Gilding the Lily

I LOVE my new house! OK, my old/new house. As we decorated the Christmas tree yesterday, I thought again how dressing up the house is such a joy, because it is so effortless. The walls are clean, the floors unmarked, the staircase unscuffed (and as of two weeks ago, safely carpetted). A flick of the duster here, a whisk of the broom there, and everything is shining again. I do get help too, so all in all the house manages to stay clean most of the week except weekends when we totally mess it up, the kids, K. and me.

I've always loved new houses or newly-restored ones. You won't find me sentimentally lingering over "charming" old houses. Please note that this is not a paean to McMansions. It's not the size that matters, just the clean new feeling. Having grown up in a variety of creaky, crumbly old houses in India (and some new, ugly, modern flats with dismal yellow interiors - still creaky and crumbly because of the bad materials used), I have always appreciated the joys of plumbing that works, roofs that don't leak, doors that don't stick, toilets that don't make you queasy to look at them, and above all, I loved houses where the grime hadn't settled into a thick coating of black grease making cleaning a constantly unsuccessful war.

Note again, I haven't said a word about furniture. Furniture or its arrangement is relatively unimportant to me. As long as there are no bugs lurking within mattresses and cushions, I don't care whether people seat me in Louis XV grandeur or on humble floor cushions. For that matter, we don't have too much furniture in our new place either. Maybe that's part of the reason for loving the house. Because it's relatively uncluttered still (except for the kids' clutter) and therefore easy to keep clean.

Hindu Shopping for a Christian holiday

This year the holidays have been rather sad. A close member of my extended family (my brother D.'s mother-in-law) passed away the day before Thanksgiving. It's been a rough year for D. and his wife. Still, at least we got to see D. and my niece I. as they were in Connecticut before leaving for Kolkatta. Luckily, the kids are too little to be affected by the sadness. They just played and squabbled like kids do.

Other than that, I have been busy shopping. As I made my rounds of malls and stores, I reflected on why it is that I - the Hindu from India - got stuck with the burden of buying Christmas presents for my American husband's family. Is it just a gendered thing? Do wives generally bear the brunt of maintaining holiday traditions, even holidays they never grew up with? Oh we had Christmas in India but for us Hindus, it was just an excuse for another party at the club, not the occasion to buy presents or cook large meals. That was Durga Puja and Diwali. K. is grateful for my efforts as he hates shopping and is not religious at all (so there is no sentimentality about the holiday either).


But speaking to friends, I realized that perhaps I'm just the dupe in this arrangement! Many of my friends leave it up to their husbands to shop for their own families. I think the reason I got involved was because of the fear of embarrassment. K. hates shopping so much that Christmas presents from him would be last-minute purchases of gift cards to Carvel or something. And I thought that I, with my taste and thoughtfulness, would find better things that his family would appreciate. I suspect they do like my choices but every November/December I am kicking myself while my husband stretches luxuriously in front of the TV. How do I get out of this situation of my own making? Without his mother receiving gift cards from Dunkin' Donuts?

Military Memories

I am finally getting around to writing thank-you notes to so many generous hosts during this past visit to India. But getting myself organized got me thinking of my childhood, specially since this time we visited Rajasthan where I last was when I was six or seven years old. It was the edge of the desert where we lived. There were scorpions and snakes, mainly scorpions. We had to shake out our shoes every day in case any venomous critter lurked within. The sandstorms were blinding, leaving everything coated in gritty, glittering powder. Everything was brown and dry, very few green things existed. We were the first occupants of the new, ugly MES flats that marked the continuation of the "ugly bureaucrat" style of architecture, begun I believe in the 1950s. Our first school bus was a horse-drawn tonga. Alas, no winsome "Basanti" from Sholay, just a series of withered old men. Then came a converted one-ton truck that ferried us all to our different schools. This was the tough-as-old-boots army brat lifestyle where fathers disappeared for two-three months at a time for exercises (or "maneuvers" as they are called here) and the cantonment became a community of women and children who depended on each other for moral support. We played outside, rode our bicycles madly for hours, went to the park where creaky old see-saws could upend you with their vicious lack of suspension. Later, when we moved out of the cantonment, I carpooled in the genteel company of a wealthy neighbor's daughter who would have been horrified at the hearty rigor of my military upbringing.

Going back this August, the changes were mindboggling to me. There were still plenty of camel-carts but the desert had disappeared. There are now trees everywhere, even middle-class army types seem to have more disposable income and the houses seem bigger and more posh (although the ugly MES flats are stubbornly long-lived). There is still poverty but the heartbreaking deprivation that I saw in my childhood is gone. These are, I think, the fruits of independence. My generation hopefully will not see, as my grandparents did under British rule, the absolute wretchedness that ruled everywhere around them. That misery exists, but it is more in pockets now, rather than spread everywhere. On the other hand, the gaps now are more apparent. Before, we all swam in the same murky sea of restricted consumer choices and dreamed our limited hopes of upward mobility (follow in parental footsteps or doctor/engineer/civil services). But now, the wealthy and even the upper-middle-class lead lives of comparable comfort to their western counterparts (with the added perks of servants and overflowing daily help with household chores). The lower-middle-class now have more wealth around them to compare their lot with and feel unhappy about.

Diwali - Not!

Diwali was very subdued. It was a usual weekend day, soccer and stuff. We did not even have fireworks as K. was concerned about the dry leaves. Very disappointing, but there you have it. Went for a Diwali party/birthday party Friday evening. After ages, I wore a sari, one of the six I had bought for my wedding nearly ten years ago. It felt good to see that I fit into the blouse again (I had ballooned in the in-between, i.e. baby-production, years) and in fact the sleeves are slightly loose now. It felt good in general to be dressed up for a change although it is of course difficult to be chasing a toddler around in a silk sari.
News from Kolkatta is also sombre. Loved ones who are seriously ill. It's a grim Diwali all around.

Hitting the Ground Running

We have been back home for the last six weeks. Initially, tt was very disorienting to be back to where the streets are so empty and where there are no itinerant peddlers and vegetable vendors "bleating like sheep on a Welsh hillside" as Trevor Fishlock put it. But having to get S. to school the second day after we arrived put an end to undue wallowing in nostalgia. There were clothes to be organized, shoes and backpacks to be bought, the house to be organized. The workers who had slowed down their pace in our absence came back and once again, the house is full of noise and dust and the shouts of electricians to each other. So now, five-six weeks later, Kolkatta is a fading memory of washed coconut trees and uncomfortable car rides into the city. S. has been to many birthday parties already and whenever I see his cute little shape bobbing and weaving through a crowd of his peers, I am always struck by how grown-up he looks now. Not at all the little baby that I rocked to sleep in the glider that now sits in my office. But at least I can still recall the sensation when I hold baby or look at her face in the crib, so similar to her brother and yet so...her!
OK, I am overcome with maternal sentiment. More later.

Tuned Out in Kolkatta

I don't know how K. does it, but in this city with its zillion assaults on the senses, he is completely tuned out! I mean, I come home from visits to friends and relatives with my nerves buzzing from near-misses with mini-buses and pedestrians but K. is totally Zen. Most of the time is taken up with visits to relatives and friends. S. is thrilled because my friend from college has a son about the same age so life here has been one long play date. Baby is of course still bewildered and clingy. The food is very good but there is too much of it, so alas I will have to go home to Connecticut and do penance for my gluttony. Gym, here I come. There is plenty of help here domestically but the nanny my mother hired is a complete failure. She has no technique and the baby will not go to her, period. So I am stuck babysitting day and night. I am getting annoyed but what to do? Oh well, will be home soon with all my daily schedule of work and home, etc.

Travelling Home

Well, we are here in Calcutta (sorry, Kolkatta) where I was amazed to note as we stepped outside the airpport, it was cooler than Connecticut! But ever since, it has been getting hotter and muggier so it doesn't feel too different from when we left.

The parents are of course delighted because all three grandchildren are here and the house is full of the sound of laughter and of my daughter screaming her lungs out whenever the specially-hired nanny approaches her.

The jetlag is spectacular! The kids go to sleep every morning at 10:00 and then wake up after lunch. They both wake up at night at 3:30 AM! And then sit like little owls in my parents bedroom with Cartoon Network switched on. Honestly, my folks have to be the best grandparents around! Not only do they not mind the invasion of their bedroom at that ungodly hour but my mother actually gets up and makes everyone tea at 4:00 AM. Not the kids of course. Speaking of television, all of S's favorite shows are here - Sponge Bob Squarepants, Avatar, Drake and Josh, etc. all dubbed in Hindi. S. sits hypnotized by it all even though he probably understands nothing.

More of the Same

Today I went shopping for light fixtures. To be honest, I hardly ever paid attention to light fixtures before but now that we need them for our own house, I can hardly pass a house without noting the style of their lights. Lantern, wall-mounted, polished brass, bronze, iron, traditional, modern, rustic....And I cannot choose one! This is where one needs a good sense of dimensions: too big and your lights are all that people can see, too small and they disappear. I spent an hour or so at Fairfield Lighting. They are smaller than their competitor in South Norwalk but that was precisely their strength. Fewer but more invested sales people, one of whom took a lot of time educating me on what sizes and styles to look for. I like that, not that I have anything against Klaff's, with whom I have done a lot of business too over the last year. And maybe I will still order something online after all, let's see.

Thunder, Lightning, and War

Thunder, lightning, hail, lots of rain, and a sick child! That was last night. You would not believe it today, it is so clear and sunny and relatively mild. As if the weather had a giant temper tantrum and now is all sweetness and light.

We are leaving for India soon, where the government has banned blogger. So probably there will be no updates unless whichever bureaucrat thought this up decides to relent. Still, there are too many other things happening there, like the Bombay blasts, and the water logging because of the monsoons. I wonder if I will have the time to think about this blog. I do hope that there is not some insane crackdown on the internet in general. I rely on it more than on TV for my daily fix of news.

Speaking of news, at least our trip to India will not be as nervousness-inducing as this poor Stamford guy's story. The situation in the Middle East continues to deteriorate rapidly. Poor Lebanon is of course between a rock and a hard place. Hizbollah backed by Syria on the one hand and Israel backed by the US on the other and both sides are reducing the country to an absolute rubble. The civilian casualties, the stunningly callous term "collateral damage" always infuriates me, are amazingly high and disproportionately Lebanese. That in itself is cause for anger. The utter disregard for civilian casualties in Lebanon is amazing but fairly typical given the attitudes to people of Middle Eastern origin in the west. Angry Arab raves and rants about the war there. But do be advised that he calls himself an anarchist so his opinions are, well, anarchist. I sometimes agree with him but being an army brat, I am less scornful of rightfully appointed government or authority than he is. Note, I said "rightfully."

Apprentice-ship

There are a number of young men, boys really, working on our construction site of a home. Now that we are back in the house, I observe them much more as they hammer and saw and chisel and nail. One just celebrated his nineteenth birthday last week, he informed me as he swung shovelsful of dirt to fill up a hole. Another, from Costa Rica, mournfully informed me of Costa Rica's elimination from the ongoing World Cup. The painter's assistant from Brazil, is friends with the Costa Rican, and somehow the Portuguese-Spanish conversation is mutually comprehensible thanks to the passion both share for soccer. I don't want to comment on them as individuals - they are all quite nice - but I do notice how very young they are and how hard they are working. I suppose this is the class system at work. The neighborhood teens cycle off to swimming and to hang out at friends' houses and these young men from Stratford and Milford and Trumbull build their houses.

There doesn't seem to be any rancor though, no scoffing at the rich people whose houses they build. I think this is because they are all skilled workers who take great pride in what they create. These young men stand around after a hard days' work admiring the shine of the newly-finished cherry floors and at the craftsmanship of the master tiler who arranged the foyer tiles just so. Also, there is a pairing off. The contractor and his son, the electrician and his son, the mason and his son, sort of like the old days of apprenticeship when knowledge was handed down from father to son. Except there is no absolute guarantee that the sons will follow in the fathers' footsteps. Just the assurance of a wise, second opinion to fall back on.

And then there are the fatherless ones - the assistants who place themselves under the supervision of the contractor and who learn from him, from master craftsman to apprentice craftsmen, the knowledge chain continues.

Sunny day blues

I'm one of the few in this well-beached part of the country who does not like baking in the sun. Never have, never will. Growing up, the sun was a mortal enemy - except during the damp, dank monsoons of June-July. And even here, under the gentler northern sun I still don't like being hot and sweaty and shading my eyes - sunglassed and all - from the glare bouncing off the languid Sound lapping contentedly at the edges of our golden town beach. Sunscreen just makes me feel even stickier although I dutifully slap it on. And I worry about my kids who could play at the beach all day if I allowed it, regardless of the blazing sun and the humidity. Oh well, since I am supposed to love it, I suppose I must "enjoy" the beach. Oh I know, boo-hoo you're thinking. But still, we bourgeoisie are allowed to crib too.

Insights from Iraq

I certainly feel the same way as this Iraqi blogger, Hassan Kharrufa, although his need to keep his lives separate has far more urgency than my desire to write freely about my largely peaceful life outside of work in southwestern Connecticut, give or take a few run-in's with carpenters and installers. Not that work is so conflict-ridden either, but then it is only part-time. How sad the Iraqi situation is, how utterly removed from mine. I pray that it continues to be so removed, I know as I write what an utterly selfish thought that is, but when I look at my children, well, that's what I think and any parent reading this will instantly understand and forgive the selfishness. If one didn't know how man-made the situation was, one would just think that the place is cursed, first Saddam, then an uninvited war, then mayhem, then disorder, then mass murder. I guess that's what happens when Trotskyites, former or practising, take charge - permanent revolution in both the US and in Iraq. Thank goodness, Trotsky did not succeed in the former USSR. The plight of the poor Soviets would probably have been much worse if this is the fruit of that philosophy.

Dark Thunder and Foul Murder

Dark clouds loom over the Sound, the sea gulls are circling very low. The rain will soon be here - in torrents, I think. But! It's Friday! It's a long weekend! What shall I do? Tommorow is K's birthday, so perhaps I should get my act together and wrap his presents. Unfortunately, brother-in-law R can't make it or else we could all have gone for a lo-ong drive to Mystic, take the kids to the Aquarium, etc. M. is out for a walk, so I took the opportunity to finish reading Agatha Christie's Body in the Library. I've read it many times. Read it, put the book away for a few years, then when I return to it, I find that I have often forgotten whodunnit, so the thrill is new the next time. I find this happens often to me with Christie murder mysteries. I don't find this happening with any other writer. Do I really forget or is it a forced forgetting so that I will enjoy the book again the second, third, fourth, fifth time? Also, I enjoy reading about stuffy British society from the forties and fifties and thanking my good fortune that I escaped being born into that dismal milieu. So, I bring to my enjoyment of Christies books a horrified fascination with the overbearing vicar's wife and the Conservative Colonel Bantry and the faceless parlormaids and cooks. Good heavens! Could such a world actually exist and flourish? I suppose it did. I am so glad that it passed by me, or before me.

Sunshine

Sun's out today. Yay! Games are on, construction moves forward and the day looks good. We went to eat at La Colline Verte, an upscale French restaurant in Fairfield yesterday. It was disconcerting to walk into a French country dining room overlooking the parking lot of a strip mall. But the food was great and they closed the blinds so I could maintain the illusion of la douce France. Oh, how I miss my Paris, [stuff about Paris deleted - too gushing] but it is time to plan another visit to the land of the friendly croissants.

Rain, rain go away

So things are still pretty damp around these parts, although the sun finally came out weakly just before the day ended. Games and playdates were cancelled. We did a brief visit to the construction site. Things are happening but things are still very raw. I hope we can get in before the lease here runs out. Sigh!

Literally blank

So, of the best American fiction published in the last 25 years, I am sorry to say that I have read - drumroll....none! So much for writing about books. Oh well, more rain threatens, I'll just go finish off Rattled, the new novel about New Jersey suburbs, rattlesnakes and competitive stay-at-home moms.

Why do I write?

Yes, why do I write this blog? After all, my posts are just about - my non-working life here in Southwestern Connecticut. And unlike work where my mind is fully engaged (I wish my salary reflected that but alas, I only work part-time), my home life is just plain vanilla bourgeois. There, I said it! That used to be such a term of contempt back in my twenties before the burdens of mortgage and credit cards and car payments descended on my shoulders. And now there are other - very cute - monkeys on my back. My kids. But I hesitate to write about very personal things. What the hell business is it of anybody else's how much I love my kids or my husband or my parents or my brother or my niece or my....they know how loved they are and don't need a blog to tell them that, anyway. And I don't want to write about my neighbors, friends and other acquaintances either. They are decent people who do deserve better than to end up as unwitting supporting actors in somebody else's play.

So what shall I write about? Well, there is the house of course. What an education it has been to go through this remodeling process. I can now talk with aplomb about tiles and hardwood floors and siding and dormers. But is that really my passion? No, I loved putting my stamp on this house that hopefully will be our retirement too (in any case, I cannot see myself going through this process again). But I cannot talk endlessly about Toto versus Kohler versus Jado. So instead, I will write about the two things that I do have a passion for: books and food. I'll write about restaurants, recipes, novels and non-fiction and sometimes all of them together. With some music and movies thrown in. That will spare my family and friends and acquaintances from having to read unmentionable things about themselves in public and will also give me an opportunity to explore my extended neighborhood a bit.

I hope everyone in this area is outside, enjoying the beautiful spring day. As I drove past the beach, the late afternoon sun was bouncing off the water and the seagulls circled and swooped, active and eager. There were young children with ice cream stains on their clothes and their mothers/nannies smiled indulgently. Our elderly neighbor dozed in his chair outside. My own little one looked around, a little stunned at the soft brightness of everything. Spring is here, yay!