A thunderstorm

 A terrible spell of thunderstorm and rain struck on the evening of May 29. Despite all the sandy howls preceding the raindrops it’s a blessing against the heated furnace. These pre-monsoon showers save us from getting baked like desert sands. Sometimes they are soothing, breezy with a fine drizzle’s courteous verve; almost like mauve mist at dusk. Other times they come blindly spiraling, unleashing storms of sand, hail and rain. This time it was a thunderstorm. The windstorm broke many trees and nests. But didn’t it scatter the seeds far and wide? In the same way, the adversities that we face in life spread the seeds of our potential on a broader platform. And the new saplings of fresher traits, skills and attitude add to our persona and we emerge a new model of ourselves.

Next morning the garden and the yard present a thoroughly beaten shape under the weather’s robust exhortation. What else is life if not about again putting your house in order once the storms fuelled by larger forces shuffle, ruffle and shake your hair like a big neighborhood bully roughening up a little coy boy?

The marigolds are ok more or less. They are in shade and being under the shadows of bigger trees has its advantages. They may feel jaded about bigger trees bossing over them. But being big has its disadvantages also. You are front in the line of assault by still bigger forces. A few bricks, put on the garden wall, fell upon the marigolds. That’s incidental, a chance fall in a particular plant’s fate. They don’t complain. The crushed plant is showing signs of recovery.

The babbler couple’s nest-making assignment is stalled. It was three-quarter complete. But I think they will have to redo it. And surely they will. They are too absorbed in their work to complain. Aloe vera is mauled. Its pot fell and broke. The badly wounded plant gets a ground hold now. Mother earth herself is its new pot now where it can spread its roots to the depths it wants. It’s injured and it will take some time to recover but when it will, there will be open earth for it to bloom. Adversities, sufferings and pain usually carry the prospects of a bigger stage in their wake.

Probably the hibiscus under the parijat in a corner envied the other one basking in full glory under open skies. The former (red-flowered) must have nurtured a complex against the latter (the white-flowered one). The white-flowered hibiscus grew nicely and quickly added bulk to its canopy. The other one had limited options that gave it a bit less than moderate growth. Now the storm has given a severe bashing to the fat one. It has fallen and it needs surgery to get its overgrown mass pruned to give it a chance of life and to make it stand again. So maybe our apparent limitations and disadvantages save us from storms, like this red-flowered one is almost unscathed as if there has been no storm at all.

Flower pots tumbled, a few breaking and others getting cracks as bricks fell from the top of the garden wall. All this exposed little colonies of slugs that were enjoying their soft, silky solitude in their damp hideouts. They are fat leech-like snails, a kind of shell-less snail. Some are squashed to pulp and juice. A wailing refrain never helps during the times of such tragedies. With sadly pervasive air, though with apparent lamenting rectitude, the others are very slowly crawling back to their preferred damp, hidden corners and crevices. A slug must be carrying some repugnant slime to deter the birds from having a burger or cream-roll because I have seen many of them happily going at their snail pace in broad daylight, right in the middle of the yard and hardly any birdie guy interested in them. Well, they are regrouping now. The little world in the vandalized yard and the small garden is also trying to get back to shape.

That’s what life is. We just try to regroup and retake our shapes after being shaken by storms. It cannot just be only about manifold rhythmic recitals, dolefully dewy delights and starry sights. There will surely be times when the circumstances beyond our control, fuelling themselves with a pernicious passion, will shake-break ruffle-shuffle tear-shear our established order. Be sure that they will do this with immaculate cynicism. Then dear readers it becomes our duty to keep the holy edifice of our values and principles intact and don’t allow these to seep out of us along with our broken spirits. You have to walk through the debris in the direction of that mystically mingling mist lurking over the horizon. You may be just a silent shadow of your illustriously kicking past but you are duty-bound to keep travelling and allow things to get stabilized and then you can try to take a firm grip on your situation. 

The clever bania

 The following happens to be tau Hoshiyar Singh’s favorite quip, or fable or moralizing story that sums up his life’s totem, exquisitely outlined in his rheumy old eyes full of wisdom—don’t mess with fools, they will have someone of their own ilk to handle them. A subdued veracity and virtuous fragrance honed in the cauldron of a tough peasant life. It turns almost into a kind stimulating spirituality even though these old farmers hardly care about religion, rituals or spirituality. A rough summary of his story goes like this:

The knuckle of a crooked index finger itches to have a tasty strike at a just-shaved head. The naughty barber felt water-mouthed at the sight of a shining just-shaved head, his own handiwork with a glee in the eyes and a gloating heart. As if dying to put warmth of life into his frosty fingers, he gave into the impulse and got a sadistic tonk at the customer’s head, who happened to be a cool-headed baniya. The man of trade and shop-keeping well versed with the boons of patience and non-reaction in the face of provocation. A reaction spoils the game; a calculated response makes opportunities for you. The strike was naughty, playful and a bit more than a casual friendly banter. He could feel the pinch of its impact. After all, it was done with a sadistic glee.

The baniya kept his composure and almost self-denyingly paid an extra anna for the knuckle-tonk on his shaved head. The barber, proudly pleased with this addition of skills, thought it pays extra to give a naughty tonk with the knuckle of an itching index finger. ‘Maybe it tickles a satisfying nerve on the scalp, making the customer happy,’ he thought.

Then a Jat wrestler came to get his head shaved. It was a shinier and bigger head, almost a new, shining clay pot, a gracefully symmetrical shape pleading at him for initiation into a fresh, auspicious start; very attractive and pleading for a knuckle strike to get inaugurated like a bell strike in a temple. So expecting some extra bonus, and egged on by the inspiring anecdote dating a couple of days back, the barber performed the ritual again. As can be expected the rough and rowdy Jat wrestler, carrying a dangerous shiftiness in mood, plonked him all over the body with crude slaps and fist-work and threw him around like a sack of potatoes a few times practicing dhobipat since the opportunity presented itself. ‘Hai mar gya!’ the barber cried.

Having received the news the baniya visited the barber. ‘You got it the very same day when I paid you the extra anna for it. I had paid you for your folly, not skills,’ he consoled the sullen, blackened and bruised barber. 

The groom-hunting squad

The villagers fondly called him Pahalwan. And pretty aptly so; just that he would look suitable for wrestling with skeletons only, having just a slight addition of skin over the bones. A wrestler of extreme feather-weight category I would say.

Those were the days when the fabled Indian arranged marriage was at the peak of its authority over the society. It churned out fabulous pairs. Six-footer burly guys got paired with thin, midget-sized gals. Or an above six feet girl had a tiny dulha whom she could easily carry in her arms like a baby. Or an extra-heavy girl had a thin groom whom she could easily crush with her weight. Or a prince charming in looks got a wife that would make anyone run for life after looking at her face. Or a demon-looking guy got a heavenly houri.

People would just fall into the pools of matrimony with a distinctly unassuming self, sweetly giving into the tersely teasing illusions of youthful desires. It was more of a draw of lots. Luck was the supreme decider in what did you get. It could be a grain of sand or it could be a nugget of gold. Those were but extreme cases. Most of the time it was a rundown mix of all the good and bad in both sexes involving physicality and natures. And with all the expected frictions, altercations, fights and quarrels the creaking cart of matrimony would drag on with its drama. Despite all the triggers, there was no tear-jerking drama. The teasing travails of a rough and tough countryside life made a motley mix of everything available.

Beyond brooding over twisted destinies and doomed fates, after the brief spells of buck-passing, the sediments settled at last, and people usually accepted what fell in their lot and moved on with life. The seamless conundrum of marriage carried a huge social sanction and breaking it on such inconsequential grounds would amount to breaching social and divine law. So divorces and partings were an exception even though the husband and wife were the most ill-paired ones.

During those days, parties of elders from the girl’s side would go scouting for a groom. They walked authoritatively in a file, wearing starched dhoti-kurta, carrying well-oiled sticks and their big turbans fitting majestically like warrior helmets for the groom hunt in the battle of matrimony. They carried an onus to hunt successfully. Someone would recommend a name and there they would go creating ripples of excitement among the youngsters of marriageable age.

A party on scout for a suitable groom arrived suddenly at the house of this Pahalwan. He hadn’t been forewarned. He hardly got any time to turn presentable. He was washing clothes on a stone slab wearing only a sleeveless vest. They stood around him. He panicked like a little hare hounded by old turbaned wolves. The leader of the expedition inspected him closely and calmly said the words of wisdom becoming his age, in fact chimed matter-of-factly, ‘Don’t take him for pheras, take him to a doctor!’ The file of groom hunters walked out silently. 

The actor

 Life is a big drama and one needs to be a good actor to wade through tricky plots. The acting skills aren’t just for professional actors. They are for all of us. Like Uttam proves it very successfully. He has his age-old little Maruti 800 and loves driving it fast. He is hesitant in lowering the speed to a safe level while taking sharp turns. It gives the look and feel of a racing car. The passengers would get goose-bumps.

This particular day, there is a brand new Eco-sport in front of him. Two burly drunks—drunk with youth and pride which is a far more dangerous cocktail than mere wine and spirits—are driving their small SUV pretty fast. Then they put up breaks suddenly. Uttam’s old little car decimates the back-bumper of their new, big car. Now as per self-derived traffic law on Indian roads, it’s always the fault of the one who happens to bang from behind—even if the vehicle in front suddenly puts up breaks to come to a screeching halt from a speed of 150 miles/hour.

Uttam is well aware of the law. He sees them getting down. They look capable of giving a painful thrashing. All of us need acting skills to survive. He acts well in this regard. He has performed the feat to good effect a few times. He slumps over the steering wheel and is found fainted due to the impact. A crowd builds up. The two aggressive guys are on the back-foot now. A mob also has its law. It sympathizes with the underdog, the small man pitted against the big guy. Our five senses allow us to observe the fake finery only. Fainted Uttam is secretly listening to each chime, trill, thud, shout and whisper. He has fervent faith in the crowd’s law. A new car’s terribly twisted bumper loses value in the face of a fainted driver of an old, little car. Public anger is ominously smoldering. The mob then becomes meanly mechanized for dispensing justice. A mob carries multi-layered sensitivities. You just need a little needle to prick them to action. The politicians do it wonderfully.

The big guys of the bigger car know they have to forego their sadistic vengeance and promptly run away to save any trouble that is building around. Uttam is then treated softly, gently and caressed by caring hands. And a miracle happens. Who says love isn’t a magic potion? It’s man! Uttam slowly recovers. This time he acts even better, getting into consciousness by degrees to make it look realer than the real. First he mutters something, then moves a little, performs weird contortions of face a few times, gives gasping sighs and slowly comes back to life. Vow, the confident metaphors of a part played well! Thanks to the marvelous Bollywood masala movies all of us can learn similar acts befitting different adverse situations in life.

This acting assignment fetches him instant rewards. He saves at least ten to fifteen thousand rupees that the big car bullies would have plundered from him. He also saves himself from a minimum of half dozen slaps that would have preceded the bargain. Acting is very profitable—in life, in movies, in soap operas everywhere. 

Feeble footprints of little moments on a mundane day

 It’s either a mature millipede or a baby centipede. It’s crawling in the verandah. Centipedes aren’t cool to have around. But squashing them on the floor with a chappal strike should be avoided. It’s a form of life having a meaning of its own. Why become the cause of its untimely demise unless completely unavoidable. I take a big guava leaf and put it in its path. And there it goes over the garden wall to become a part of the larger game in the open. Dear friends, practicing kindness at such small levels, at the level of ounces in quantity, may douse the seed of hate in us, lying predatorily to get sustenance from small acts of cruelty and flare sometime as a monstrous fire.

Practicing kindness, however small quantitatively, still sweetens the soul because each work of charity and kindness carries the same divine quality of love irrespective of the small or big nature of the task. Enlightened will doesn’t pour down upon us from the heaven. We have to work for it, gently pry away layer after layer of our rigidities and reach the stream of fluidities. And the littlest acts and thoughts of kindness and charity are the scalpels in our hands to accomplish the task.

The babblers are making a nest on the small parijat tree. Given their querulous ways, they are usually successful in raising their brood; just like the doves are generally unsuccessful in completing a successful nesting due to their docile ways. The doves then cry amidst groundswell of sorrows for a couple of days. Who would feel a dove’s suave sensitivity? It’s a tough world. All those who take advantage of the doves’ coyness get on the backfoot while tempering with the babblers’ nest. Squirrels, crows, shikra, cats and even snakes get forewarned. Not many of them have the lungpower to bear up with their high-pitched verbal resistance. Their war songs are exhaustively lavish. The garden would lose its calm though because the babblers keep shouting imprecations at all and sundry throughout the day. Is this world fit for angry, shouting people only?

But there is scent in the air that overpowers noisy babbler notes. It’s a big joint family in the neighborhood. A happy and full of life group of people. There are a few young and adolescent boys and girls. Youth has its own special, seamless, musical versatility. If you are receptive to others’ joy, you can also warm your old bones, sitting elderly by the bonfires of youth around you. They are going to Manali for summer vacations. I was acquainted with this fact about the trip. But this morning, the entire locality got heavily clouded with Deo fragrance as the youngsters sprayed the entire bottles on them. We have lost most of the flowers, and also the sweetness in our souls, so even artificial smell will do. But isn’t it too heady and heavy? It’s like you just need a cube of simple sugar but you get saccharine. A case of overdose.

Nothing beats the sublimity and tantalizingly exotic touch of the petals on your olfactory senses. The blinding blizzard let out by Deo bottles is almost like an irresponsible adventurism. But even Deo smell will do in a creeping climate of hate, phobias and drain stench. In any case I wish them a happy journey.