Posts
Of Periamma(Periappa's wife) and mom hitting the bed barely before midnight, thinking of the idlis that need to be made in 3-4 hours and wondering if they might as well start now
Of the first burst of cracker before ganga snanam
Of going in order of age starting with thatha(dragging him) for the first rocket
Of references to some morbid pencil cracker in the days of yore(!) so we never bought any for many years
Of asirvadhams in anticipation of the money
Collecting the money across all the cousins and dreaming of spending it all on crackers again and realizing it is enough for a family picnic
Of writing essays in tamil about naragasura and deepavali
Of Paati mandrams
Of spending an entire afternoon with biglis, with another older cousin saying she(I) is ready for them, without realizing others treated as a bore
Of putting a hole in cousin's saree each diwali while holding the agarbathi that thankfully she never got upset about and doesnt even remember now( may you all be blessed with cousins like that)
Of Paati deciding Deepavali/other major festivals dont have to be joint affair anymore - just a gradual transition as families got bigger
Of spending the entire day visiting each others houses
Of cousin's husband marveling at how deepavali was celebrated in the family
Of pouring over the cracker list, balancing between the expensive 1000 wallah, rockets and other veedis
Of the bottles that are needed for rockets
Of parachutes that never landed in the launching homes
Of the vedis carrying mom's name, so brother would call her out before bursting each one of them
Of the first Deepavali on moving to the city of my birth when my brother burst the vedi at 4.00am, startling the neighbour - neighbour switched on the lights, looked at us and went back. City didnt start the celebration at 4.00am
Of the storms, rains and associated power cuts coinciding with deepavali often enough
In the City of my birth, deepavali often was a lottery conducted by weather gods
Moving here, across oceans, deepavali was/is always a weird day,
A day with memories of the mega festival in the head and no traces of it in the surrounding
Of marveling at the thousand July 4 fireworks on chennai sky on couple of diwalis when I managed India trips during diwali
I have realized quite a while ago, home is where Parents are. Whereever they are, whether it is in India or one bedroom apartment I used to stay in or sibling's homes - parents followed the same routines, procedures that it created home.
But Diwali - no. It stays in the memories in the head.
Of the first burst of cracker before ganga snanam
Of going in order of age starting with thatha(dragging him) for the first rocket
Of references to some morbid pencil cracker in the days of yore(!) so we never bought any for many years
Of asirvadhams in anticipation of the money
Collecting the money across all the cousins and dreaming of spending it all on crackers again and realizing it is enough for a family picnic
Of writing essays in tamil about naragasura and deepavali
Of Paati mandrams
Of spending an entire afternoon with biglis, with another older cousin saying she(I) is ready for them, without realizing others treated as a bore
Of putting a hole in cousin's saree each diwali while holding the agarbathi that thankfully she never got upset about and doesnt even remember now( may you all be blessed with cousins like that)
Of Paati deciding Deepavali/other major festivals dont have to be joint affair anymore - just a gradual transition as families got bigger
Of spending the entire day visiting each others houses
Of cousin's husband marveling at how deepavali was celebrated in the family
Of pouring over the cracker list, balancing between the expensive 1000 wallah, rockets and other veedis
Of the bottles that are needed for rockets
Of parachutes that never landed in the launching homes
Of the vedis carrying mom's name, so brother would call her out before bursting each one of them
Of the first Deepavali on moving to the city of my birth when my brother burst the vedi at 4.00am, startling the neighbour - neighbour switched on the lights, looked at us and went back. City didnt start the celebration at 4.00am
Of the storms, rains and associated power cuts coinciding with deepavali often enough
In the City of my birth, deepavali often was a lottery conducted by weather gods
Moving here, across oceans, deepavali was/is always a weird day,
A day with memories of the mega festival in the head and no traces of it in the surrounding
Of marveling at the thousand July 4 fireworks on chennai sky on couple of diwalis when I managed India trips during diwali
I have realized quite a while ago, home is where Parents are. Whereever they are, whether it is in India or one bedroom apartment I used to stay in or sibling's homes - parents followed the same routines, procedures that it created home.
But Diwali - no. It stays in the memories in the head.