The monsoons of 2014 have been
bleak. Almost every visit of mine to my home the last two times has co-incided
with the monsoon arriving. Barring this one. Monsoons. They are the reminder of
my childhood, my fantasies that still trail around the inner recesses of my
mind. The place I drift away to when I am worried about something my adult life
is dishing out to me. Monsoons were the time I watched nature and everything in
my dadu’s garden. It seemed everything was suddenly pulsating with a life that
wasn’t so visible through summer or winter. Monsoons were precious to our joint
family of my father’s parents, my four uncles, aunts and their children all
together for that one time of the year taking breaks from the monotony of their
urban lives. The time when power black outs made the family huddle together to
exchange stories, tell jokes and hear my mother sing old Hindi songs while my
dadu championed her, adding his generous “khub shundor”. These family rituals weren’t forced upon by the
accidental darkness interrupting our flurry of familial activities. They were
sought out mutually and sincerely when all we could have done was stick to our
corners of dadu’s home or indulged in our own little chit chats. Thank
goodness, we didn’t have a computer, no cell phones ……just Doordarshan on TV.
Our sit outs around the invisible bonfires, a clan proudly exercising
storytelling and observations on science, nature, politics our history were
almost ritualistic practices of tribes as it were. Sometimes in the damp thick
darkening daylight and other times when
entire nights were flooded with the customary darkness of rainstorms and fierce
winds. A tribe’s bonfires replaced by the old fashioned wick lamps and tin
lanterns my grandfather so carefully oiled, polished and saved in his cupboards
waiting to be brought out for these occasions.
I love
monsoons because it’s that one time of the year when the earth, the sky and the
very air itself here in Bhubaneswar has reached its fruition. Every element heavy
in its natural state coming to a full cycle after gestating a year of varying
seasons, nursing moisture and winds from far off lands. The red soil typical to
this region runs wild in narrow cylindrical long stems at first and then
accumulating, joining fellow rebels almost to form thicker gushing long winding
streams of water across the garden, the porch, the roads and into the dangerous
half open drains. Black dark storm clouds curdled up flashing dangerous streaks
of blue and white blinding lightning, upon which my dida exclaimed “The Gods
are fighting a new war amongst themselves.” And the air. Whatever I say to
describe the air will fall short to what my brain is experiencing taking in
greedy whiffs of its wholesomeness. A hundred different flowers, leaves, smell
of wet earth, water hitting different points of laterite stone, moss, barks –
altogether! If only I could bottle up all of it together! The very essence of
all my associations with my home, my people, my roots…. my solace.
I am home after being away in
Mumbai for almost two years through which all I seem to have done is scurrying
from one mode of conveyance to another, anxious through my day at work and
nervously fidgeting through my phone ending office mail etiquettes. Every day
in a big city far away from the reality of what a small town beautiful to its
very core makes me even more aware of what my hometown does for my heart .It
makes me so very happy to be here amongst all these elements in their purest
form. To wake up to the koel fiercely calling out at 4 AM. To see my mother
tinker around the kitchen, my father gardening with all his focus till 11 AM.
This time, the monsoon visit has been less luxurious with sparse rains and
halting showers. But we are all home together my parents, my elder sibling and
I after a gap of 4 whole years! And so we make the best of it. We try being
respectful of each other’s space but invariably drive each other crazy with our
rules, our needs and our level of comfort with being around each other – 4 very
different people all struggling to deal with each other now that my sister and
I are no more kids. We huddle up in the afternoons after lunches, munching the
sweet ‘nodiya supuri’ paan that is the mandatory must have and gossip about
relatives, political news, trivia and science. We make tea for each other, one
strong, one Darjeeling, one without milk. We bring out old pictures that need
to be digitally saved into a systematic database that will hopefully provide
the generation after, a glimpse into the Mitra clan and their sometimes
maddening yet delightful lives. We make lists of furnitures that need to be
sold, teach our mother to navigate through OLX and make up her mind about new
items that the home needs.
These are but just a token
gesture. A miniscule amount of the duty we as children are able to fulfill,
gifting them our company, our time, our love and gratitude for being our
parents. They love it at first. But nag us and taunt us about the life we lead.
About the life that women, daughters and sons of their friends are leading,
some even younger to us .” Everyone in our peer group is busy with not one but
two grandchildren during summers. What do we have to look forward to?” We stare
back with blank expressions of guilt, of our lives playing out as we see out of
our control of plans that would help achieve the perfect family, husband, kids
routine. We dismiss their sadness as customary expressions of old age and we
distract them with ‘must do tasks’ this time now that we are together after 4
long years, “lest we aren’t together like this soon” . The family portrait we
lack on our living room wall. “The incomplete family”, my mother adds. “Your
love and affection is fine but where is the circle of life? The next generation
to take care of you and look forward to once we are gone?” I agree with her in
my heart silently and look away at the sky. It’s paler today and likely to
shower for a bit. I am waiting for that massive downpour I remember from my
childhood. The one that blanks out every sound, every thought, every movement
around me. And lets me drift away to the inner recesses of my mind.
