Khwaja mere khwaja, unnecessary band baaja

Remember the crush you had in high school, when you'd write his name in a notebook and doodle around it while talking on the phone to your best friend?

Remember watching your crush out of the corner of your eye and wishing you were attractive enough to be on his radar like the girls who wore their skirts two inches above the knees instead of two inches below?

And remember how, after swooning over him for weeks, you almost came within kissing distance one day, only to discover that he suffered from the worst case of halitosis, enough to make the smell of cow dung more inviting?

That’s how mom felt as she sat through a late-night showing of Jodhaa-Akbar this past weekend. Feeling somewhat like a born-again virgin, revisiting a theater for a Hindi movie after watching Mitr in 2002, mom hesitated for a second before handing over a whopping $10 in cash for her ticket.

Within the first few minutes of the movie, as she watched blood spill and elephants crush soldiers' heads like coconuts, she thought of all the ways she could’ve spent the $10 wisely – on three gallons of milk for the family; a Netflix subscription for an entire month; possible art supplies; even a much-needed threading of her eyebrows and upper lip.

Watching the two most beautiful people in Bollywood trying to unsuccessfully ignite passion onscreen, mom thought of the four hours she could’ve spent on worthwhile activities, such as grinding idli batter for the week ahead, cleaning her closet, packing for her India trip, or catching up on lost sleep.

In fact, were it not for the friends she sat with, mom might have slipped out the fourth time Hrithik flared his nostrils like a virile Arabian steed. Instead, she sat with her legs crossed against a full bladder, reluctant to use the restroom lest she miss the entertaining comments from a raucous Tamil crowd and the gossip her girlfriends dispensed during intermission.

Had someone handed her a remote control, mom would’ve watched the movie at the same speed as the spin cycle on her washer. The frustration of the protagonists mirrored her own, especially when she realized that the elaborate nose rings and kilos of jewelry on Jodhaa were the principal deterrents in consummating the royal marriage.

While the film focused on the princely pair, mom silently rooted for the underdog - Jodhaa's sensitive cousin, who she secretly felt was a poet trapped in a prince's body. The character's gentleness reminded mom of the man asleep in her own bed - a person capable of stirring great sentiment and ardor in her heart.

Had she stood up and walked out of the movie when the first wave of tenderness hit her, mom would've gone home and initiated an "art" project that would have made good use of her supplies.

And had the project lasted as long as the movie did, with no intermission, she would've written off the investment as having excellent returns.

Can you hear me now?

He’s at work again. Sigh!

For someone who isn’t the ambitious sort, he seems to spend an awful amount of time working.

“When will Appa come home?” the children ask their mother.

“I don’t know,” she says, hoping he’ll walk in the door any second, drop his laptop bag and scoop the children in a bear hug.

I wish he could see their faces as they wait for him. The television screen is reflected in their eyes, but their ears strain to catch the familiar drone of the garage door opening.

He probably has no idea he means the world to them and to the woman he married. She rarely shows it, but she lives for the moment he walks in the door, drops his car keys in the drawer and lets her bury her face in his chest.

The palpable excitement in the house when his car pulls in takes her back to her own childhood, when she and her brother would race to open the gates in the evenings and herald their father’s arrival.

“Appa, appa,” they would shout, dancing a jig around him, waiting to see what he had bought them, for he never returned home without a treat.

Funnily, all these years later, it’s not the treats that linger in her memory. Instead, she remembers crossing her fingers behind her back, hoping against hope her father would stay home instead of speeding off to the local club to play billiards with his friends as he did every evening.

Her children show signs of impatience now. The little one needlessly picks a fight with her brother. “Appa said 8 o’ clock, but he still isn’t here,” says her son at 8:15 p.m., wanting to follow-up with a phone call.

With an eye on the ticking clock, she tends to her children and watches her husband's dinner grow cold. She desperately wants to tell him to pay no heed to the cliché about spending quality time with the ones you love.

Because to this family, quantity is what counts for now.

Is this love or am I dreaming?

The moans and groans emanating from the master bedroom last weekend had more to do with sickness than salacity.

Mom lay in bed clutching a box of Kleenex, her red nose providing ample entertainment to her children and their play dates as they watched her nasal secretions with fascination.

“Are you sick?” asked a concerned Kuki, before proceeding to jump on the bed like a monkey, unmindful of mom’s hacking coughs and pleas to go bother dad instead.

Midway through the rowdy ruckus and her sixth cup of ginger tea for the day, mom realized that she needed fresh produce (and more ginger) to jump-start her marathon cooking session for the week ahead.

“What?" mumbled dad without looking up from his laptop. "I’ll go to the store tomorrow,” he said, under the mistaken impression that cooking dinner two nights in a row absolved him from further responsibility.

In a surge of pride and self-respect, mom decided to take the high road and drive herself to the store.

“I’ll show him,” she thought, backing out of the garage forcefully. “I’ll shop and cook for the whole week if it’s the last thing I do before I die!”

The local Asian market was predictably crowded with families on a weekend, and mom struggled to maneuver the cart through the throngs and wipe her runny nose at the same time.

As she sorted through a pile of green beans, she noticed through the corner of her bloodshot eyes, a tall desi hunk who walked around in a daze with a cell phone stuck to his ear.

In a sea of grim-faced men from the Far East, and balding, bespectacled brethren from the homeland, desi dude stuck out like a Roma tomato in an eggplant bin.

Mom watched him walk around the produce section in slow motion. As he passed by her, she heard him say into the phone, “Nahin hai, jaan, I’m telling you it’s not there …” before he proceeded to complete another angapradakshinam around the vegetables.

By the time he approached mom again, she was wrestling with a plastic bag, sorely tempted to use her free-flowing snot to pry it open.

“Excuse me?” asked the man hesitantly. Taken by surprise, mom’s heart lurched and she dropped the bag and her jaw at the same time.

“Can you tell me if this is methi?” he asked, holding a bunch of parsley as if it were a bouquet of red roses.

Mom pointed him in the right direction and was rewarded with a disarming smile tinged with relief. Mumbling his thanks he gushed, “Got it, jaan,” into the cell phone as he wheeled his cart toward the cashier.

With a sigh, mom watched him walk away and turned to face the turnips.

As she bagged her purchase, she couldn't help wonder if he looked for methi out of love or because his jaan had threatened him.

When weekends vanish in the blink of an eye

Since mom’s organizational skills leave a lot to be desired, Sunday nights are usually a bedlam of activity in our household.

The kitchen is in disarray with pots bubbling over with dinner preparations for the week ahead, the dining table bears signs of the last supper and the morning’s newspapers, Anu wants his homework signed only when mom’s elbow-deep in dosai maavu, and the stress of chores undone for the week ahead causes mom to run around snapping at everyone in her way.

“Turn that T.V. off and go to bed!” she yells, resentful of spending an extra hour in the kitchen before she can turn in for the night.

The kids ignore her until mom thunders up to the television and turns it off amid protests.

“No fair!” whines Kuki, as she marches upstairs. “Why can we stay home only two days?”

My darling child, you only have the rest of your life to ponder over this gross injustice.

Open Sesame

Mom recently found herself in a quandary when her normally dapper colleague walked by her office with his fly undone.

“How’s it goin’?” he asked, leaning against her doorframe, seemingly oblivious to the fact that his black shirttails were playing peek-a-boo through his beige pants.

If she'd had her Blank Noise blinkers on, mom would’ve dismissed him as a pervert and “accidentally” poked him in a sensitive spot with the sharp end of her pencil. But being of a somewhat ambiguous orientation, the man has little to fear on a floor full of women, particularly when he walks like them and gestures with the same grace.

“Cashmeres are on sale at Nordstrom,” he began, moving his fingers as he spoke like a Thai dancer with long nails.

It took every ounce of self-restraint on mom’s part to focus on his face and his words rather than allow her eyes to stray southward.

She dug her nails into her palms to quell the giggle birthing in her belly. And when the man rocked on the balls of his feet and thrust his hands into his pockets, stretching the panorama even further, mom’s chest cavity threatened to explode with pent-up mirth.

After an eternity of small talk, her colleague walked away and mom hastily checked her own zipper to make sure she wasn’t violating any corporate dress code policy.

She briefly contemplated running after him and letting him know before the entire office got a sneak peek. "But would he more embarrassed if a man or a woman pointed it out to him?" she mulled.

"Maybe I should send him an e-mail," she considered briefly. "But could that be used against me in a harassment case?"

Deciding to get a closer look before saying anything, mom got up from her chair. "But what if his fly really isn't open, and the black patch on his crotch is all part of the design?" she thought, sitting down again.

"Wait, what if it's intentional?" she gasped. "Maybe he's trying to send a signal to the mailroom boy when he makes his mid-morning run."

Mom then turned to her computer. "Should I just e-mail the boss in Canada and let him deal with it?" she wondered, chewing on her nails.

A good hour later, when her colleague passed by again, mom was relieved to note that despite the inaction on her part, the case was now firmly closed.

Whew! It's a good thing she didn't do anything willy-nilly.

What would you do?

24X7 I think of vacation

Mom's current state of mind

Kahin pe nigahen, kahin pe nishana

By the looks of it, it’s not easy being a woman, and a married one at that.

Some women have to deal with a spouse who drinks too much coffee and leaves the mugs lying around. Others put up with slothful husbands who don’t bother to remember the correct sequence of their wife’s first cousins.

Still others are married to men who suffer from selective hearing; who cannot discriminate between natural gifts and silicone implants; and cannot locate a gallon of milk in the refrigerator unless it jumps into their arms gasping, “Take me, take me!”

In mom’s case, she’s married to a man who is guilty of all the above and more. Dad not only brings his work home every night, he even goes to work on the weekends.

A paragon of perfection herself, mom finally put her foot down last week after dad walked in the door after dinnertime, as usual.

“That’s it!” she cried from the kitchen. “You better stay home this weekend and spend time with the kids before they forget you.”

Visibly contrite, dad reassured her that he would spend the entire Sunday at home. He even backed his promise with an impromptu hug. As mom melted in his arms and started composing a ‘honey-do’ list in her head, the kids walked in on this rare scene of intimacy by the pantry.

“Guess what?” exclaimed mom. “Appa’s not going to work on Sunday.”

“Yaay!” cried Kuki, trying to pry her parents apart.

“Well, duh, it’s Super Bowl Sunday,” shrugged Anu, masking his elation with nonchalance.

Before mom could reach for the kitchen knives to aim at dad, he beat a hasty retreat to the bathroom and stayed there until the coast was clear.

Mom woke up bright and early on Super Bowl Sunday and headed to the mall after cooking dinner for the week ahead. With nobody but dad’s credit card for company, she was determined to spend a large chunk of time and his money on herself.

Among the largely female population at the mall Sunday afternoon, mom was surprised to find a proliferation of desi couples holding hands and sauntering through the stores at a leisurely pace.

She saw an obedient desi husband at Macy’s waiting outside the fitting room while his wife entered with an armful of clothes and modeled them for him. He even clutched her purse without a trace of embarrassment.

Another guy had a protective arm around his woman as she inhaled bottles of fragrances and held them up for his inspection. There was even a giggly couple sitting with their heads together at the food court, sucking through a common straw and feeding each other forkfuls of noodles.

At last count, mom passed by the puppy store where a desi lass cooed over a fur ball and squealed, “Cho chweet!” while her companion gazed at her indulgently and slid an arm around her waist.

Somebody, please tell me, where can one find such men?

Sleepless in suburbia

Mom fell asleep at the wheel last week. Again.

Note to the men reading this – don’t worry, guys, the car’s all right.

She's not sure how it happened. One minute she was listening to the radio and craving a warm cup of tea with a hot samosa, and the next thing she knew, mom had lurched into the right lane like a drunk driver.

It’s a good thing the lane next to her was empty because mom couldn't have dealt with a car crash on a full bladder.

If you ask me, people like her should be barred from commuting more than 6.78 miles - the exact distance from our house to the Asian grocery store where she buys fresh bhindi and frozen jackfruit. Everything that's important in her life - the public library, Costco, the mall, her eyebrow lady - fall within that radius, and there's really no reason for mom to step out of her comfort zone.

While she’s still not sure how the near-accident happened, mom knows why it happened.

The daily 60-mile commute, offset by a few hours of restive sleep, is starting to take its toll on her. As she watches the last vestiges of her youth evaporate on a highway, mom feels like a zombie functioning on auto-pilot.

Her day starts reluctantly at 5 a.m. and ends an hour before midnight. Sleep, one of her principal hobbies since childhood, has been set aside for retirement.

“How much longer?” thinks mom, staring at the billboards and bumper stickers with listless eyes, striving to break free from her self-imposed sentence. After all, the decision to work was her own. “Do whatever you like,” has been dad’s refrain since the day they were married. But of late, when she vocalizes her frustrations, he mumbles something about being responsible and mature and striving toward a goal in life before abruptly leaving the room.

"You mean getting through the work week and making it to Friday is not a worthy goal?" mom wants to shout at his receding back.

Chastened by his attitude to work, mom reflects on a legitimate reason to quit her job. Other than the commute that’s slowly corroding her, and the giant carbon footprint she’s leaving in her wake, the woman’s been very lucky professionally. That corner office with a window was handed to her on a platter, and her position entails perks with few responsibilities.

Why then is she not satisfied with merely counting her blessings?

If mom cranes her neck, she does see a light at the end of the tunnel. But before she can feel its warmth on her face, she has deadlines to meet and miles to drive before she can oversleep.

In the meantime, if mom is to be involved in a car crash, please God, let her be the only casualty.