Just a thought...

Revisiting Childhood!

Its Diwali once again... Though i dont celebrate Diwali..(i dont celebrate anything as a matter of fact..yeah.. i lead a very boring life:-( ) i actually like this festive season. Previous day of Diwali.. n everybody seems excited. People are talking about their shopping, the gifts, the crackers, the sweets etc. Therez always anticipation and excitement in the air and somehow though i dont do any of the above activities I get excited too. The previous night of Diwali i left Chennai to Cbe..n as soon as i got there we left to Calicut n from there to Wynad. Kerala is the only state I know in India tht doesnt celebrate Diwali and it was so evident too. While Chennai and Cbe were buzzing with activity, Kerala seemed oblivious to all this. For people there, it was just another day. Some of my relatives dint even know it was Diwali :-)

I reached Poothadi very late... Only Mummy n Ammama was there with the nurse and the maid. I am seeing Ammama after almost a year.. She is walking a little but with great difficulty. At times what she was saying also was not clear. She seemed like a little kid.. getting excited about seeing me, being stubborn about a few things.. it was all very different. Even Poothadi looked different. This was the first time when there is nobody around. Even Pinky was not there. For me Poothadi always means lotsa people, uncles and aunties sitting around chatting, all cousins climbing the mango tree, going out to the fields, playing with the pillows, calling the spirit through a glass, never ending gossips, not taking bath fast n trying to escape vellichan screaming, eating raw mangoes with chilly powder and salt(mmmmmmm..), playing cricket with everyone on tht big ground, running on the coffee beans on the ground n falling down... there is nothing we dint do as kids. And today... all of us are in different locations in the globe engrossed in our own world.. the chance for all of us meeting is well..next to impossible!
One thing that is so different about Poothadi is therez lot of time there... while people here seem to be scrambling for time and space, there u find them in abundance. U hava a lotta time to do things there. And itz always the best place to be if u need to reflect upon life, or just laze around! My two days went off fast talking to amamma, irritating my Mom n speaking to Shobha vellima who had come down. Pinky came on the last day and it was fun to talk to her. She is the youngest girl after me... in our cousins gang(neices not included:-)) She is in the 12'th and it was fun talking about her class n guys in her class n their pranks etc.. Yeah Lets accept it.. She too has grown up( or is it meeeeee i wonder)
I also discovered a few things.. the house is nearly 90 years old, and we are 69 members in all...uncles,aunts, first cousins their spouses, nephews n neices.(Yeah, me and Pinky counted)

I left Poothadi this time with Daddu(mummy decided to stay back with ammama for another week) to Cbe, it was with a feeling of nostalgia, a feeling of pride.( i too have probably, "finally", grown up) For everyone, Gods Own Country means backwaters, coconut trees etc.. to me, its probably this place in remote Kerala called Poothadi which is a small world in its own.. Gods Own Country indeed!!!:-)

posted by sreeshma @ 2:30 pm