How my mother taught me to live and love during a pandemic
The monsoon rains of 2005 whipped through our windows that lay under a grey sky in Thane, a city near Mumbai. The sofa in the living room was getting wet, as the smell of dirt, grass and a cultural kaleidoscope of food being prepared in similar kitchens drafted in, making me hungry.
“I want to eat something.”
In minutes, my mother prepared an extraordinary snack. While I leaned against the kitchen door, she poured murmura (a kind of puffed rice), chopped some red onions and tomatoes, took out her favorite weapon — a scissor, and cut some green chillies and cilantro. A dash of oil and lemon juice, and other secret ingredients I was too young to notice, and there in the metal bowl lay my happiness for the evening.
My mother was always a handy person to be around during unpredictable weathers. That monsoon brought more rain than I had measured in my dreams and seen in my life. The view from our corridor, which opened onto the outside world, showed a glimpse of days to come. The football field was drowning in mud-colored water, and the few seats etched on its periphery had all but vanished. As we stared at this scene, both Ma and I had the same thought: Thank god we live on the 12th floor.
My mother taught me many things that monsoon. While we stayed cooped up in our small apartment for days, I learnt Chinese checkers, a game that soon became a sparring contest, usually ending in wins for each of us by just one move. I learnt about Lolita and Poirot, Fellini and Bergman, hence beginning my long-lasting love affair with books and cinema. I watched as she spent every morning solving sudokus, anagrams and crossword puzzles, asking for my help when clues got hard. In the afternoon we would nap, resting our bodies as the heat and humidity soaked our clothes and tired our minds. During the evenings we would listen to music in the living room, me reading a book and my mother making phone calls and drinking a glass of rum.
Oh, the phone calls. They happened all the time. She called friends and family. Colleagues who became friends. She called people she barely knew, creating a lifetime of friendships just by reaching out and creating laughter. Her sociability skills were off the charts, and she was particularly adamant when she wanted to reach out to someone without knowing their contact information. With some ingenuity on my part and focus on hers, she even managed to track down her college roommate from her days studying in Illinois. Madonna and my mother bonded like only old friends can, regaling memories and tenderly commemorating a younger life that they would cherish forever.
But what I experienced then and am witnessing now have brought these sepia-stained memories into sharp relief. I live three-thousand miles away from my mother, in a country that is experiencing a charged time in history. Monsoons are not pandemics. But monsoons, like pandemics, are made safe for many by the brave and compassionate. Both are made devastating by ill-will and lack of resolve. The monsoon in 2005 took over a thousand peoples’ lives. This pandemic has already taken tens of thousands.
Parallels exist in all of history, but rarely do we experience jarring moments that intentionally float us back to younger days and a simpler self. We are all talking about being connected more, caring more and being more present. These times evoke those old memories, transporting us to deeper thoughts and reminding us of what a momentary break, even one brought through pain and suffering, can do for our souls. As I read articles in The New York Times, The Atlantic and other sources about the inadvertent climactic changes that are allowing Earth to breathe again, I think of that monsoon. The deluge brought with it immense misery and loss of life, but landed on soil that was thirsting for water.
These days I am staying home, as many of you are. My husband and I are still finding our footing in this current reality, reaching out for shared activities that will bring us closer and help us live while balancing pain, sorrow, love and happiness. But these days would be a lot harder were it not for those monsoons, and my mother’s style of living. She created a pocket of life for me back then that has become my recipe for today. I hope all of you find those pockets as well. For now, I’ll wait for the rain.