Life lines

There are a hundred little things that make life worthwhile – let’s appreciate them

 

Columnists – and I am no exception – tend to rely heavily on what I like to call the ‘pet peeve’ narrative. You know what I mean, right? All those columns on ‘What I hate about airline travel’ or ‘The most annoying things about working in an office’ or even ‘The top ten ways in which my husband/wife drives me crazy’.

 

Well, this column is travelling in a different direction this week. Instead of another litany of complaints about what I hate about something, I am going to share a list of what I love about life. So, here in no particular order are just some of the things that I believe make my life worth living. 

 

·       Those lazy mornings when I can sleep in and not bother with the alarm. There is no luxury quite like lingering in bed, swinging gently between sleep and wakefulness, knowing that another ten minutes of snuggling beneath the covers is not going to throw your day out of gear. 

·       That first cup of coffee that signals that the day has begun. The aroma of coffee beans in the kitchen; the first sip that jolts my tastebuds awake; the caffeine jolt that follows; I don’t think I could get through the day without this.

·       The ability to download any book I want on my Kindle at any time of the day or night. Growing up in pre-liberalization India means that I still remember a time when new books took weeks if not months to arrive in Indian bookshops. So, it feels like a minor miracle every time I read a review of a new release and just open my Kindle app and download it within seconds. What a time to be alive!

·       Long-haul flights without wifi which mean: no catching up with emails; no scrolling through Twitter or Instagram; no doom-scrolling through news sites. Instead, it’s all about watching trashy movies or catching up on a good book – or both – with a glass or two (or four – who’s counting? Not me!) of champagne.

·       The fact that I live in a city that has so much to offer. There are beautiful parks in which I can walk through the year. There is no dearth of historic monuments to visit. There are plenty of museums showcasing everything from antiquities to art to textiles. There is a clean, functioning, well-connected Metro to take me to far-flung corners of the city. And there are plenty of coffee-shops and restaurants to hang out with my friends and family.

·       I am grateful that I have the downtime and the resources to go on holiday every once in a while. But I am even more grateful that much as I love going on vacation, what I love even more is coming back home. Holidays and exotic locations are all very well, and don’t get me wrong, I enjoy them as much as the next person. But there is nothing quite as lovely as sinking into the depths of my own sofa, or slipping between the covers in my own bed. 

In my view, the best gift you can get is the ability to enjoy your everyday life as much as you enjoy a break from it. That’s where true happiness stems from – and may each of us be lucky enough to experience it.

Lockdown lessons

Being cooped up at home leaves you plenty of time for self-reflection

I think we are all agreed that this lockdown has been the most challenging time of our lives – no matter what our circumstances. Of course, it is much worse for those who don’t have a home they can isolate in; those who don’t have the luxury of space to socially distance; those who have lost their sources of income and don’t know where their next meal is coming from; and most tragically, those who are walking thousands of kilometers to make their way back to their villages, with all their possessions on their backs.

But even though it is imperative that we check our privilege when we start whining about how bored and irritated we are being stuck at home, there is no denying that after more than six weeks of the lockdown, everyone is going a bit stir crazy.

I must confess that when it all began, I was sure I would be okay with being confined to my house for weeks on end. How hard could it be to stay at home for a few weeks, I asked myself. After all, I have been working out of home for years now, and I am quite used to the being stuck indoors, with just my immediate household to provide me company. So, with a well-stocked kitchen, shelves full of books that I had been meaning to read, and stretches of quiet time in which I could finish the novel I was writing (the sequel to Race Course Road), the lockdown should present no great challenge for me.

Well, six weeks into the lockdown, I have to admit that this enforced isolation is finally getting to me. I do my best to stay in touch with family and friends. In fact, I have never made as many video calls as I do now. I am more active on my Whatsapp groups than ever before. I’ve even done Insta lives to try and stay connected with the outside world. And I am engaging much more on Twitter than I would normally do.

Yet, somehow, that’s not enough. And that has come as a revelation to me.

I have never considered myself to be a particularly social person. Given a choice between going out to a party and sitting at home and reading a good book, I will always choose the latter. My idea of hell is having to make small talk with strangers at formal dinner parties. And I find it hard to make new friends, being quite content with the small, tight group of old pals who have sustained me through the years.

But even for someone who self-identifies as a loner, the lack of human contact at this time has had a peculiarly dispiriting effect. I have found myself dreaming of having a restaurant meal with my girlfriends (no, getting on Zoom while eating our solitary meals at home does not even come close). I make elaborate plans of getting all my family together once the restrictions are lifted. In fact, I am even looking forward to negotiating crowded airports – which I have always loathed – when we are finally allowed to travel.

So, I guess it turns out that I am a social being after all!

But that’s not the only thing I have learnt about myself in this period. I have also realized that I need to better appreciate the people who make up my world. And by that I don’t just mean my household help, though it goes without saying that they have my eternal thanks. I mean those people on the fringes of my life, whose contribution I have tended to take for granted.

For instance, I certainly appreciated my colorist a lot more when, a few weeks into the lockdown, I turned my attention to my greying roots and reached for a home-dye kit. I will spare you the details of what followed but suffice it to say that the results were not pretty. If any salon had done that to me, I would have demanded my money back. But given that this was self-inflicted, all I could do was try not to wince every time I looked at myself in the mirror. And give thanks for the man who would soon be asked to launch a rescue mission.

I felt much the same way when I tried to recreate some of my favourite dishes in my own kitchen. As I peeled and chopped and sliced, and then stood sweating over the stove for hours on end, I suddenly appreciated the effort that had gone into all those restaurant meals I had taken for granted all this time. Never again will I dig into a biryani or tuck into bedmi aloo without giving thanks to the many hands that have created that magic on my plate.

If the lockdown has taught me anything, it is this. It is people that make our world go round. Not just the ones whom you count among family and friends. Not just the ones you love to distraction and would gladly take a bullet for. Not just the ones who love and cherish you.

It is also the ones whom you don’t see or value as you rush through the day. The ones who remain invisible, but bring tangible value to your life. The ones who toil silently so that you don’t have to. The ones you take for granted.

We really should appreciate them all. Lockdown or no lockdown.