Tag – This is it!

I feel like a schoolchild hiding under the desk because I haven’t done my homework.

Why? Because I was tagged!

Now, you might snort, but I tend to take things seriously, especially when some of my favorite bloggers tag me.

Ladies, I love you. I adore you. You say nice things about me my own family doesn’t, but I have to admit that this whole tag business is beginning to feel a little incestuous. It's usually the same blogs nominated for different awards.

Who starts these tags anyway? Barely is one tag laid to rest before another one takes its place, somewhat like the cobwebs on my ceiling.

Can I start a tag where we can stop tagging each other? Pass it on, people! Liberate yourselves. Spread the word, and tell them Terri sentcha.

P.S.: I wonder why I never received the “Nice Matters” award that was passed around like the arati plate at a temple.

P.P.S.: I hope I haven't unconsciously qualified myself for the honesty tag that’s currently doing the rounds.

Cheeni kum, namak zyaada

It’s funny that the first question Lakshmi asked when she met mom was the same one dad had posed as he wheeled his suitcases into the house after a month-long trip.

Much to mom's chagrin, neither of them gripped her hand, looked deep into her eyes and asked, “So, tell me, how are you really doing?” (Such a gesture would have caused the floodgates to open, resulting in both parties wiping mom’s snot off their wet shoulders while deeply regretting the question.)

Instead, they enquired about more pressing issues. Both wanted to know if mom still had the same maid.

Sigh! Unfortunately, the status on that is still quo. But the woman did chase a lizard out today, for which mom is willing to overlook the urine stains on a “I-swear-I-just-cleaned-it” toilet bowl.

As though her cup of frustration were not running over, mom recklessly invited a cook into the household a few days after she hired Rani. (To spare Lakshmi’s gentle heart, we cannot disclose her salary.)

“Don’t worry, madam,” the woman had assured her. “So what if I’ve never made North Indian food before? How difficult can it be?”

Very, apparently, as two months down the road, mom’s the one standing over a hot stove sprinkling masala over the sabjis, while the woman mutely watches and wonders why this family cannot be content with rasam and rice every day like her other clients.

“No, no!” shrieks mom, entering the kitchen a tad too late. “Mustard seeds and curry leaves don't go with rajma!"

"But, vaasanai ..." argues the cook, shocked at mom's blatant disregard for time-honored South Indian tadka.

"Isn't the moru kozhambu a little watery?" asked mom one day, watching the sweat drip from the tip of the woman's nose onto the boiling pot in front of her.

"This is how Iyers make it," said the maami with an air of authority, wiping her face with the kitchen towel mom had just used to wipe her hands.

"Well, can you make it the Iyengar way instead?" suggested mom gently, watching in horror as the woman proceeded to wipe the spoons with the same cloth she used to wipe her face.

Maami thought it best not to dignify the question with a response as she swiftly wiped the kitchen countertops with the same towel and started rolling out rotis.

Watching the woman operate, mom is tempted to post "Wash hands before returning to work!" signs around the kitchen similar to the ones posted in staff restrooms. She could even add a few of her own:

• Conserve water!
• Cover food to keep flies away!
• Do not use kitchen towel to wipe your face!
• Wash vegetables that fall on the floor!
• Tell me again how you can mess up curd rice!
  

This past week, mom has been making the rounds calling home service agencies in search of a replacement cook and a new maid.

“Make sure your cook is a Brahmin,” well-meaning aunties advise her. "Whatever you say, only Brahmins are clean pa!"

Is that right? You mean to say that the Iyer maami coughing and sneezing in our kitchen without covering her mouth might be an aberration?

Fair of face and full of grace

“What a pretty girl!” said grandma, craning her neck to get a better look at Shoefiend standing at her gate waving goodbye to them. “Is she a dancer?”

“I’m not sure,” replied mom. “I know she’s a very good writer.”

“Then she probably is a dancer also,” said grandma, firm in the belief that goddess Saraswati usually imparts more than one asset to the gifted.

“You’re right,” said grandpa, taken in by Shoefie's traditional garb, complete with a diamond mookuthi that glittered in the sweltering Chennai sun. “She definitely looks like a dancer.”

“Look, I’ll send her an e-mail and ask her. OK?” said mom peevishly, starting to show signs of irritation at the prospect of visiting relatives with her parents that afternoon.

“Such pleasing manners also,” observed grandma, looking pointedly at her grim-faced daughter.

Chastened, mom had to silently agree that it’s not easy to find fault with a person like Shoefiend who is charm personified a few times over.

As bubbly as a bottle of uncorked Dom Perignon, the girl is also blessed with a voice that reminds you of water skipping over pebbles in a stream, and your eyes automatically scan her drawing room expecting to spot a veena or a harmonium in a corner.

Instead, as you allow your gaze to linger on the ethnic furniture, the ornate brass lamp hanging in the corner, the dark frames on the walls, the wooden jhoola and the antique chests doubling as tables, you realize that Shoefiend’s writing is somewhat like the room - tasteful, with no unnecessary frills.

“I wish you lived on this side of town,” said the genial hostess, tickling her baby’s chin. “There’s so much to do in Madras.”

Little Boot, who until a few moments ago had been livid with rage rooting for the nearest boob, let out a gurgle as if to echo his mom’s sentiments about nalla Madras. Unmindful of the long plane ride that lay ahead of him to London in a few days, he sat on his mother’s lap and smiled toothlessly at his guest, engaging her in goo-gaa banter before being distracted by his bracelet.

“Your friend has a kutti baby?” Kuki had asked that morning. “I want to come see the baby,” she said, convinced that mom was going to meet mumbaigirl (the only other person she’s met from London).

“Why didn’t she bring the baby when she came home?”

“That aunty doesn’t have a baby yet,” explained mom. “This is another aunty. She also lives in London.”

“London?” repeated the tween son. "Ma, don't you have friends in any other place?"

Hello? ... Anybody out there from Paris, Rome, New York or Milan?

At Crossroads

Mom is officially unemployed again.

“Does this mean we’re going to be poor, Amma? You can’t buy me any more pretty stuffs?” asks her daughter, alarm pooling in her eyes.

Frankly, after keeping company with nocturnal creatures in the house for the last three months by working Mountain Standard Time, and looking like a raccoon with dark circles around her eyes, mom’s not sorry to see her contract end.

“Negotiate with your boss. Ask him to renew your contract,” said grandma, unaware of the strings mom’s kindly boss pulled to get her a work-from-outside-the-country opportunity.

“What are you going to do now?” asked a friend.

As usual, mom has no clue. Beyond making baingan ka bharta for tomorrow’s lunch because the eggplant is starting to look a little limp, she has no plans for the immediate future.

“It’s not too late to do something professional like an MBA,” advises grandma.

“Why?” asks mom. “Is it because an M.A. is short of one letter?”

Grandma changes tracks. “I tell you, teaching is the best profession,” she says. “You can become a teacher in your children’s school just like your cousin who came back from California did. They give you a discount in the tuition for the second child, and you get two months off every summer.”

Obviously, grandma is unaware of the fact that mom went to work specifically to get away from her own children. Why then would she want to spend time with other people’s children?

Mom doesn’t feel settled enough in her new environs to venture outside the home looking for gainful employment. Besides, a kindergartner’s schedule of only three hours of schooling would severely limit her time on a cubicle farm.

“Do we have to go to extended day again if you work?” ask the kids, worry writ large on their faces.

It seemed to me that mom moved to take a break from her wake-up-at-5 a.m.-and-keep-going-until-you-drop-from-exhaustion-only-to-repeat-the-process-the-next-day lifestyle. Why then is she even eyeing glass office buildings she passes by, wondering if they have a corporate communications department?

Ask mom what she really wants and she’ll tell you without hesitation that she needs a vacation. In fact, never before has the need to get away been so acute.

There’s nothing she’d like more than to leave the house behind with its resident lizards and relentless ants, the sulking maid, the grouchy garbage collector, the early-bird milkman, the noisy neighbors, the barking dog, the matinal keerai kaari, the house pet, and even her children, and recreate her honeymoon with dad for a few days.

The only problem is it’s far easier to drag a goat to Bakrid celebrations than it is to get dad to spend time with her.

In the meantime, as she waits for the romantic rheum to awake in dad, mom nurses a secret hope that a creative, interesting, well-paying, part-time, exactly-what-she-wants job opportunity will land in her lap - sort of like the startled lizard that fell on her as she drew the curtains one evening.

Mom's screams could be heard all through the neighborhood as she ran to the restroom to scrub herself like Lady Macbeth.

Has anybody else ever been tickled by the soft underbelly of a creepy crawly?