Turn around days

It's been over two years since I've written in here. And I must admit I've missed it. It's such a joy.

So if I say the day is precious...guess I have reason enough today :)

A day that made me sit up and relook at some very core level stuff. What are the values I'm living by, what narratives do I want to hold and which let go, what boundaries am I willing to push, where does my core value of growth really sit. 

And to be able to ask the question honestly....to have the space for those questions to even come in....that I believe is by  grace, and I'm ever so grateful.

I'm adding in a couple more pictures which are as abstract as these are real....as precious and as meaningful:

Like I started by saying....it's not necessary to understand it all....it's just as good to partake of beauty in whatever form, and the exuberance and joy just flows.

Happy to be back !

A precious day....a precious b'day....and a precious rebirth-day :)

 It's okay if that doesn't completely make sense (or does :)

Somedays just come into your life to fully turn them around. And this is one such, which has by some freak, no providential, chance been repeatedly doing it for me.

I've had milestone events happen on the day.....including today.

Starting with kiwi....it's beloved kiwi's birthday. The day this bundle of joy came into our lives (cause we chose that as his b'day :)

Here's some pictures. (for lack of time, i just dug up from previous posts :)

Ofcourse to start with his b'day. Home baked cake (not to miss the heart shape), and he'd get not just the first big piece but also more than half of it. 

He always wanted to do what they both did, including read....you can tell by dikshas expression how she'd been pushed aside for him to take center stage

So much bonding

and communion

an everyday welcome from school, he'd almost get confused on who to focus on first

once they settled down

Kiwi....while dhruva and diksha may or may not remember other important days from the family, your b'day is one they both just seem to wake up with on this day. And will still do the cake and deepam....a gesture to the fact that you continue to matter. 

Stability - Ability to Adapt

I came across this when I was doing some research on 'Values'.

It was like an aha moment.

Plus, I very quickly realized how many aha moments it was creating for whoever I spoke to about it, be it friends or clients.

Why?

Because it sounds counter intuitive.

The moment you hear 'stability', you are thinking; fixed, concrete, strong, unmoving

and 'Ability to Adapt', brings to mind contrasting thoughts; like scrappy, fluid, moving, flexible

That's when you pause to think of what 'stability' even means.

It's about how you feel within. A measure of how good you are feeling within yourself and with life around you....your surroundings, with your work, in your relationships, with your eco system, all of it.

And then you see it.

Everything is dynamic...in flux....evolving. Most facets of life are on a continuum, And to experience 'stability' you need to be able to adapt to this dynamic system, within and without.

There are some discrete entities like being married or not married, having a job or not....... yet, your work, avocation, health, financial status, relationship intimacy, and level of happiness are generally continuous, meaning that they can gradually get better or worse.

And that brings us to our 'ability to adapt'.

And this done efficiently, smoothly..........and in alignment with ones values is what enables 'stability'.

Recognizing ones values, plus an ability to adapt......and you have 'feelings, thoughts and actions aligned'......which imho is heaven :)

When Girija changed my life

Present day context: a poem from Girija

It was a wow moment to get up to.

This poem from her was on my phone when I got up day before yesterday, 27th morning.....and ofcourse it brought a smile, a deep down one....hard to even go down to how deep. Even if parts of it, like she said 'are brutally honest".

And as I started to write now, my thoughts started to go back, old memories got evoked, and a whole story came alive.

The poem itself is one I so cherish, and to preserve for posterity where better than here :)

Girija, what touched me is just how well you get me.......and what I admire is how beautifully you put it.....the nice parts, and the tough parts.

Thanks for being that friend who's always there, in moods which are joyous, which are reticent, which are questioning, which are confused and even those that are disastrous.

I'll never forget the day, all of fifteen years back, when I came to your house in JNIDB unannounced and said  "take off today, you can't go to work today, please, I need you", and despite it being a tough day for you, you took off...you went for one meeting, cancelled the rest, and stayed back. 

That day was momentous. The Google in the poem, rather in my life, would not have happened had it not been for you that day.

Let me tell the story:

I'd quit IDBI after thirteen years of service and been a stay home mom for five years. Sure I did farming and salsa and painting and carnatic sangeetham and bharatnatyam even......and all that was nice. But that fateful day, I wouldn't be exaggerating if I said I was at my nadir. I was in pain and drowning. And she held that space.

Through talking to her, I reached this space of  'I think I want to go back to work, any job, I don't care about salary, I don't even care what kind of work, yes, I think I want to restart'

And what do I hear....... "apply to google".

Even through my tears I could only laugh.  Here I was, talking of any any job, and she talks of the one company that's known to be the most difficult in the world to get into. I thought she was bonkers.

But no, she was serious. She started to write out a resume, and I was like "chi girija, that doesn't even sound like me". And she's like "just shut up, either you write it, or you let me write it". 

Finally, she let me write four lines of the cover letter, but everything else was her. And before I knew it, the application was done.

Three months of uncertainty, one exam with 99.6 % as bar and four crazy interviews later............I walked through the portals of Google :)

Girija, for the poem, for that day, and for all that you've been and are..... 🙏

Getting into momentum

It's fascinating to see how, even what you love to do takes energy, focus and effort. 

Maybe it's because what you love to do:

is dynamic 

has components that are not in your control 

is that few notches challenging 

pushes you to better yourself

and so on....

likely, one, some, of all of the above

Writing the blog is one such to me. Much as I love it, the gaps come in, the restart is an effort......and so today I'm resorting back to Seth :)

From Seth

Following in the footsteps of those that came before

No matter how hard you try, you can’t.

After just a few steps, you’ll be slightly enlarging the footprint. By the time six people have done it, the original is completely gone.

Footprints might be a fine compass, but they’re not much of a map. That’s on us.

Missing you more today, daddy

These are moments when I really miss him.

Every birthday he would ask "emi nee age ipudu", and whatever number I gave him, he would have something to say about it, something which made the number suddenly turn positive.

daddy and me.......from the archives...moments forever

His verve and energy for life, his love for trains and planes, for birds and flowers....they never waned, not till the very end.....it was so inspiring. 

If dhruva recognized his love for cinema, and diksha her love for animals, enough to make it into their respective career paths, I wouldn't be surprised if a major factor of influence was daddy. 

He has watched and discussed movies with dhruva from the time he could take dhruva to the theatre to the time dhruva took him to the theatre. Their innumerable trips to the zoo when they were little, just the three of them are like family legend. I would be like "how can you manage both of them daddy", but he was unfazed.

The other day ( a few months back :) when diksha pointed out a star and said "that's sirius no thatha", he was like "how do you know?" and she's like "from you only no thatha".

Our gifts to each other were almost always books. Only the last few birthdays of his, my gift has been artificial flowers as he so loved filling up his study and bedroom with them. 

This one gift of his doesn't cease to touch me. 

For my wedding....somehow the jewellery and sarees and all the other wedding regalia disappears under the meaningfulness of this...... as this is what has stayed, and stares out at me from my bookshelf each day, like it did today.

I miss hearing you say "happy birthday" daddy.

Pan 24 - This May Day

I can feel the energy surge through my fingers just opening this page.

I haven't been here since the 18th of April.  A month before that was each day of an adrenalin high, which inspired and created my pandemic series.

And 19th April, if I may use the term, was like an adrenalin low. 

Life ebbed out. Daddy, may your soul rest in peace.

Daddy left this world as we know it with so much profundity, that at times I feel mom and I are still processing it as we speak each day. There's so much depth and inspiration there that I knew I needed to write.....as much for self as for others. Yet something was holding me back. It's like mom said so beautifully a couple of days back "I am in a space of full acceptance, there is no grief, I'm not feeling anything, but I am still not able to sing" 

Guess blogging to me, is like singing to her.

Today is the 13th day, a symbolic gateway day.....where they say the soul passes on to the next dimension. Maybe that's as literal as it is symbolic.

When I got up this morning, I had this from Google Rediscover:

From a road trip to Coonoor that Diksha and I did four years back.

A dawn and a dusk.   

Today is Diksha's birthday. ("A very happy birthday sweetheart")

The picture seemed to capture the essence of the space....... the dawns and dusks of life. 

They come....they go, and they come again.... so do birthdays ......and at the larger level so does life.

Daddy, you wanted to come back to be a pilot.......should I be saying 'may your soul rest in peace....or welcome back to the possibility of becoming a pilot'. 

Knowing you, and your zest and love for life, it'll likely be the latter, so I'd rather say 'good luck with the new life daddy'  

You are with me forever more too.

Pan 23 - stuff that touches the heart

Diksha has doggy friends wherever she goes. Can be in college, on a beach in mahabalipuram, a cafe in cochin, down our street.....just about everywhere.

I recall, when she got back from Australia for her vacation break in November, she took me to meet one such doggy friend.... a street dog near one of her fav'rite haunts in Jubilee Hills. I was telling her "it's six months since you've been gone deech, how are you going to find him". 

She was a little skeptical too....she wasn't even sure he'd recognize her.  

It was a busy main road.... rd no 10, Jubilee Hills, and in all that traffic there was no way she could call out. She'd named him poofy, but she wasn't sure he'd remember his name. To my total amazement, she had this particular low long whistle.............and sure enough, within minutes there was this super warm reunion :)

This time round when she was back, what with quarantine and lock down, she was concerned for him. She posted on some instagram groups........dog lover groups I think, asking if anyone could feed poofy, and she actually had three responses. I was so surprised..... all from strangers....strangers who thought alike.... so so amazing.

And last week, since her own quarantine ended, she has taken on the onus of feeding stray dogs in our area. Whatever essentials are or are not at home, the supply of bread and biscuits for the dogs are definitely there :)

A little clip of the doggies eating.

Deech, and all the other kids who are doing their bit and beyond to look after the strays which have no way to fend for themselves during this lockdown.........wonderful wonderful work, so proud of all of you !

Pan 22 - So Cute

Another one that diksha sent me. 

While the caption is nicely creative, even the picture made us curious. She researched to find that in a zoo in Canada, this is a frequent occurrence where the otters in the moat around the orangutan's enclosure come up like this quite regularly.

Pan 21 - Towards Better

From Seth

Towards Better

There’s rarely a straight line from here to better.

But there’s usually an arc.

The slog won’t last forever.

And winning streaks aren’t endless either.

As we move through time, we’re often presented with opportunities that are carefully disguised as problems. And every day we’re forced to make a choice. The default might be to hold back, but it’s not the only option.

The chance to move toward better can become a habit.

Pan 20 - Have you ever seen the rain

A few days back we had this sudden really heavy downpour, an actual hailstorm. Diksha and I opened the front door to see if we could collect some of the hail, before we literally got swept back into the house with the force of the rain.

Within a few minutes she created this post for her instagram account with the picture from our terrace.

I felt it was incredibly lovely.........the terrace, the rain and the song...each among my favorites :)

Pan 19 - Seeing Synchronicity

Something we all experience......

It's not often that we actually get to capture it......so when it does happen it gives me a personal high. It's almost like feeling more in tune with the universe.

Synchronicity is not the same as us noticing more of what we have on mind. For instance, if you're thinking of buying a washing machine, you'll start to see more hoardings and ads of washing machines. This is basically tuning into what's already existing.

Synchronicity, on the other hand, is mysterious and meaningful coincidences.

Synchronicity is a concept, first introduced by analytical psychologist Carl Jung, which holds that events are "meaningful coincidences" if they occur with no causal relationship yet seem to be meaningfully related. 

The other day I had three such experiences. And I get excited because it seems to tell me I'm at my optimal frequency.....and it's precious just by virtue of it being rare....as before long something will happen to make life go topsy turvy again. 

It's like my barometer of resonance with my inner self and with the universe. 

The instances, I'll write about as I also want to preserve it for posterity. 

I was listening to this rather powerful meditation on gratitude, one that shifted approach from 'I feel gratitude' to 'I am gratitude'.

I finish listening, and as if on cue I get a message from Anita, an individual who I can quite comfortably say was instrumental in changing my life. I recall the moment the shift began...I was in the middle of a meeting at SELCO...........and she and that began the moment of my shift........and have over this period impacted my awareness, my decision making, my life, my attitudes, my career.....everything. 

It was like the universe telling me this was my chance to express gratitude to her.....and that went onto her joining into the fourteen day meditation program I was doing....a nice level to connect on.

Second was; it was a few days since I'd spoken to a friend, and I'm wondering if I ought to call....and within minutes the call comes in.

They're little incidents......but when your mind picks up the amazement at the coincidence is when you realize they stand for something more.

Fine tune your radar........you'll tune into a subtle but distinctive shift in life !!

Pan 18 - Thanks Dr Praneeth

Dr Praneeth is someone we met during dad's emergency admission into hospital a few months back.

It was under really difficult circumstances that we met him...this was about eight months back when we went into Care Hospital with some apprehension, as daddy's regular doc had left to join at policy level with the central govt.

In the midst of what appears like chaos, but is in reality an emergency being taken under control was the calming presence of Dr Praneeth, who I could see very quietly take over the situation. 

That was all of eight months back.

And like I was telling Dr Praneeth yesterday, he has touched our lives in such deep ways over this period, that it's left an indelible impact.

Infact, there's this book 'when breath becomes air', one which brought out for me how a doctor can heal not just through medication, but also through his very being. Dr. Praneeth reminded me of that. At the cost of sounding a little overboard, I'd still say  'he espouses the very values of the profession....and of being a wonderful human'

We even started on opposite sides of the table in more ways then one. He strongly recommended surgery, while daddy had decided that he didn't want surgery, and it took us time and space to navigate that difference and gradually align.

Any questions we had......it's almost like he knew our thoughts and would take the time out of his crazy busy schedule to make himself available, and enable us to understand, however basic or complex the questions.

He seems to have the ability to say the most difficult things with a 'clarity and kindness' that are remarkable as a combination.

And what's more, in February when we were at the hospital we had mentioned that March 7th was dad's birthday, and how it was a very significant one for him....... and imagine our complete surprise when March 7th, he comes home with his whole team.....and a cake and bouquet of chocolates too.

A gesture that created history in the family... no one in our friends or family circle had ever seen anything like that. 

Dr.Praneeth, Dhruva, Daddy and Praveen.......unfortunately, don't have picture with the rest of the team and the cake. 

It sure made his birthday a more special day.

Dr Praneeth, a simple thanks is not enough, not even many would be....for all that you've been and done through this process..... and lastly for yesterday.....for having allowed us to take daddy back home against medical advise..... for having supported us through that very difficult decision....for having understood that at this point we were catering more to his emotional needs.

And I must add, like mom said, he has this ever present smile..... one which just puts such a pleasant context to each interaction with him. And it's something I personally place a really high premium on too, my blog's not called 'keep smiling....' for nothing see  :)

You will be remembered Dr Praneeth, with admiration and gratitude. 🙏

Pan 17 - A Super Pink Full Moon

Thanks to now spending entire evenings on the terrace, the full moon today came closer not just by virtue of it's being at it's nearest to the earth, but also be becoming part of an entire evening.

It's apparently the biggest and best moon of the year.

Actually it started last night or rather early this morning as the moon set.... it shone so bright through my window that it's light actually woke me up at around 5....imagine :)

When I saw how spectacularly it rose this evening, I not just called diksha out, I also told a few friends as I was talking to them (evenings on the terrace have become walk and talk time). While Diksha got me a few pictures, I was pleasantly surprised to get a couple of pictures from Mumbai, alongwith their 'wows'.

And what's more, Monica who is big time into astrology said this was best time to do a moon meditation and that it was time 'to let go of old patterns' . The thought appealed so I did that too :)

As it rose through the cloud cover

Thanks Vishakha, that's some zoom

Thanks Suvir, that's a beautifully framed picture

Thanks again Suvir, for having added in another, it's stunning

Thanks Deech, that's panoramic

That was one super moon evening (pun intended :)

Pan 16 - Two good pieces

I received these links with the message "two good pieces on it....in case you haven't come across them yet".

One, an article in the NY times magazine which came with the message "it's frighteningly brilliant ! the best you might ever read on the virus"

And the other a write up by Yuval Noah Harari, author of Sapiens, with the message "why good writing and quality journalism is one that regenerates humanity and strengthens liberal democracies by informing them"

https://nymag.com/intelligencer/2020/03/the-story-of-a-coronavirus-infection.html

https://www.ft.com/content/19d90308-6858-11ea-a3c9-1fe6fedcca75

Both totally totally worth reading.

Thanks Swaroop for sharing these.

Pan 15 - Thoughts.....Conversations......Aha's

Will it change the world as we know it ?

As analogy I read somewhere that the way we know time as 'Before Christ' and 'After Christ'.....it will now be 'Before Carona' and 'After Carona'. As big as that.

At an individual level, while Covid has pushed a lot of us back to basics....into the 'life of detail', it has done a lot more.

At an individual level, the space and time to be with ones own thoughts, feelings, sensations.

I've heard people talk of taking up personal level vipassana, people who are delving deeper into meditation, conscious reevaluation, stretching imagination.....

And there's also the collective level. That's even more new.  No single thing has impacted the whole world as covid has.

Collective energy is powerful.

While regular conversations are throwing up words like 'apocalyptic' 'dystopic' 'disruptive'........what's underlying maybe fear of a virus and of death.....there's also no one immune to the fact that the world needed something like this.

I read somewhere how 'ego' is being pushed to be replaced by 'eco'. As subtle and as sweeping as that.

Conversations are also throwing up the deeper stuff. Folks saying this will reveal some truths for a lot of us.....what do our lives stand for..... what do our relationships mean..... what does success mean....what does work mean.

While these questions have always existed, they've always sat on the outer eco system for most, on the fringe for some.....and now it's like the tipping point....it's walked right into the doors for many.

We are being shown the mirror. 

Do we have the courage to see it....at the collective, as also the individual levels.

Pan 14 - Ain't No Sunshine

Why is 'ain't no sunshine' part of my Pandemic series?

Well, yest as I was washing dishes, my radar picked up the song playing behind Diksha's closed door......and what would have been a moment that would have been like 'noticed and passed', grew larger.

She peeped out to say "your song ma.....heard?...... and Bill Withers passed away yesterday". And in response to my look, she goes on "no, not of covid, he was 81, and died of some heart thing".

While I asked her to replay twice as I went back to my dishes, my mind would no longer be contained. It was one of my favorites, in a collection that was not just cherished, but listened to like a million times.

And sure enough it brought up feelings of nostalgia......and nostalgia in it's essence, deep feelings of happiness and of sadness that can take you over.

So a post in tribute to Bill Withers ....  Thanks and Rest in Peace.

Pan 13 - Sparrow on our terrace

This was one of those simply amazing moments

Ones that can occur even in the midst of difficulty and turmoil.

At first I couldn't believe my eyes, I checked and rechecked to see if I wasn't mistaking a munia, or flower bird, or bulbul.....but no it was definitely a sparrow.

And what's more I saw another the next morning, and this time for long enough to get a picture.

I wasn't as excited even when I saw three peacocks on my terrace (yes, that happened once, but then while that was thrilling, seeing how close I live to kbr, guess it still doesn't amount to amazing)

So why is this amazing?

Because sparrows have completely disappeared from the city, for years now, likely over twenty  years......and they were an integral part of our growing up days.

This one appearing was like so, almost potent....an indication of how quickly things can change......how quickly does the earth heal.....how deep is this impact......that kind of thing.

Seeing more stars in the sky has a logical and simple enough explanation.....less smog.

Hearing more birds does too......more silence around... more time to listen, and maybe happier birds too.

But the sparrow.....that is such a wonder.

Pan 12 - Lamp of gratitude...

At this point the underlying, or rather overpowering emotions in the air sit on the spectrum of uncertainty, fear, anxiety, frustration, sadness, worry, boredom......and yes also amazement, wonder, gratitude

Likely more, maybe way more, of the difficult emotions than the happier ones.... essentially because so much change in so little time doesn't allow for processing time.

For this post, I'm picking gratitude.

I realized this as I lit the lamp this morning, and I was overwhelmed with the feeling.

Diksha testing negative was only the immediate and visible part of why. There's so much more to be in gratitude for...... at the micro level and macro level.

Starting from her even being back with us, for dhruva being here too, for my parents being able to cope, for ravi helping them out as much as he is, for being able to connect with family and friends and know they are safe........

for the government showing the kind of leadership and solidarity, for the essential supplies chain continuing to keep us provided, for the grocer remaining open under the circumstances, for medicines being available, for the garbage guy still coming to collect the garbage.......

and a special call out to my kirana guy who even with his shutters down, was willing to give me 'ensure' from the back door for dad...

for the net and phone that have become our connect with the world outside....

for that experience of more birds...and more stars in the sky

and that list goes on.

On the way back from the hospital diksha didn't want to stop anywhere, but I was like "I need match boxes deech". And she's like "ma, how is that an essential item"

I needed it to light the lamp.

I don't have a religious altar at home..... the lamp in my drawing room symbolizes my hotline with the universe. Any conversation happens through it....and today it got named lamp of gratitude :)

Like I heard in a recent talk.....it's about shifting from 'I feel gratitude' to 'I am gratitude'

Can we continue to feel it in 'complete empathy and acceptance' even as we see life unfold in unprecedented and mysterious ways. 

Can gratitude and acceptance become core.

Pan 11 - The Covid test

Based on inputs from the doctors in family, we headed to the 'Government Fever Hospital' in nallakunta........koranti hospital as it's locally called.

When I told diksha we were going to 'fever hospital', she was like "what??? there's a hospital called 'fever hospital'?". 

Well, there is. While it's called the 'Ronald Ross Institute of Tropical and Communicable Diseases', all old hyderabadis will know it as 'koranti dawakhana' or 'fever hospital'.

And strangely enough 'koranti' is the localized word for 'quarantine'. for which this hospital was established all of hundred years back, in what was then the city's outskirts.

While I've passed it a thousand times going to my mom's and ammamma's place of work which was further down the road, I hadn't even seen this massive name board ever.

Infact ammamma had told me a story of how during the plague they had created a shelter  in the area, with a lot of tents, which was mandatory for all people who lived in tiled houses as they would invariably have rats in their rafters....and how some of our relatives had to also move.

My mum also recalls how they would bring the clothes of infected people and burn them at a lake in front of their house, also in the same area (this must have likely been the spanish flu)

Anyways, to come back to the present.....

As we drove there with those tight covid masks on,  I'm telling diksha "how on earth did you wear this mask for all of twenty hours ma........I'm sweating within it.... so much so I think I'm drinking my sweat", and she's like, "chiiiii maaa, just stop talking no" :)

We entered the fever hospital with that tight knot in the pit of the stomach.....guess it represented a mixture of apprehension and anxiety.........not as much of covid at that point, but of just a 'government hospital',  we've all heard enough to feel that way I guess, right?

We drove into an iron gate........down a long driveway (guess that fits for isolation and quarantines), past a spattering of people in coats and masks......and then really old looking boards which read; 'malaria ward'..... 'small pox ward'......the knot getting tighter......and then took a left to ward VII as directed, and drove into a nice parking lot. (an urban relief even amidst covid :)

The hospital itself is a sprawling complex of single storied buildings......old yes, but otherwise nice. The isolation ward we went to had about twenty beds, with new mattresses on each of the beds, the fans were new and working, the bedsheets were old and worn out but visibly just back from laundry.

The bedsheet on diksha's bed had a potent looking stain on it.......and I went hunting for another bedsheet to cover that. Those are also scary moments as you don't know what you can touch and what not. 

Sure it's not your five star corporate hospital, but it's nothing like what people are posting online. People don't seem to have the maturity to reset expectations depending on context. It only reaffirmed to me that people who think negative will be cribbers no matter what, and unfortunately they are the loudest and most visible too.

Infact, as diksha waited for her test, I even braved a peep into the bathrooms, everyone's nightmare right.......and while old, it was yet clean.

And old means really really old....when I was searching online for how old, I found a Hansindia article saying it completed hundred years  in 2015

While everyone in the premises, the doctors, the nurses, the lab assistants were all in their hazmat coats, and talking through their masks....I found each of them pleasant, friendly and efficient.

(While Diksha was the only one in the ward when we went in, within the hour a large bunch of people came in, and I learnt from one of them that they were a team of airport employees who have been doing the passenger covid checks.....and one of their colleagues had tested positive, and that's why they were all asked to take the test)

At first a doctor came in and took a detailed report of diksha's symptoms and some medical background. And then diksha had to wait a while for the lab assistant. Those were her rather tense minutes I think, as she was like "ma, ask them if it will hurt". (it took effort to not let my tears escape)

The test itself is a swab taken from deep inside the throat and the nasal chamber. Not painful at all.

And then it was waiting for the results......twenty four nail biting hours, a twenty four hours that we spent away from talking or even thinking covid.

She tested negative. omg, omg.......the relief experienced is near impossible to describe :)