Mountain air

Sonny boy’s imagination can make me smile even at the most harried times.

This morning, the heater was not working in the downstairs bathroom, and so, shooed him to the upstairs bathroom. Now the heater there has a leak (yeah, our heaters are like that only) and so the inlet or outlet or whateverlet tap above the false ceiling is kept closed until time of use. The time of use was at hand, but us less-than-6ft-tall people cannot reach the danged thing so I had to holler for the husband to come and open up the tap so the hot water would flow…

After all that unusual activity we were running late for school and as usual something had to be missing. This time, it was the bottle of Vaseline. The blessed bottle was nowhere to be found. (Later, much later, I found it in the downstairs bathroom!) So I took the Himalaya moisturizer that I am currently using and started to apply.

"Mmmmmmm…." Sonny boy sniffed appreciatively. "Nice smell, no Amma? It smells of ..of.. hills and mountains and all that, no?"

I looked at him squarely and continued my applying. And then the penny dropped. Himalaya.
Sonny boy bent down to where I was applying cream on his toes, to get a better look at my face and see if I appreciated the mountain air as well. So I was smiled back at him

He continued.. "how do they get the mountain air into the bottle, Amma? Its a wonder, no? All that leaves and flowers and…animals... and "
So something from all those drives through Nagarhole has indeed percolated into the young man's consciousness..
Indeed it would be wonderful if they could bottle all that, Sonny boy.

Housefullllll

The home was teeming with people the last 2 weeks.

From Sonny boy's viewpoint, 4 grandmothers, 1 grandfather, 2 aunts, and 1 cousin.
With of course the Acha, Amma and Sonny boy and eternally adolescent dog.
I hated coming away to office and Sonny boy would linger over goodbyes while leaving for school. All of them save one, being ladies and relatives from my side of the family, I think the Acha might have been a tad relieved to get out of the house for a while.

The happiest persons were of course Sonny boy and the dog. The dog was ensured of feet anywhere he chose to lie down and Sonny boy would get at least one person at any time of his waking hours to play with him. Given that his B'day had just gotten over, there were heaps of games.
But what we enjoyed the most was carroms. The oldies enjoyed renewing their carrom skills and handled Sonny boy's whines at not winning quite affably.
Day one saw Sonny boy in mutinous mood, hands akimbo and face turned into the sofa.
Day two saw him tentatively flexing his fingers at the game, never mind that he got the striker into the pocket more often than he had the coins.
Day three saw him getting better at winning and losing.

They left in pairs.
The aunt and cousin first.
Then 1 grandie and another aunt.
Then 2 more grandies.
Now 2 are left.

And I'm trying to make them stay for as long as possible....

Sonny boy and toys.

A curious Sonny boy wondered aloud: Acha, when you were not born and Gandhiji was not born, and there were only dinosaurs, were there toys???

The last month or so, he has been in a tizzy of excitement over what toys he can possibly get for his B'day.
He's asked lots of people to come- everybody he sees almost. And he was overheard telling his Ammamma yesterday, with a wide grin- there is not even going to be place to SIT in the house! I wonder If I'm going to be the one to be surprised on his birthday!!

Given that these days everything spins in our house - the plate, the pen, the school book, the soap, himself!... the Beyblade is of course a must. I never thought I'd mourn the Ben 10 days, but I find that I do. At least Ben'd stay with the boys, and not intrude into the homespace.

And then there's something called a Piranha Panic. We have no idea what this is, except that this morning, the Acha had a nasty surprise when Sonny boy told him that he's promised to get him Piranha Panic for his B'day.
On being asked what it was, he gave a garbled version of fishes and piranha and bites and fishing lines..

Acha and Amma were totally befuddled.
Amma; Who else has it, Sonny boy?
Sonny boy: Nobody has it. I'm going to be the first to get it. *A big smile*
Acha: Where did you see this?
Sonny boy: The advertisement used to come on TV. On Cartoon Network, Acha. But now everybody knows about it, so it doesn't come any more.

LOL. He sure knows the basics of a media plan for sure.
But that means that we have to probabby google for what the Piranha Panic is.

This year, I've put a foot firmly down on any expensive toys for him, bearing in mind that he has ZILCH care or consideration for his toys. I try to make him put away his toys after playing, but then, our maid, who's of the old school, believes that I'm a cruel nag and tells me to not put the 'paapa Chinnu' to such distress and does the needful herself as much as she can.

And I've noticed that he enjoys games we can join in playing with him. So this year, we plan to give him a carrom board. Which is something that all of us can play. And also something that his friends can play when they come over. Its a tad noisier than the general board games of snakes and ladders and ludo and the like.
The Acha wrinkled his nose and said that a carrom board was not a BIRTHDAY gift. But then, I put my foot down. Why does a gift have to be expensive?? Seems to me that we're falling more and more into the trap of using money to make up for our lack of physical presence around Sonny boy. As a compromise, we also got him a cricket set.and now of course there will be this Piranha thing as well.

I'm always putting my foot down when the Acha discusses a particularly expensive gift. I keep telling him that when we were growing up, we considered ourselves lucky if we got more than one gift. And the gifts were mostly books which we enjoyed so much. He counters this telling me that its precisely because we didn't get it, that he wants to indulge Sonny boy.

We agree to disagree on this point. Its as much his son as its mine and he has a right to indulge him in ways he thinks fit. Mostly, on matters of discipline we share a common ground, though he is a way more indulgent parent.
And I'm quite often the no-parent. The one who's alway saying no.

Anyway I digress. So his B'day is on Feb 25th and he's been counting the days from the New Year onwards. I'm hoping that this year, he gets the toys he dreams about and he learns to value and take care of them.

I still have a big cardboard box of his toys left unopened after we shifted to our current house. Its been three years since we moved (!) and those toys are still awaiting deliverance. There are plenty of other toys that he's got since, that clutter the floor randomly at varying times of the day. And so I've been thinking that I'll donate those toys to an orphanage along with the old clothes that are another unopened box. Couple of boxes, cos they have mine and the Acha's too in addition to the BIL's (who was staying with us before we moved).

Sigh. I HAVE to clean up the house before partytime. And I SO don't have the time!

And YES! After ages of wanting to do so, I finally added some more names to my reading list. Dipali, you're the inspiration. I LOVED those pickled limes of yours.... :-)
The list is not complete by any means, but then, it'll never be, I guess....

Steely anniversary to us

I'd meant to do a thingie post every day to lead up to today. But they sure mean it when they say time flies. So here I am with just one thingie post to this blog's credit- on what is our eleventh wedding anniversary.

Given that we pretty much arranged our own marriage, I love that we were able to make it on Republic Day. Neither of us realised at the time ( we were both so glad to be finally tying the knot) how wonderful it would be to have your anniversary on a holiday ALWAYS.

Looking back on that day, we both were like a pair of teenagers.... I couldn't keep my grin off my face while getting ready, and my Moothamma finally threw up her hands in frustration, saying, "ok, ok, smile for now, but once we reach the temple, adangi-othingi irikkanam". She meant that I'd have to act the docile bride. Given that I had never in my life been docile, ever, of course I gave her advice/admonition not a second thought.

But when it came to about 10 minutes before the muhurtham without a sign of the groom and party, the beam began to lose its sheen a bit. Where on EARTH was he????? Turned out the party was late cos of a traffic block on account of some Republic Day function on the way. And you came hurrying into the temple with that trademark grin on your face.

From then till today, it has been 11 Republic Days. 11 years of fun, love and laughter... quarrels and fights and hurts, and forgiving and forgetting... 5 different homes, one son and one dog.. and it continues...

I cannot imagine me with any other person, my darling. And if you were to see this as I write, your tongue-in-cheek ripartee would be that no other person would stand me for what I am.

Here's to many more years of love and happiness, sweetheart, many more years of being the yang to my yin. Love you!

Thingie Post.

Thanks, Sue for the idea.

So, next week, its going to be 11 years of living with the man, as it were. And I figure that if the Sue can be so generous as to write 30 things about her man, I can go upto at least a dozen.

The thing I like about him is that he follows "Little Women" even if he didn't like it as much as I did. He tries never to let the sun go down upon his anger.
Never mind that half the time he's the one who started the row in the first place, even if he hasn't, he's always been the first one to patch up.

Whereas for me, I'd still be thinking dire thoughts of him 2 days later. Sigh.

gourmet tastes

does Sonny boy have.

For breakfast he'd like- Dosa
Morn' Snack- Dosa
Lunch- Dosa
Eve' snack- Dosa
Dinner- Dosa.

Any time we're on the road and stop somewhere for eats, we don't need to ask Sonny boy what he'll have. For no matter whether its breakfast,lunch,dinner or just a snack, his preference is going to be
DOSA!!!!

I know I should probably be counting my blessings, but.... Aaaargh!

Forget the microwave, I should probably have invested in a tabletop grinder. gah! No wonder I'm not a baking goddess. And whoever heard of a dosa goddess?

Separation

By now she knew that bags being packed and much rushing to and fro, lugging clothes around didn’t harbour pleasant tidings for her.
‘They’ were going to go off somewhere without ‘her’.
She knew it. But in her heart of hearts she hoped. And so, when the Acha asked her out for a late-night drive, she jumped joyfully, her tail wagging nineteen to the dozen.

Alas. The Acha was only dropping her off at the kennel. And this time the stay turned out to be for 10 loooong days.

10 days when she was quite the Lonely Lady. And 10 days in which the even the normally pretending-to-be-immune-to-her-charms Acha was forced to say, “if ‘she' were here, she’d be there”- looking at the vacant cushion by the bed.
Amma was of course missing her every second.
And Sonny boy was was heard often saying "If Trinity was here she'd be doing this" Or that. He was also heard regretting that she wasn’t there to eat his leftovers.

But all that’s changed. She’s back! And we’re together again.
And if there was a song Trinity could have been singing this morning when she gambolled like a deer- a druken one at that- through the doors of her home, and jettisoned herself on the waiting Acha, it would be

Apne hi bas mein nahin main
Dil hain kahin toh hoon kahin main...

... aaj phir jeene ki tamanna hain!

We lurrrve you too, my darling!