“Dinner? Again? We Just Ate Yesterday!”

 

Have I ever talked about one more bete noir of mine before? I have a feeling that I have hidden this aspect of my life in shrouds and I do not like to unearth this side of my psyche unless forced to!

I have been told that the best way to treat delusional trauma is to speak about it with your psychoanalyst. And since I live in India, where going to a psychiatrist is considered more scandalous than coming out of the cupboard, I’m appointing you all, yes, the whole world as my psychoanalyst. Consider this my therapy session.

For the last thirty-five years I wake up planning the days menu. That is three full meals and snacks as and when required. There have been breaks (I have to confess!) when we have been on holidays (though I still have to decide what to eat) when I have been ill and when we go out on our frequent meal hunting episodes during the week, but mostly it’s been me, my kitchen, and the menu.

The most difficult part is the menu of course specially when the children were young. If one wanted rice the other would like roti, if one wanted Italian the other would want Spanish and so on and so forth. Now we are just the two of us. You would think that life is a cake walk in the paradise of eating, unfortunately our inner desires which had been strictly under check through our growing up years has broken through all the locks, all barriers have been broken down and we do not hesitate to speak aloud our thoughts!

I have no problems with breakfast; I have a varied menu to choose from; I am an expert at the dishes that we both like; I do not even have to plan for it. I can whip up a mouthwatering breakfast any day.

Lunch is the tricky part. For thirty years I have had to fend for myself for lunch. The brats had tiffin, lord and master also had tiffin or ate at work café. So I either fasted (If I was trying to lose weight!) or made myself a sandwich. Now with Work from home I need to plan an elaborate meal (means other that rice and dal at least three different items). I do cheat a lot – when I am in a cooking frenzy I cook more than required and spread it over the week or rehash old stuff to look like new!

Dinner of course is something I would love to obliterate from the world! I always run out of ideas here (Unless we are going out) I would be quite happy to settle for soup and pasta or a baked casserole. Unfortunately, I have a hungry partner who wants a full four course meal even after a seven-course lunch and there again I am at the grind stone!

 Some people find cooking therapeutic, the slow chopping of onions, the simmering of masalas, the gentle bubbling of something wholesome on the stove. Me? I find it exhausting.

Before you even touch a pan, you need to decide what to eat. That alone can feel like a full-time job. Scrolling through recipes, trying to balance nutrition, budget, and what’s actually in the fridge, it’s draining.

Thirty minutes to prep, forty minutes to cook, ten minutes to clean up. That’s nearly an hour and a half for something I’ll eat in 12 minutes. Is it worth it? I could be doing something better (scrolling reels, playing games, or gossiping on WhatsApp!)

One pot turns into three. There’s chopping boards, knives, plates, and somehow, a mysterious sticky patch on the counter that wasn’t there before. This part of cooking is something I do like so I am not complaining!

I think I was born a sous-chef: happy to hover, clean, and assist, but allergic to being the one in charge. Once in a while the partner (now a days anyone you cohabit with is a called a partner not husband, boyfriend or lord and master!) loves to cook. He has almost given up on me trying to cook mutton the way he likes it, so he cooks it (takes about three hours and the kitchen turns into a battlefield, I am not complaining!) I enjoy it a lot.

Somebody presented me with a fridge magnet as shown in the picture. My Niece who was a little girl that time looked at it with interest and then read it out and spoke aloud, “This means you never cook!”

There’s so much guilt attached to not wanting to cook, like it makes you lazy, irresponsible, or less “adult.” But here’s the truth: food is about nourishment, not performance. If you hate cooking, that doesn’t mean you’re failing at life. It just means you value your time and energy differently.

Some people garden. Some people knit. Some people make pasta from scratch. I don’t. And that’s okay.

 

Shifting Horizons: The Generational Dilemma

 

 

Growing up in the seventies and eighties in India felt remarkably similar no matter which state you came from or which language you spoke. Middle-class children across the country were raised with a shared set of values: discipline, respect for elders, and a firm belief in the power of education. Childhood meant simple pleasure, playing in the streets with friends, sharing meals with neighbours, and celebrating festivals with unrestrained joy.

Summer holidays were sacred pilgrimages to our grandparents’ homes. Mornings began with a glass of milk and a dose of advice: “Read the newspaper every day; it will improve your language and thought process,” our grandfathers would say. (I agree with them now, but back then I only wanted to rush off to play or sneak in a comic book—which, incidentally, was frowned upon.) Grandmothers would try to teach us cooking by explaining our favourite recipes, perhaps hoping we’d absorb their culinary wisdom.

Looking back, the gender bias is obvious. Girls were asked to speak softly, sit properly, and argue less. Not having a brother made me louder and more assertive in school, as if I had to defend myself. Yet, in the company of elders, I became the picture of obedience, eyes downcast, mind wandering into my stories.

Our news came from newspapers and the grapevine of telephone calls and tea parties. We were passive recipients, overhearing scandals and successes rather than actively scrolling for them.

Today, I marvel at how much has changed. Millennials, Gen Z, and now Gen Alpha live in an entirely different ecosystem. Letter writing is nearly extinct. Phone calls are rare. Newspaper reading? Almost gone. Communication now thrives through apps, messaging, shopping, gaming, meetings, each transforming language itself. “You” becomes “U,” “you’re” becoming “u’r.” As the younger generations say, “Not a big deal.” Perhaps they’re right.

News too has transformed. People get updates from apps or from irresistible reels crafted by professionals or simply by anyone with a smartphone. The fourth estate is no longer a single institution but millions of citizen journalists, each with their own lens. Yet this democratization is also dangerous, fake images, AI-generated videos, and political propaganda swirl together, convincing enough to deceive the untrained eye. Truth feels negotiable, and democracy can slip into the tyranny of a single narrative.

the truth is being twisted to suit the news. The fourth Estate has by and large been so corrupted that we have to stop believing our eyes and ears.

And yet, even in this fragmented digital landscape, we find comfort. In a world of remote work, fewer neighbours, and fading festivals, reels and short videos tell warm stories of resilience, mental health, and shared struggles. Strangers online can feel like kindred spirits.

The world—technical, economic, and social—is vastly different from what it was forty years ago. But human creativity persists. We adapt, innovate, and find meaning. So here’s a cheer for Gen Z and beyond. If I’m reborn as part of Gen F, I hope to witness an even more stupendous and brave new world.

 

A Letter of Romance

 

 

Dearest Darling,

It has been a tough week without you! I have so wanted to run and gather you in my arms that both my heart and stomach hurts. The golden-brown crispiness that you personify is like the sirens of the Greek mythology, I cannot but drift and be embroiled in your coils.

The soft opening and closing of the doors, the surreptitious glances and the tenterhooks of deep desire, the ecstatic joy and the final fulfilment. I really miss them.

How long can I keep up this yearning under wraps? How much longer need I catfoot around the obvious? How may I skirt the main issue of being faithful?

I know you are there waiting for me. All I need to do is unveil the truth of my heart. But I am a coward in both aspects of my double life. “To be or not to be” is the question, that hammers in my skull exactly at eleven a.m. and four p.m.

I need you. I am desperate. I will give myself a couple of days more then it has to be either here or there.

Will I give you up or continue to be in a clandestine relationship is what the next forty-eight hours will unveil to my psyche. I will be brave enough to take the bull by the horns and follow my destiny. Only You can help me ….

Yours forever

Whatever Happens.

 
I have written similar letters in my mind many times. Have I ever sent them anywhere? No I haven’t! Not because I am a prude (as my family calls me!) but the recipient is uneducated, illiterate and has no brains whatsoever. How would the receiver then understand the poignancy of the yearning and desire that besets me?

It’s not that you’re grand or glamorous. You’re small, quick, secretive, a crust here, a lick there, a bite of cheese while “just checking” if it’s still good. You thrive in the shadows between real meals, and somehow you convince me you’re invisible. “We don’t count,” you whisper, like a guilty crush. And I believe you.

When I’m waiting for the microwave to ding, you’re there. When I’m staring blankly into the fridge, hoping for answers to life’s problems, you’re there. You’re my little stolen moments, my snack confessions, my delicious denials. You’re not an indulgence, you’re research.

By now you would have guessed the ‘lover’ in my hidden life.

Oh, Half a Cookie, you’re so selfless. You break in two just so I can convince myself I’ve only eaten “part” of you. Sweet Broken Chips at the bottom of the bag, you don’t count because you’re “basically seasoning”

You’ve been my co-conspirator, my secret ally, my tiny rebellions against portion control. I know the scale knows about you. I know my jeans know about you. But still, when the clock hits 11 a.m. and I’m standing in front of the snack cupboard like it’s an oracle, you’re there — a crumb, a bite, a spoonful of comfort.

Will I then be able to fight the inevitable and squash this desire into shapeless crumbs? The forty-eight hours will soon pass and as I stand against the tide, the sea salt in my crisp will awash my determination and the sands beneath my feet will give way to your dominant personality and I shall be Scarlette to your Rhett. All my resilience and strength will be “Gone with the wind”.

So here’s to you, my invisible indulgence. We both know you count. We just won’t say it out loud. “And so, until tomorrow, my beloved crumbs, I remain yours — secretly but irrevocably.”

 

A new battle!

 

Those who follow my blogs will know that one of my bete noires is the Pigeon! I will not go into the distant history of my various battles which began when I was a teenager but has begun in the last four years.

In our new apartment, we have sizable balcony (I believe they call it ‘the deck’ nowadays). A lover of plants, I have filled the perimeter with potted plants. In the monsoon they grow so well that it looks as if you are sitting in a mini forest. Not satisfied with this I have added lights and fountains and small Knick knacks which according to me enhances the whole atmosphere.

We spend our mornings and evenings and sometimes late night in this august space. We live on the thirty sixth floor which faces cloud and mist clad mountains so you can understand our obsession. In fact the children have named it “The Rapunzel Tower”. If I can help it, I do not leave it for days on end. I am self-sufficient! (though my hair is neither as beautiful or long or strong as Rapunzel!)

So the snake in my ‘Garden of Eden’ (I know I am mixing metaphors!) is the Pigeon. When we first moved in, we left our French windows wide open. The pigeons took this as an invitation to move in but lacked the IQ to figure out how to leave. Cue pandemonium: fluttering wings, frantic cooing, me switching off ceiling fans in terror of accidental pigeon homicide.

After multiple concussions (theirs, not mine), I was reduced to calling the guards to remove stunned intruders while they laughed at my cowardice. Eventually, I thought the Pigeon News Press (PNP) had published a warning about our flat being a trap, because the invasions ceased.

I exhaled too soon.

We had been gifted a lovely, large, faux stone, waterfall which was a little too large for the main living room so with my brilliant mind I put it on ‘the deck’. The rains had stopped and the sun was now burning down shamelessly, the little stream that passed by our apartment was becoming dry.

Then started the “Return of the grey force” … they came in twos, sat on the balcony rail strutted around, did a lot of cooing and fluttering. I ignored them, they were after all outside, I reasoned to myself. So I let my guard slip and the next moment one of them hopped on to the back of the sofa I had been sitting on and then another step on to the waterfall bowl and drinking away to glory. He was followed by his partner and there ensued a battle royale and my lovely clean space was filled with poop and feathers!

Thus began third world war and has lasted for the last three years and I have a feeling it will be called ‘the hundred years war’ (If I survive that is!)

First, we moved the waterfall to another location, did not work. Then we placed the head of a pharaoh with head gear and snake on the top most bowl, it did work for a couple of days but one of the young fearless ones flew and toppled it! End of episode two. Then we camouflaged it with real live plants, did not work. Draped it with artificial leaves, did not work. Put lights over it, did not work.

The only deterrent was to put off the waterfall during the day, but then that was not conducive to peace and harmony, so back to shooing and making noise whenever they dared to cross ‘The Laxman Rekha.’

We of course were given a lot of advice- “put those pokey things around the waterfall,” “keep a recording of loud noise”, “put a scarecrow figure”- believe me we tried everything. I remember scouring Amazon for anti-pigeon machines and even tried some sonic repellent. Then the ultimate advise “just take it off from the balcony, all your problems are solved.”

But this is like throwing down my arms and waving the white flag of surrender! Could I be so cowardly as that? How dare these birds even dream of defeating me? So I vowed to continue my war. There is ‘win some lose some battles’ but I will let these birds drink the dirty water from my waterfall over my dead body! It is now a ‘do or die’ and a continual MOP (Military Operational Plan) is being created second by second.

The last ammunition is a string of flashing lights fitted onto a revolving wall mounted side fan falling over the waterfall continuously and has lasted for four days!

There are of course the couple who come over to do a recon once in a while but no bird has come into my arena! God willing this battle is mine!

Minimalistic aspirations!

I have shifted homes more than a dozen times during my very long tenure on planet Earth. Of course I have no recollection of my earlier lives or my existence on other planets. Anyway half of the shifting I did before I got married and the other half continues to this day.

When I was a child and we moved. There were no ‘Movers n Packers’ so my father and I packed up each of our possessions (My mother stuck to her personal belongings and kitchen, and my sister was somehow not there when we were moving!). The possessions I recall, included the tube lights and bulbs, air conditioners and air coolers, books and magazines, showpieces and photographs, in short everything. I was in charge of the packing of small things (Not Furniture) and it was my responsibility to see that each packed item (we used old newspapers, towels and dresses and saris to be thrown) was carefully fitted into the wooden crates lined with hay and straw. It would be inspected by Dad and then nailed shut.

My mother was a hoarder. She loved buying stuff that were new in the market and then used maybe once and stored (Ovens, juicers, grills, barbecues, biryani makers, rice cookers, induction heaters et al) during each of these shifting there was the eternal arguments of what should be kept and what should be thrown. Every time my mother agreed that somethings needed to be left out but when we unpacked in the new place they would all be there!

When I started my adult life I did the other half of my moving. We did have packers by then so neither I nor the rest of my family needed to pack anything but we did need to sort things out. I too, like my mother, am a hoarder but not exactly like her. I began by hoarding used gift-wrapping papers (sometimes I did use them), I also kept shoe boxes (to store some unwanted things u know!), then there were magazines, letters, visiting cards (of plumbers and electricians!) and before the arrival of the cell phone I hoarded telephone books with their numerous cuts and numbers! Pens which did not work, pencils which were blunt, paints which were almost dry and I am sure you can add a lot of things that you do and I might respond with “I did that too”.

But this was the time when I did weed out my wardrobe. I did this so that I could, without guilt, refurbish it in the new place. This did not include the heavy saris which were my wedding trousseau, they were well packed (having never been opened after they came from dry cleaning after they were worn once!) so it was not a great deal of trouble. I of course used my judgement to weed out the kid’s wardrobe. I failed in this aspect of my ‘lord n master’ wardrobe as he had his own ideas about what should be thrown off!

When we last shifted to the current abode, I had been ruthless in throwing away clothes, papers, books, utensils and even things like ribbons and artificial jewellery. At first settling down in the new house was heavenly. Every storage space was meticulously planned out and only things that had any usefulness in them were kept and I even made a kind of excel sheet to catalogue my belongings (though it tapered off after sometime!)

Then one by one the crisis happened. We needed old towels for random cleaning and so were the requirements of old bedsheets. The tool box filled with feviquick had been unfortunately thrown off. Those extra wood planks had been inadvertently left behind! Those mismatched tea cups had been thrown off (so useful when you have the whole house filled with painters and electricians and plumbers needing cups of tea at regular intervals!). The old paint brushes though too hard to paint were great for cleaning the sliding window channels. The list is endless….

So started my various Amazon deliveries to fill in the holes of unnecessary items. My ‘minimalistic’ ideas went out of the window.

Now after four years I have come a full circle and every other day is filled with “to keep or not to” as I wade into cupboard after cupboard listing, cutting, throwing and rehashing stereotypes.

I look longingly at new dinner sets, cooking sets, furniture, curtains and thingamabobs, for I cannot buy a new one if I have four sets languishing for use in the unlabelled cupboards.

Now I need to get away from the house into someplace there is nothing to buy, every once in a while. Do you think this malady is curable after all it is a genetic disability and it is NOT MY FAULT!

 

Balcony reflections!

 

                                                                                                                                                     

“Woof, woof!” followed by short growls and enhanced by loud barks…

I had just made my cup of tea. It was six o’clock in the evening as I strolled out onto the balcony. It was a lovely sunny yet chilly day in Birmingham. It really was a pleasure looking at the greenery and the quiet canal that passed by my daughter’s apartment where I was spending a couple of weeks.

The Condominium was normally a very quiet place during the day and even the evenings were occasionally spotted with short bursts of conversation that punctuated the stillness of the starry skies.

So, this extremely raucous sound made me nosey and find out what was happening. What I saw was hilarious! Two brown Pomeranian were having the time of their lives! They rolled on the lawn, on top of each other, bit each other, barked, growled, and went round and round like a pair of tornadoes!

While they indulged themselves in this game play they tangled up their leads held by their owners. The laughter and happiness that ensued from the untangling was filled with joy and I smiled involuntarily.

Before I go any further in my musings let me tell you that I am not a dog lover. I don’t mind them, but I would not like to spend my life or time with them. In fact, the brat of the family (who loves them by the way) has been after us to keep a dog at home to fill in the empty nest but till date I have stood firm.

In England , I have noticed that most families have some kind of pet, could be a dog, a cat, or a feathered friend. In fact, I realize that most young people even in India are going into this form of indulgence (and the not so young too!) but as I have mentioned earlier I have no feelings on this relationship status!

So, to continue with my narrative the two owners (I shall call them dog fathers) both looked as if they were in their early thirties were chatting and enjoying the dramatics as the two dogs went in and out and tangled them as well as themselves. In fact, I wondered how they did not fall! I was now watching their antics unashamedly.

After about half an hour of this the group was joined by the doggy mummies. Both of them paid no attention to the drama but stood around talking to each other while the daddies did the untangling and poop cleaning. The sun was still high in the sky (It being British summer time) and after sometime they dispersed.

Years ago, when my children were very young. We mothers used to take them to the park to play. While the children played, we gossiped and spent the time of the day without paying attention to what mischief the children were up to. The fathers were busy at work, so they were not around.

But the equation is the same now. Now in the days of 'Work from home' the fathers are also around, and mothers too work from home. Even with all the gender equality being forced down our throats I still see the strict demarcation of chores based on genders. Not surprising that the ‘mummies’ want a break and do not take interest in the dogs while the ‘daddies’ have to shoulder the responsibilities of the ‘children’ in the outside world.

As I grow older, I see a serious shift in social norms. Couples prefer to have dogs rather than children. I suppose it is understandable. They give unconditional love, eat whatever they are given, do not have to go to school, there is no teenage angst and million other advantages.

There is no right or wrong in this trend, but it is a serious movement towards not wanting to be responsible (I am not stating that it is irresponsible) for another human life. What will this ultimately lead to?

I believe that most Japanese power couple take a conscious decision not to have children and have been doing so for more than a decade. The result of this is the average age of Japan is about 46 years, this in twenty years will lead to a population which will have very few young people to continue the world. Is this what we are looking at worldwide?

Is this where education is leading us? To a world full of autumnal people? Is there still time to rectify our errors? Why cannot the young people be parents both to their own children and the dogs? Is life all about having the “time of our lives”?

I believe that we are at the crossroads of evolution. Whether we walk through the unknown “deep dark woods” or “the golden utopia” is a major topic for discussion. I understand that it is good to have pets but to let them be replacement for children is a mistake which we will never understand now but will be apparent in thirty years .

I’m not condemning anyone. Pets bring solace, companionship and structure to lives lived in small apartments and busy cities. But as I sat on that balcony, watching two pampered Pomeranians whirl beneath me, I wondered whether we’re trading playgrounds for dog parks, children for pets and what that choice will mean thirty years from now.

Perhaps our balconies will always overlook green spaces. The question is who will be running across them: our grandchildren, or our dogs.