Home Again!

Recovered from jet lag and found the house still standing. I'm glad to be back, yet sad I left. Even though I was brought up here in America, the best memories of my kidhood were there. Other than to visit, the main reason I was there was my mother remarried. I was a little skeptical at first, but when I met him I didn't think she could have found a better person to start the second chapter of her life with. Even though the wedding was small, we still injected as much wedding drama and teasing into it as we could. After all every bride, at one point, has to wish she eloped.

Other than the wedding, I did my fair share of traveling up and down from Bangalore to Madras and back. My base of operations was my grandmother's house in Madras (you call it Chennai, I call it Madras). At one time or another, every member of my family has passed through its doors, eaten at the table and slept in one of the rooms. They say a house isn't a home till there has been a death, a wedding and a birth in it. My grandparents were newlyweds in the house married off each of their kids from it, and all the grandkids were born there. My grandfather passed away in it, and it provided comfort for everyone who came.

The house has stood empty for years. My grandmother moved on, to the more pleasant climes of Bangalore, to be near her kids. She makes the occasional visit to make sure things are in working order. I wasn't prepared to see the house age. I showed my kids everywhere. The terrace where all the cousins flew kites, the mango tree where we plucked unripe mangos only to have the kitchen cook chase us away admonishing us to leave them on the tree. My kids did not see it. They saw an old house that looked a little lonely.

But for two days in June, the house brightened and threw open it's doors to host another celebration. People filled it. Not as many as before, but the core group that lived their lives in it. All the seats at the dining table were filled and the bedrooms were used. There was laughter and spirited discussions taking place all over the house. My kids finally caught a brief glimpse of my childhood memories.