To be busy , noisily.

 Right now, everyone is busy in this house. 

My parents are with me here, so they are busy. 

I am busy.My father is busy and my mom is busy too. My spouse who is normally busy in his government office, has come home and is busy . 

My father has bengali news channel blasting an animated discussion about a recent change of guard . But he is not listening. All the yelling and counter screaming is being broadcast. It dissipates in earnest to the general air of a placid bedroom. Rendering it volatile. Communal. Political. Vendetta roils in the air , coiling into corners like venomous snakes. He is busy folding his cotton towel. Smoothing out the creases . While Bengal burns . Not unlike the Roman emperor Niro . 

May I add, he is also hard of hearing. 

My mother is the eternal Bollywood fan . Her days begin with mournful love songs of Lata and others . "Mohe bhool gaye sanwariya "( my beloved has forgotten/ forsaken me ) the wails start pretty early. While a pretty dusk breaks over the green fields of Punjab, she mourns her Alzheimer ridden spouse. 

Quite aptly, my father has indeed begun forgetting. Years , events , details are blurring into each other. But he hasn't forgotten her. Not yet. 

Right now, Mohammed Rafi croons a lively shammi kapoor jiggly dance number. 

Sitting outside in the balcony, watching peacocks scuttling on the road , and hornbills sagely ensconced in high tree branches, her phone proclaims to the world " chahe mujhe koi junglee kahe" ( may the world call me a boor ) 

However, she remains chair bound , walking around with the aid of a walker . Slowly, dragging feet after feet , like a shadow, gradually melting away , feet first . 

My hubby after a long week, is lying prone on the cool tiled floor, slapping his chest.  Emitting a wheeze periodically. He is watching a slapstick comedy on his phone. Laughing. His laughter gets stuck somewhere around his diaphragm. It has to be brought out. Forcefully. Like a comical Hiemlich's manoeuvre.

 I am chasing a fly .A fly that won't die . After raucously replacing utensils on the shelves , after making countless teas  , as per varying tastes . 

Even tea making is an exercise in memory. One black tea , one green tea, one milk tea with mild sugar, one very milky tea with lots of sugar and one cup of lukewarm water. 

Even the accompanying snacks vary. The mild sugar tea has to be paired with one jam toast, the very sugary tea with two, lukewarm water with two sugar encrusted nice biscuits, green tea with salted ,oil free peanuts and the black tea is to be paired with whichever snack is most abundant.

The fly lands on my brand new cup. I wait for it to move. A dead fly and a broken cup do not go together. It lands on my nose .

I can't slap myself. Even if I want to. So I wait. 

As I continue to swat the black marble slab of the kitchen counter, I try to listen.

To my hubby's comic cacophony, to my father's impassioned speeches emanating from his phone, to Mohammed Rafi talking about unrequited love, and I can't hear anything.

An oriental magpie cheeps on a dead neem tree outside.

I walk , trance like, and watch the magpie. Fly swatter in hand .

Outside a house full of medley of noises .

All familiar. All strange. All inaudible. 

All at once. 

An auto ride to remember

 A thick mane of hair faces us . The locks curl up to the base of the neck in a fetching, well oiled , well combed fashion . It is also caressed lovingly by the right hand, which has three glittering gold rings adorning three fingers . The forefinger, the thumb and one other finger . It is difficult to keep track of the finger as we are careening down a road full of the usual humanity and their detritus, which one encounters in every Indian road .

There are numerous obstacles, women in chador, shuffling across, urchins darting in between adults legs , playing a dangerous game of either chase or hide and seek. 

Blind beggars straying into the main street , with arms outstretched, a doleful dirge on their lips. A shriek later , wide eyed and panting , they curse profusely , but we are out of earshot by then . 

A man in impeccable suit and tie . talking on phone , athletically dodges , and raises his fist aggressively , as seen in the rear view mirror . The driver chuckles . We can see his shoulders shake .

We cross giant cut outs of his inspiration , a moustachioed  , well built , south Indian movie star . A cigarette hangs limply from his fleshy lips . smoke rising in thin wisps , he is wearing an auto driver's khakis , sleeves rolled to display shining , bulging biceps , on which is balanced a tiny auto , daintily landed and almost missed like a yellow and black hornet . 

The driver bows , acknowledging the greatness of the wasp bitten , biceps wielder . 

In our country  , movie fandom is crazy . We take hero worship to a whole new levels . The movie stars  are venerated like Gods and have temples made after them . 

I wonder what happens to these temples once some scandal ( with unerring regularity, very paradoxically ) breaks out , concerning these "Gods" .

At bends , we cling to the rods provided above our seats , for this exact purpose . To prevent Passengers from being jettisoned out into the gravel and the dust . A lighter human would have been swept off his or her feet . Thank God for body weight .

At bends the three wheeler becomes a two wheeler , and we are dosed with the exact amount of adrenaline that formula one drivers possess when they " drift " . A drift is not to be messed with , as pariah dogs languishing in shallow pools discover much to their chagrin . Quick reflexes save them and we are followed by raucous barks . More shoulder shakes , more mirth . 

Our plaints of " bhaiya  dheere chalo / abhi bahut time hai " is met with stoic silence / stone walling / linguistic incomprehensibility . In other words , entreaties fall on deaf ears . 

Fervent prayers for our destination ( Railway station ) to materialise out of thin air , like the famous room of requirement in harry potter is answered and a cream and gold dome is seen rising in the distance . Several rapid swivels around bulls permanently seated like a living statues in the centre of the road ( now the driver curses , and smoothens his hair again ) , a hasty greeting shouted to a fellow auto wallah , a fellow monarch of the "kingdom of roads " , a heave of the bucking auto later , we have , incredulously stopped . 

We walk on jelly legs as we have been floating around the city , on a carpet of wishes , driven by a crazed khaki wearing genie , and  the terra firma feels mildly strange.