Category — Favorite Things

Today I didn’t have much time to think about anything, so I will just tell you what I did.

I got up and had a coffee while putting muesli and yogurt in bowls. I noticed again just how lovely the sunrise is, over the coconut trees. Then I noticed that there is still furniture waiting to be stained in the courtyard.  And then I put that thought right out of my head.

I watered the garden and cleaned up the little things, put away laundry and supervised Kid A and YaYa washing the breakfast dishes. They like to pretend they are running a restaurant while they do the dishes, so today I told them they were worthless donkeys and they were both going to lose their jobs if they didn’t stop rubbing suds up around their elbows. Actually, Diary, I didn’t really say the worthless donkeys part, but I could have.

Then we sat at the table and wrote down what the kids need to get finished this week in their school work. How many exercises in math, what they need to write, and how many times I would like them to break off their pencil leads while juggling their pencils, whine “I didn’t mean to! I don’t know how it happened!” and then dump all of the pencils on the ground in a mad search for the pencil sharpener.  Many, many times, is what I wrote down.  We may as well expect it.

I would have to say that not a ton of work got done today, because there were many interruptions.  But we did all of our reading, and tomorrow is a new day.  I need to work on the interruptions, because my neighbors don’t always understand about homeschooling. I need to draw good boundaries, Diary dear, and you know I’m terrible at it.

I started cooking around noon, and I made dahl and rice and subzhi, with some more interruptions thrown in. I also did the second kimchi step, so the kimchi should be ready in a day or two.  I love cooking, but I love making things that are a little strange even more.  Like kimchi and yogurt and peanut butter and muesli.  Not that they’re strange in and of themselves, but they aren’t just a meal, they are something more.

Then we ate, and Solo was kind enough to make us a rice carpet.  He also stood up in his seat and waved his bum around to the music, which caused everyone at the table to nearly die of laughter.  Sometimes I wonder why I bother feeding anyone.  They could live on cracking themselves up.

Later the kids watched Tom and Jerry, which is the kids’ primary source of historical information of things prior to the 21st Century. I consider it very educational.  We have many, many episodes, and some date back pretty far, so that if I say, while we are reading, “blah blah blah phonograph… hey, do you guys even know what a phonograph is?” they will say, “Yeah, we saw one on Tom and Jerry!”  This also goes for a phone that plugs into the wall, and a hobo with a kerchief on a stick, something Kid A is always pretending to be.

After Tom and Jerry, it was time for the sea. I rushed around flutteringly, getting nothing done, before finally getting out the door and then coming back in several more times because I had forgotten things. We met friends at the sea and I sat in the shallow water and tried to prevent Solo from diving in, since he feels that he is invincible. The boys all used the bodyboards and Leafy got a little more bold about going out further.  I saw a friend from Dharamkot, and we talked about our summers.  The moon rose looking like a gigantic golden coin, and the tide came in swiftly, soaking our towels. Then we walked home and Kid A and Leafy cried all the way, while YaYa and Solo were troupers.  They like to take turns like that.  Everyone misses Daddy. I hosed them off outside before we all took a shower and I noted again that I really need to tell my landlord that my shower is not working.

We had scrambled eggs and bread for dinner, and I didn’t even remember to cut up the fruit.  It was a beautiful, simple day, Diary dearest.  There was such a sense of camaraderie between us today, and when it is here, it is almost physical, something that reaches out and embraces us all. We touch each other impulsively. We say we love each other too many times. I listen more, and the kids try a little harder to get along. It is this kind of companionship that makes me really love being a family.

The other day was a writing day for me.  Chinua has been giving me all of Friday to write and get some work done on the book and another project I’ve been working on, and I LOVE it.  I feel like for the first time in seven years I can really focus.  Or, focus as well as one can when one’s children keep opening the door and asking if you are done with the computer yet because they’d like to watch a movie, or as focused as one can be when one’s baby crawls to the door of the room that he KNOWS you’re in, and when it doesn’t open, bangs on it, yelling, with two open palms.

I take what I can get.

This Friday, however, I needed to try to get a truck up to our house to pick up the boxes that we are sending to Goa by mail. (Since we travel by train, the post is the easiest way to get things like our books, toys, and anything else we don’t want to carry on our backs to our house down south.) I really didn’t want to do it on a Friday.  It’s my special day, see?  But I also saw the wisdom in not putting it off.

Chinua said, “I don’t want you to do anything that’s going to make you angry later, because I don’t want you to be angry.”  Fair enough.  I needed to do what was necessary and deal with it in my own cantankerous soul, rather than letting everyone know how put out I was by doing this work for them, and they’d better appreciate it, because my whole DAY was ruined, practically my whole LIFE. Also, it was raining.

I made myself a list:

Tips for Making a Lame Day Better

(by me)

1. Draw stuff

2. Take photos

3. Talk to people

4. Notice things

*

Well, I couldn’t take the camera because it was raining and I was walking, and my little camera is broken, so we only have the big one. And I didn’t draw anything.  But I did talk to people.  And I did notice stuff.

I noticed a cow walking down a steep flight of stairs, onto the street below.  I’ve never seen anything like it before!  I peered up the stairs, to see what the attraction was.  Nothing up there. When I asked her what she was doing, she totally ignored me.

I also noticed, when I took my mobile phone to the shop to have it looked at (it’s not working), that the man checked to see if my battery was full by ducking his head down and putting it in his mouth. The battery, not the phone.  I thought this was odd.

I bought scarves.  And I talked to the man in the shop where I bought scarves.  (I can’t find the link to the post, but me buying scarves is a big deal! I have a hard time buying anything for myself.) He showed me some nice wall hangings, but I didn’t buy any.

I talked to my pregnant friend when I bumped into her on the street. I noticed that her eyes are a very brilliant blue.

I talked to the jeep men about bringing the jeep to my house.  I asked them how far they could bring it, and they said, only to the upper road. I asked them to bring it down the steep sort of road and along the non road and up the stairs and over the definitely not a road, but they stared at the ground and muttered.  So I asked if they could just bring it down the steep sort of road, and they stared off into the air and muttered.  My problem in India, you see, is that I am far too polite.

I loitered all day, waiting for the rain to stop because we can’t move our stuff in the rain. The rain never did stop, but I talked to a few more people, including a couple of begging kids, a Tibetan tailor, and a man from Mumbai whose wife teaches a cooking class.

Finally (when the rain let me know it was not a day for me to move boxes) I went home and found my family.

So I didn’t get anything done, but I noticed some things and I talked to some people.  All in all, not a bad day.  And at the end of it, I wasn’t angry.

Epilogue

This morning the sky was a big bowl of glazed blue pottery, and our neighbor, who is moving his stuff as well, persuaded a taxi driver to come all the way to the definitely not a road.  Chinua and Cate loaded the boxes up, had them stitched in white cotton in the Indian way, and had them sent off at the post office by noon. I spent the morning drinking two tiny cups of coffee and cleaning, and that was that.

Kid A says:

When it rains they fill with drops, and we like to hit the bottom of the leaves.  The water shoots up in a perfect ball.