Mid-Life Love

Dear Mr. Saha,

I have finally found the time to write to you after ages today. There used to be times when each little phrase I wanted to coo-coo went into the paper and got collected  till it was delivered by hand to your shirt pocket, the pocket with small blue bird emblem on it . Those days are gone.

My hair now has the silver tinges which peeps out every now and then defying my efforts to keep them under wraps. At times after a shower when I am looking at myself at the mirror I try to remember if ever you looked at me in a  special way but all I can remember is your boyish smile , you standing at the doors of 12 C waiting for our class to get over. You remember you had those big glasses which made you look like an Electrician and with your blue bag you used to look like a conductor, also my memory gets misty with the mornings when a young boy will run to get on to my auto or wave his hand frantically from the tram :), yes brings smiles to my lips.

With time you have emerged into a creature of serious species who looks at the world with cynical eyes. You have grown a more reserved person with political views and at times influence me too :O surprising isn't it !! You have such ranges in your personality that sometimes I feel like asking are you Real? Or are you split ?? Or are you nuts ??? But you are still you .

You hate to call up friends if I remind you that you have not called them for ages now and they will be offended. But then it might happen the very next week you call them up on an emotional splurge seeing The Bengal Reds finally succumb and talk away for hours . Ohh boy!! you you still have that boyish smile :).

You had been the one who introduced me to the world of social networking to Orkut , to Facebook and gradually you withdrew back to your den. The only posts that we can see from you are the articles you want us to read to look through your eyes to see beyond our image of the "All Things Bright and Beautiful..The Lord God made them all" ( I love when you recite those lines from memory- again that boyish smile peeps in my mind) . I know they are an important read but you know at times if you just "like" a photo or just post a couplet or just scrap someone that boyish smile will peep again and make my day sunny.

Love the times when you emerge in a devastating avatar to pull someone's legs paired up with your PJ twin or you just have a couple of beers to wash away your cynicism is the time you really become the boy in you. The world is indeed a beautiful place to live in in spite of all that is going around us and there is so much to love to be loved.

I still love you.

Your truly.

P.S. Reply awaited soon :P

Home Away

"Baari Jaabo" ("Wanna go home") -- has been my all time favourite and highest frequency phrase ever since I have left my home after finishing high school.  In a sultry afternoon or a chilly morning or a rainy night I keep uttering this quadrisyallbic phrase . I do not know why, if that phrase makes me feel at home or closer to my loved ones or its just a passing phrase which I have caught hold off during my initial homesick days and cannot let it go. I am not sure. But this post is not about that. Its about a home away from home.

As my earlier posts suggest that I have led a life of vagabond , so to actually call any of my accommodations truly as my home will be a literal misnomer. But thats not the complete truth. I have always had romanticism about falling in love again and again and over again. :D I believe that may be a good conjecture for my home away.

It had been after a lot of trouble and too many nights had I spent crying and fighting as to when we will settle down at one location to have a decent life, that I finally came over to stay (permanently) at 1021 Dempster in Evanston. The incident which preceded this action might not have been a cheerful or gracious one but indeed it was fateful.

My husband and his three friends(actually five - as two have moved out)  have been living here since more than a year now. I have visited this house umpteen number of times during my visit in Summer'09 and then since I have been in USA and was posted in Columbus. "Nicole" as the house is called was the first thing I had noticed when I had come in June-2009.

That's "Nicole" For you :)(with Ananya- my friend visiting me for a week)

Sayantan (our very own Satty Bose..ever since D.K. Bose is making the rounds :P) (one of the apartment-mates or rather one of the "Dempster Gangsters")  as they fiercely call themselves had momentarily taken me for a ride to believe Nicole Kidman used to stay here as a child :P :P. I got to know Sayantan and his PJs soon enough but still, to this day I will not deny that I often fall his prey. You will soon get to know the other housemates and their traits :P.

My first take on the apartment was as similar as any of yours first impression on any bachelor apartments. The apartment was sort of a "dumpster" with almost all pieces of common furniture having been salvaged from near the Trash Area and rooms were cluttered with almost unusable stuff . I got to know the house is at least cleaned once a month when the maid comes to pay them a visit ( that had been a part of the rent package...I was so glad that it was..otherwise "bhagwaan jaane aur kya kya dekhne ko milta" :P). I actually did not like the apartment will be a little too mild but let us leave it at that for the moment :P. The kitchen sink was the next obnoxious part of the house where I had to fish out for a spoon submerged in thick greasy layers of curry,daal, sloshed tomato..ok that's it :P. I used to avoid going to the kitchen as much as possible.

But on the fateful event after which I came to stay here permanently and got all my correspondences changed to 1021 I realized I have now become a part of it and could no longer avoid the daily chores or activities. Little did I realize that the seed has been sown. I became a full-time resident with my name getting enlisted in "Dempster Kharach-er Khata" ( the Google doc accounts excel sheet which records the house expenses)...wasn't I a little bloated :P :P.

The friends or the Gangsters whatever you like to call them are a bunch of loonies each one having their specific and unique fortes. Sayantan you already know is the Head Chef (he has an unique hand at culinary items..ohh I love his "jhinge posto" :)) ,and is a master of PJs. He is extremely fond of pulling legs and at times involuntarily he and my husband team up to completely destroy someone's evening :P :P Yeah yeah I know their explanations .. that some people are so gullible that they feel its their responsibilty towards him/her to make that person feel honoured :P.

DD -"chokh bandha kare bhorsa kara jai" -- one whom you can trust even in a blind fold :P(you can understand the influence of Satty and my husband on me right :P)  - is no other than our very own Dibyendu - our own worldly sage. I have never ever trusted a sage or a "baba" but if someone ever comes close to my ideal of such a "pir" it will be him. Ohh Man he has no love for his worldly belongings. If he is your friend he will not hesitate a moment to give over his car to drive or his ipod for good.However one thing he truly loves and is passionately passionate about is his Research Work- he can talk at lengths on his work or discuss others' research topics with zeal .  Once he gets home you will often see him(still in his black leather jacket and shoes) cooking for dinner with all 4 burners on. :P :P He is almost equally passionate about Bollywood Gossips and is our source for those snippets and enrich our knowledge.Also lately he is into "Running" and completed "8K". So a loud cheers to him on that note :)

Krish or Krishanu Nandy is our youngest member and the kiddo of the house. He is next gen kid and almost always on the web..no do not get me wrong..he is a wiki freak and is always learning..good for him though:). Well he is very much into Improv and watching all sorts of British and American comedies. He actually got me into watching some of these and I can tell you they are not that bad huh!!! I wonder at times how much these kiddos know :P

Presenting to you the members of 1021 Dempster : Apt #1W : (tnyatta-ta -trumpets blowing :P :P-well this is indeed a theatrical version :P)

LtoR-My Hubby,Krish,DD,Satty and thats me-taken at the dining

Once I (and you too by now :D) got to know these characters life could not have been otherwise. I was still getting used to my WFH(ok so for non-techies..its Work From Home) life which was indeed very dull and colourless (after my Bangalore Office life) hence, longed for the gang to be back from work in the evenings.

Then it was our coffee time with small anecdotes from each one's daily activities and pushing someone to cook for dinner. But mostly these Gangsters are perfect on their responsibilities and principles and never had to be reminded that it was their turn.

I had pre-decalred of not taking rounds of cooking but voluntarily helping people prepare for their culinary invasions each day. You will not believe the amount of thought these guys put in each day for the meals. If only our mothers can see how easily these guys solve their daily pain of thinking what needs to be made for dinner today :P:P . Well food in our home is lavish :) -"Ohh!!! see I called it our home " - Yes that was the change that was gradually seeping in and one day just caught me unaware :).

The Gang with a Bang!!!

Last year when Amit left..okk pause...so Amit was a Gangster too(very much a member of 1021 # 1W) who have gone further with his exploits and have now made Bay Area his latest capital, I had  felt a pang of pain as he used to be around most of the time after I had joined the household as he was done with his work by that time. He used to keep me company and we together will fool around. Amit is a very pure and honest guy :) . He loves to have fun ;) in more than many ways and is known for his flamboyancy.  I slowly got used to his absence as I got busy in more and more of work and then hanging out with the Gang here. Little did I know that not all pains are so bearable.

That's Amit with Satty and DD on his day of  thesis defence

So life in Dempster is kind of a Rock and Roll party, a circus, a Roller Coaster ride and somehow all these people and the walls and the rooms seem to have grown their roots too very deep into me and I have realized that this is what I call Home now, in spite of its stinky smells which you can get once you enter the main door( may be because fish had been fried the day earlier, or there are too many trash bags lying around to be thrown :P) . Well at least the sink is clean these days :D and you can find us spraying the air freshener all around :P. So we the Gangsters hold to our daily jokes as our our strength to pull through our daily lives, the daily dinner table gossips, the head banging to D.K. Bose, the Netflix movie sessions, our first time watch of NBA, the Bhaiphota ..well we have too many bonds which make us one big family and we are very very proud of it.

We laugh spontaneously at "that's what she said jokes"--oh yeah I understand those these days :P thanks to Krish and Satty, try to make them digress from their Favourite Topic ("the potty ones " :P:P).DD's famous one liners :( :( Ohh I will miss all of these..ohh lord I am already lamenting it seems. 

Well our close knit family seems to be coming to an end very soon as our lease gets over this August and we plan to move out to respective apartments( though in the same area) life can never be better than this.

Thank you Gangsters for making me feel at Home once more away from my home.

Though in my mind I know "Aane Wala Pal Jaane waale hai" and life always moves on but still bidding good bye has been the most difficult task for me ever as always :( . But this is not the end of "Dempster Gangsters", we will carry on with our exploits and keep our flag flying high :P .

So long................................

P.S.: A few pictures of members who are remembered on this occasion and without whom Dempster is not complete :)

LtoR:Koli-Satty's wife,Tarun-5th member,Me,Satty,Munai-Tarun's wife,Suva-my hubby-taken on Satty's wedding

Sirisha-DD's wife,DD himself 

The Gang the day before Durga Puja at the dinner table -Satty taking  the snap