I am in the plains today…arrived on a warm and balmy Delhi night, with wedding traffic jams and bright lights and noisy trucks and lorries on the road to home.
I am here to attend a wedding, to do a quick trip to the East, and then, a much awaited school batch reunion in the West! I will meet school mates after 40 plus years, I will eat prodigious amounts of Bengali cuisine, I will chatter and laugh with cousins and aunts and I will spend some time with Baba in his home.
Last morning, I stood and gazed and stared at the mighty mountains as the sun came up and the sky turned orange and pink. The horse-chestnut trees are at their sunshine best…their yellow and golden leaves catch the colors of the sun before dawn and after dusk. The crisp and cold North wind blew through the pine trees, and I could hear the magpies and bulbuls singing in the forest.
At home, the dogs and their blankets, dog biscuits, room heater, food packets, coats–everything was piled into the car and they went happily to the village with nary a backward glance at forlorn me standing on the road head. Hema and her kids and her goats are going to be family for Biskit and Pepper till I return.
The village was celebrating a wedding and I had to refuse all invitations to come and dance and eat and bless the new couple! Its the wedding season everywhere, and I have left that hill wedding to come and dance and eat and bless the new couple in our family!
While a big part of me is looking forward to all the fun and festivities and travelling, another big part of me is counting days to return to that quiet and majestic part of the country which I call home. I realize that I have two choices ahead of me. I can either keep looking at the future ( return home), or I can stay in the present and enjoy each day here.
Right now, with my friend’s spaniel, Angel, curling up beside me(asking for cuddles and affection every ten minutes ), sunshine and street sounds flooding the air, and some good morning hours with my fiercely independent Dad, its a good way to begin the last month of this year!
Pssst…..just fourteen days to return home!