When right is not quite right…

“Ridiculous! It is still calculating route! I mean, this thing is ancient!”

“Don’t worry, we still have half an hour. Just 3 more turns..”

“Why don’t you get a new one?”

“Now you know what to get me for my birthday!”

“..!!.. Next is right on 6th, right?”

“umm.. Yes…. right on 6th.. Take right, take right, this is sixth….Now what? Keep in the right lane when you know you have to take right… we will be lost in all this one-way maze… Now what!?”

“that.WAS.RIGHT.on.sixth. Relax… “

“Oh!… ok.. “

“Next?”

“umm… left on Seneca”

“Next?”

“right on Jackson”

“It’s here on Jackson right?”

“look for it on the right”,I say and start looking for it on my right side.

Eventually, car takes a right turn which is quite right while few people in it are still busy rolling their eyes and/or shaking their heads.

*Photo courtesy of Wiki.

Spring again! and Tulips..

Event :
I am on the verge of writing the next-gen masterpiece!

Don’t worry, this notion seizes me quite often. Then abandons me promptly too, and sanity prevails! No harm done. Enter antibiotics, and things change..

Fact :
Antibiotics kill common sense! When people around you are convinced that you have very little or almost none to start with you need to be more careful.. somehow I  manage to forget this, always..

Aftermath :
A zombie like existence for couple of days or couple of centuries.. hammering away on my faithful mac.. I am busy scratching thousandth of sentence for hundredth of time when a lucky ray of sunshine strolls across my table and shatters the spell. My dear husband gets the drift and without waiting for another disaster, whisks us away – to paradise!

There in the midst of snowy mountains, is a festival of tulips! Where spring bursts forth from thousands of green buds in spectacular explosion of color..  a sunny horizon is lit with soft rainbow of rippling petals.. crisp wind, cold and sedate, a tonic to any tired soul… the heart of the wind hums a melody, a song of pale but happy mother earth.. fluttering with sheer delight, my daughter? nah, a butterfly!  Heady fragrance of hyacinths mingles with mild seducing scent of tulips.. a dream.. A celebration of every color of spring!

And futile attempts to capture a few shades of it..

Back with The Spring!

Yes, I am back! After surviving several months of variety of ever-spouting ailments and an apparent blogging hiatus, it feels great to be back..

And what could be more befitting than Cherry Blossoms to celebrate happiness and sunshine? To remind me that though ephemeral, life is stunningly vibrant and beautiful..

Spring Sunshine

A sprig of spring..

and a blossom..

a spring in my step

up on the tree..

strewn on the grass

spring is in the air

and everywhere..

and summer is coming…

One overdue note: My thanks to Gori Rajkumari and to all those who voted for me! This helped me immensely to gear up for a second take off..

One important note: thank you friends, for all the love, good wishes and much-needed encouragement. Hoping to keep aloft now..

a cup full of love..

My featherweight body is soaring gracefully among creamy soft clouds.. air is crisp, laden with a sweet heavenly scent… something spectacular is awaiting just ahead.. my eyes will behold thousands of rainbows shimmering in every direction if I open them..  I breath in the heady fragrance and close my eyes tighter to hold this moment of anticipation, swaying giddily on the bliss that surrounds me… something brushes against my cheeks, even softer than feather and more delicious than morning sun, a sweetest voice is singing soft words in my ears.. ” its 8 o’clock Mum! Muuum, 6 o’clock. get up Muuuummm get up its 18 o’clock…”

Well! By now my poor soul has crash-landed into the body it belongs to, but my eyes refuse to adjust to the beastly glare of a harsh 40V Phillips bulb. Just another weekday morning.. The little angel is her most wonderful self nevertheless! After that kiss and get up call, my morning lark is free to flutter around helping everybody with everything.

If you know how heavy you feel while coming out of a swimming pool, multiply it by a thousand. That should give you a rough idea about how heavy I feel after getting down from those clouds. Rainbows refuse to abandon me, with mountainous effort I manage to keep my eyelids open. I close my eyes again, to lock away my dreams and ready myself for the new day.. I breath in deeply and.. wait whats that I smell? Aha, invigorating aroma of ginger tea! Bless those black leaves! Nothing else holds that black power to make me light again, and open my eyes wide again..

Shrewd readers must have guessed by now that I am blessed(?) with yet another morning person, and that one is my husband. He has finally given up hopes of turning this night owl into a morning lark and has resorted to only other happy solution – a hot cuppa to kick-start daily mortal proceedings. He is a real lifesaver, makes the best tea in our world. Curious? Want to know his top secrete recipe dear fellow night owls? Follow me then, lets do some snooping..

So first thing, he gets up and enters kitchen! (I happen to envy people who can get up just like that in the mornings!) Then he grabs any clean pot, puts some water in it. How much? Well he does not seem to hold with measuring things around here, so as much as he wants I think. (Recipe itself will explain that measuring is absolutely useless in this case.) Puts the pot on the burner and adds some grated ginger and cardamom powder.. then he waits for it to come to a boil. This mixture has a tendency to take ages to do that if he just stands there and waits.. apparently he remembers something important that just can’t wait – today, its his ID card. It was snatched by a typhoon yesterday and abandoned on the pile of toys somewhere – best thing to do? go ahead and get the search started, no worries.. then something starts to smell weird.. it reminds him to come running back to tea. Then he sees that water level has dropped to bottom and ginger is about to burn. He adds more water. Now waits again for it to come to a boil.

Generally by this time our little girl is up – fully in her element -and wants to help Dad. “Dad, pick up please.” By the time he takes out tea and sugar containers she is either standing on his toes or hanging by his t-shirt chanting “pickup pickup pickup..” The most important thing here is not to lose balance, rest can wait. Then he picks her up. “big girl help.. dad help.. tea help” So he lets his big girl pour tea leaves and sugar in the pot – a toddler can not count so he just gives her a free hand. He then adds milk, waits for it to come to a boil.. of course he resumes the ID card search. Finally he rescues it from the bottom of the doll’s cutlery. His daughter is very proud of him now. He is awarded with a victory dance. “Dad find it.. good job.. Dad find ID good jobeee..” Something starts to smell really really weird this time.. milk is milk, no-one can help if it decides to gush out and flood the hot burner..  He runs to kitchen to switch off the heat. Then he strains and distributes the remaining contents in two mugs as best as he can. Done! (insider tip: No need to cry over spilled milk just yet! Keep using other clean burners on hand until there are none remaining.. in our case the number is 4!)

About time to get giddy over a cup full of love and life..

Magical Musings..

Emerald city is doing her best to live up to her other name -the rain city -with a vengeance! Daylight savings time has ended and with that daylight is a history..  a perpetual dark night ensues, studded with chills n rains..  a new day is marked with overgrown exasperation of my park loving daughter.. I try hard to keep myself untouched by all this but eventually that dreaded day comes creeping, and even my rainier-high optimism falters and fades..

So after tucking my daughter in for a nap I try to cheer myself up. 2-3 cups of ginger tea disappear without making any impact.. then high-headed with the caffeine I try hard to keep myself engaged somehow.. anyhow. A number of futile attempts and I give in! I sink down in the chair besides the window and let myself be taken over by that invincible gloom… ‘sigh’..  best time to muse aloud maybe? or jot it all down to connect with an unhappy empathetic soul… or to harass some unlucky soul out there who might attempt to read these rantings more like.. well, whatever!

Why do I write by the way? that’s a question that creeps back to haunt me since ages, as I am no writer either by education or profession, and not a good one by any comparison either.. but I write..

My hands make me do things.. I write.. I blog.. I sew.. I craft.. I cook.. I have this unquenchable thirst to create new things with my hands..  I like to make my world more and more beautiful in my own eyes. Even the routine stuff which I do daily has layers of magic hidden in it. Every time a new layer unfolds it leaves me breathless.. it has this uncanny habit to sneak up on me when I am least expecting it, with a bolt of its magic glare! It jolts me alive, down to the very core of my capricious soul.. it is as if the whole universe is conspiring to reveal me its wonders.. beckoning me to be free, to let it engulf me in its everlasting rhythm to learn the secrets it carries in its bottomless heart.. those moments make me yearn for more.. and more.. I keep yearning for more.

Show me anything handmade, I have undying fascination for it! Root of this craziness lies back in my childhood in Kolhapur, where handmade is the very essence of life. Every happiness was boosted with gifts specially made for me by my mom, aunties and friends, and made me more proud. Many of those are lost now, but they will be cherished in my memory, forever. I relive those moments when my daughter jumps with unspeakable joy after wearing a new homemade dress.. seeing my vision take shape under my hands is exulting.. It soothes me and brings me the supreme joy of creation which The Almighty might have felt at The beginning! A simple exercise of drawing a little circle and then drawing two little ones inside it, and then a curve under those, means sunshine to my little girl.. a piece of black cloth and red cloth cut and shaped, then sewed to resemble a ladybug is sure to bring joy to a little bug-lover friend.. cutting a balloon from a construction paper is more rewarding than buying a real one from the lady at the store.. And a finished project is always a lesson learned, successful or not!

So you see, this doesn’t need to be anything grand as a rule. Even cooking rice is full of magic if you know where to look!  Mix those pearly grains and crystalline water, then let the heat work its magic.. it will rumble, bubble, froth, brim over, cool down a bit and then wait quietly for me to come and admire its perfection.. the satisfaction of fluffing it while wafting in its hearty aroma, to see the tiny grains dance under my fork is gratifying in itself. Then comes the best part – add a hearty dollop of homemade ghee and add a piece of lemon pickle! ahh… even the most horrible of chilly demons are sure to drop me for a while! Then all I have to do is wait for a glimpse of that precious winter sunshine..