of all - my mother-in-law's heaven-bound journey has concluded and she has safely reached heaven. At least that is what we believe. It ends our period of mourning. It was a hectic set of ceremonies over 5 days, and it is done now. Went well. My father in law was extremely fidgety and nervous, and I'd rather have had him travel back with us but he wanted to stay on, so we had no choice but to come back, just the three of us.

The son, as usual, was completely non-fussy, and was all grown up - a great boon to us whenever we have to attend to something important. He was more social than ever, remembers most people and relationships now, and talked incessantly and most important of all - in spite of everything and all the stress, managed to come back in good shape :) (Touch wood!)

This was the first time I traveled First Class in our trains. It was rather nice. Thankfully the son had the dinner I packed for him without too much fuss and need for videos etc. On the way back we had a 2 person coupe which was even more fun. The son is also enjoying his train rides now - a good sign (makes it more economical too ;) :))

What's going on

In Hyderabad for a week+ for mother-in-law's death anniversary ceremonies. These are the culmination of the year-long ceremonies we have been performing.

Days are full and eventful with people coming and going. I couldn't help get a tad bit emotional this morning to see my mother-in-law reduced to a symbol, a ball of rice :(

I was feeling a little nostalgic too about the early days of my knowing them and just beginning to court Subhash. I was going through some old emails and stumbled on the first ever one that I wrote to them back in 2004. The other day, my mother-in-law's sister called me to ask what my father in law prefers to have for dinner and if he does/doesn't eat a few things. What his pattern is these days etc. I was flattered. She did not ask anyone else, she asked me! From that email in 2004 to this phone call last week, I think the journey has spanned a great many years and a great many stages too. I hope we can continue to stand by him through good times and bad. The loss is irreparable, we attempt to make it a little less painful, and hopefully we can succeed.

School friends and all

As if to prove this post wrong - a chance meeting with a couple of school friends happened just a few days later!

These gals and I met after 15 and 17 years each. It took probably a half an hour to warm up but once we got started, there was no looking back. We chatted on and on about current day events, back to school events, again back to present events and back to school gossip, kids, husbands, schools, etc etc seamlessly and it all came gushing back.

When I was in school, one of these girls was with me from LKG all the way till +2 in Francis'. I was very conscious of how my language changed between Telangana Telugu and proper Andhra speak at school and at home. And like magic, after I was talking to this girl for half an hour, I found myself talking in the same Telangana style Telugu. Some things do not change at all, do they?

We met again the next day at the second friend's place (I only discovered she also lives in Bangalore that weekend, thanks to the other friend) and it was very close to our home too! Again chatted away, met her son, talked about how all of us will be in Hyd soon, thought about catching up with the bigger gang and parted ways.

All thanks to Orkut/Facebook I must say - else I have no idea how I would have connected with all these gals!