Out of Service

The humans are off to visit family in New Jersey the next few days to eat, drink and be lazy - as if they don’t do enough of that at home.

Do I sound bitter because they’re not taking me along?

In between 10,000 guilty kisses mom rationalized that given my rabid fan following, I was sure to be recognized and attract attention from the bloggarazzi. Oh, the price one pays for popularity!

Anyway, if you happen to see a desi family of four, along with a gaggle of relatives, in the Noo Joisee area this weekend, stop and say hello, won’t you? They should be pretty easy to spot as they'll be hanging out near a food source.

What are you doing for the long weekend?

Kutti + Baby = Kuki

Unlike her angelic brother who mewed softly like a kitten when he was born, Kuki made her entrance into the world four years ago bawling like a banshee.

The obstetrician covered her ears and the nurses poked their heads into the room, claiming they could hear the baby out in the parking lot.

“Nothing wrong with her lungs,” wryly observed the doctor, as she placed a muculent, caterwauling newborn face-down on mom’s belly.

Exhausted and sweaty from the labor, mom clung to her clammy bundle of joy, afraid the baby would slip from her hold and fall to the floor. She was still amazed that nobody had managed to drop either one of her babies as she ejected them from her body. As far as she could tell, there was no safety net below the birthing bed, like in a trapeze act, to catch slimy babies that fell through the doctor’s grasp.

As the nurse whisked the infant away to the far side of the room to be weighed and cleaned, mom prodded dad who stood silently holding her hand. “Go count the baby's fingers and toes,” she hissed, slightly miffed that he had forgotten to charge the camcorder battery despite being informed of the big event approximately nine months in advance.

When the nurse finally handed a swaddled, quiet babe to mom, she noted that the little angel looked quite like her older brother did when he arrived – chalky white with pink splotches, shriveled skin, navy blue eyes, a conical head from being sucked out and a face that didn’t resemble anybody the humans knew.

Mom (cooing): “Hi, kutti baby! Welcome ... Hello, Ananya.”

Dad: “Ahem … I thought we’d decided not to go with Ananya.”

Mom: “But Ananya’s a nice name. I tried it on the nurse and she didn't mess it up. It means unique.”

Dad: “Yes, I know what it means. But I still prefer the other name we picked.”

Mom (stalling): “You mean the one you picked. But Ananya starts with an ‘A,’ like Anu.”

Dad (acting as though he had just squeezed a watermelon through a grape-sized hole the last five hours): “Look, stop being so wishy-washy. When you decide on something, stick to it. What’s the point of going back and forth again?”

Mom (snapping): “Fine, do what you like.”

Dad (storming out of the room): “Fine!”

Mom gazed at her infant, who looked back at her quizzically. Barely an hour old, the baby had already witnessed her first battle of the sexes.

Mortified at the first impression they had created, mom decided to conserve her energy for the really important battles, such as whose turn it was to change the baby’s soiled diaper, or who gets to pace the hallway with a crying infant at 3 a.m.

A good half-hour later, as her arms grew weary of holding the suckling and the sensations slowly returned to her nether regions, dad walked into the room, looking slightly apologetic. He took the sleeping baby from mom’s hands, and with a sheepish grin, handed her the birth record.

"How considerate," noted mom.

The baby's middle name was now officially Ananya.

Maha Mom

If you want my opinion, a single day dedicated to mothers doesn’t quite cut it. For all they do, celebrations should last at least a week. Or, in my mother’s case, over her lifetime.

I can’t begin to tell you how this amazing woman enriches our lives. As I watch her go about her daily duties with a quiet sense of determination, I marvel at her steely will and positive attitude in the face of adversity. I silently shed tears of blood when I think of all the sacrifices this matriarch has made for her family.

Born in a traditional Iyengar household in circa 1922, Smt. …. oh, wait … wrong story …. I somehow got a few generations mixed up; but you catch my drift, right?

Mom is so marvelous that without her our house would not be a home - it would still be an apartment, and dad would be green in the art of making money disappear in the blink of an eye.

Besides, any woman who deliberately consumes all the cookie dough bits and leaves behind a near-empty tub of vanilla ice cream in the freezer to save - yes, save! - her family from the ill effects of trans fatty acids merits a special chapter in my book.

Wouldn’t you agree?

Rest in Peace, Bud

Mom sat at her desk wallowing in self-pity over a looming deadline when she learned that Newcastle, my pal of eight years, passed away yesterday from liver failure, a year after he relocated to Bangalore.

When mom read the e-mail, she felt as though she had been punched in the guts. The news was not entirely unexpected - NC was a senior citizen and had had a string of operations recently - but the wave of sadness that engulfed her took her by surprise.

Of course, we feel horrible for NC’s human who’s traveling and won’t get home for another month. If mom, who only watched him while his humans went away on vacation, feels so badly, imagine how the people who shared their lives with him must feel.

Newcastle’s demise also brings home another harsh reality that mom would rather not face – my own ageing.

I recently crossed my 10th milestone and am slowing down perceptibly. Mom checks my gait every day, and worries when she catches me limping. She doesn’t want me bounding down the stairs in case I sprain my back and is most loath to take me for a dental exam because it would involve anesthesia.

She hugs her fears to her heart as she watches me pant after walking around the block. Just as she does with her children, she stands over me before she retires for the night and watches my body softly rise and fall in rhythm with my breathing.

Mom came home with a heavy heart today and hugged me. As I tried to lick her face, she thought of Newcastle’s pink nose, drooly breath, knobby tumors and saintly patience whenever the children climbed on his back or pulled on his ears.

She buried her face in my neck and prayed silently, sorrowful at Newcastle’s demise but palpably relieved by my warm, goofy presence.

Hush, ma, I'm still here.

Don't Have a Cow; Have a Pretzel Instead

It’s not a good sign if you’re in a room of 300 people, and the only person awake is the guy on the podium delivering the presentation.

Wedged like a canned sardine between a heavyweight Texan and a woman with a noisy stomach, mom tried all she could to stay awake and appear mildly interested as bar graphs and flow charts flitted on giant screens around the banquet hall, and the presenter droned onstage about revenue and product strategy.

The granola she had eaten for breakfast had long been digested and mom idly wondered what her slim pickings for lunch would be in steak country.

In Omaha for a three-day conference, the vegetarian choices around her were as dull as the cloudy weather and as drab as the gray landscape outside. The people around her seemed to be built like the cows they consumed, and mom stuck out like a sore thumb trying to find something green to graze on during meals.

Her first night at a steakhouse, she looked at the hearty portions on the table and almost fainted face-down in the gobs of butter served scooped like vanilla ice cream.

Feeling like an orthodox Brahmin in a mosque, mom pulled the waitress aside and apologetically asked if there was anything remotely vegetarian at the restaurant other than onion rings and twice-baked potatoes. The woman helpfully pointed to the seafood section. Mom explained her dietary restrictions and resignedly waited for a bowl of steamed carrots and peas while her dinner companions tucked into half a cow each.

When her special order did arrive, she was pleasantly surprised to find the steakhouse chef a lot more imaginative than the kitchen staff at her local Olive Garden - an establishment that has not changed its vegetarian offerings since 1985.

The next day, mom was delighted to find aloo-gobhi and rice on her plate, while the other conference attendees chewed on T-bones and mashed potatoes. The Gujarati lady at her table complained, “What is this strange rice? Must be South Indian, hmmph!” but after subsisting on continental food for three meals, mom would have happily consumed even the kohlrabi kootu and karela curry she wouldn’t normally touch with a barge pole.

The first day away from home, sitting at a swanky restaurant surrounded by a corporate crowd, mom was asked if she was missing her children. Searching deep in her heart, mom realized that she wasn’t even thinking about her children. Given the time difference, she calculated dad would be driving home with the kids and dealing with a cranky Kuki in the throes of a “gimme candy”-induced rage.

The same question the next day had a similar reaction. Mom dutifully called home at night, but truth be told, she was savoring the unusual quietude and watching Roseanne and Friends reruns in her hotel room until late night.

The third morning, however, mom awoke to a gentle tug at her heart strings. Her room was a little too quiet and orderly. There was no dog hair floating around, the beds were creaseless, the place didn’t smell of stale sambar and she could walk around the room stark naked without any pressure to suck her stomach in.

As she sat in the airport later in the day and watched a pair of children shrieking and running around while their mother calmly nursed a third child, the gentle tug in her heart grew to a violent jerk and she felt a familiar longing. “What if we had another baby?” she mused, making a mental note to broach the subject with dad.

Five hours later, mom was enveloped in sticky bear hugs at the airport curb. “We missed you,” cried Kuki, refusing to get back in her car seat. The children prattled nineteen to the dozen and fought over the single pretzel packet mom had received on board.

As she strapped herself into the car, mom glanced at dad, who had played single parent the last three days. With an eye on traffic, he watched the children bicker over the pretzels in the rear view mirror and let out a deep sigh.

Now was not a good time to talk about filling that empty middle spot in the back seat of the car, concluded mom.