Everything's Official About This

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This week, three employees who’d worked with CMama for a whopping 40 years retired. They are all in their sixties now, so they must have joined when they were in their twenties. Which is where I am right now. Forty years from now, I hope I will be a batty old lady who buys a copy of CMama from a newsstand and complains about how the fungus of youth has spoilt the golden tradition of this magazine. I certainly hope I will not be working here still. Nostalgia is the prize for growing old and I intend to make full claims to it.

My mum, who is one of civilization’s finest unrecognized philosophers, used to do a ‘self-analysis’ at regular points during her youth. Profoundity seldom strikes me these days; my head’s so fried by the time I get home that all I want to do is to press buttons on the remote (not too hard). But yesterday, since there is no escape from genes, profoundity struck me…and I went into rewind mode.

School:

1. My earliest memory of school life is being pinched hard on the cheek by this teacher whom I called ‘Queenie’. She used to wear a clip on top of her head that looked like a crown. I disliked her instantly because I thought she disliked me instantly. Why else would someone pinch the hell out of me like that?!

2. Being forced to sleep on the school corridor in the afternoons. I used to play ‘car race’ with this tiny boy whose name I cannot recollect. It involved us lying on our respective mats and saying ‘drrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr’. Whoever stopped first lost.

3. Being caned for playing in the rain. So much for Rousseau and the noble savage and the rest of the bilge.

4. Being Bharat Mata in UKG. I wore a half-saree and a flower garden on my head. I also had a crown (beat ya, Queenie!) and was required to stand up on a chair while the minions (personalities from different states of India, all below two feet) stood on the ground. This is probably the happiest I’ve looked in my life.

5. Bhangara dance in 3rd standard. I danced the bhangara with this plump boy who was worse than I was at dancing. Consequently, we stepped on each other’s foot a million times. This could have been the beginning of a great romance, but it was not to be. Nobody steps on an erstwhile Bharat Mata and gets away with it.

6. Singing ‘thechi mandharam thulasi’ like a professional carnatic singer. As one of the mallu kids, I was asked to be part of the mallu chorus. I went onstage, shut my eyes in deep concentration, and sang the full song shaking my head vigorously and slapping my thigh…though none of this was required. The audience was apparently deeply puzzled by my behaviour.

7. Using ‘dog pound’ in my English composition in 6th standard. Chitra Pandey, our English teacher, circled the ‘pound’ and told me that there was no such thing. I showed her the dictionary and she gave me two whole extra marks for my vocabulary. This was probably one of my proudest moments ever.

8. Being the only girl in class who knew what the four-letter word meant. I then educated everyone else scientifically. Gone were the days when ‘You are a stupid’ was the prime insult heaped on a person.

9. Writing a few million poems and plays that I can barely bring myself to look at now. My favourite themes during those years were sadness, tragedy, angst, sadness, tragedy, and angst.

10. Writing my last Board exam. Accountancy. I finished in 1.5 hours and did not bother to check my answers since I was so happy that School Was Over, duddddeee!

College:

1. My earliest memory of college life is wanting to die on Day 1. The class was full of a. Churchu Parkku babies b. Goochee style missies c. aliens d.morons. Where does a nice chicken eating thayir sadam from PSBB fit in this?

2. Thinking N was stuck up since she’s from KFI. N thought I was stuck up since I was from PSBB. We both thought the Churchu Parkku people were daft. Sorry Anika :D

3. Drooling over a small, pink poet called Ranjit Hoskote.

4. Sweeping the Green Hut for lunch with Shumsie. Shumsie came to meet us all the way from Pakistan. We’d read all her books sincerely before she came. Then our class gave her a book with our writing and she promised to get back. And never did. No wonder there’s little progress in Indo-Pak relations.

5. Eating noodles with N and gang in Vandalur zoo when some of the delicate beings fainted and we had to make a stop.

6. Performing Cats at the British Council. I had whiskers and everything. Not a patch on Bharat Mata, of course.

7. Behaving badly in Elizabeth’s class. What delight it induced in our lives.

8. Crying over Othello. Doing fiery seminars about Othello. Writing essays on Othello.

9. Performing Pride and Prejudice. I had a gown and everything. Not a patch on Bharat Mata, of course. But I got Mr Darcy in the end.

10. Valediction. When we lit candles, laughed at people who were crying, went to Gangotree and ate chilli cheese toast.

University:

1. My earliest memory of university life is wanting to never look at bread again. I became a patriot because of bread.

2. Hearing some of the best love stories ever from my classmates. And none of them involved straight couples.

3. Going for a drag king show and thoroughly enjoying the attention from the kings. The Pride march in Brighton was even better.

4. Stalking Catherine MacKinnon in the loo at Cambridge. She smiled at me when she was arranging her gorgeous grey hair and I nearly swooned.

5. Hounding Judith Butler for a photograph. Trivia: Butler and I are of the same height. Yippie.

6. Watching Veerasamy on my laptop and missing home because of TR.

7. Hating the cold, silent, grey English rain.

8. Deciding I’d never do a PhD because writing a thesis was a godawful bore and I wanted no part of it ever again.

9. Shopping in the pound store and buying pound cake for breakfast.

10. Buying Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows at midnight.

Office:

1. My earliest memory of office life is wanting to go back to school. The average age of my colleagues was 50.

2. Traveling all over Tamil Nadu for various projects. Ordering room service and eating by myself, at peace.

3. Discovering that the Government deserves tax evasion.

4. Being an Angry Young Woman wanting to change the world FOREVER. This lasted for 3 months.

5. Teaching gender for a week in Bharatidasan University and feeling grown-up.

6. My interview with bossman. Arguing for an hour on why stories shouldn’t begin with ‘Once upon a time, a king wanted a son’.

7. Joining the ancient Print team as the youngest and as the baas. Being 23 and five feet tall didn’t help.

8. Having Aana and Chena published. It’s my favourite weekend activity to go read it in Landmark.

9. Reading feedback from children and feeling high for days on end.

10. Making elaborate retirement plans.

What a life it has been. Sigh. I haven’t typed out a million other things I remember. But it’s time for lunch now and I have mushrooms.

Bye ya.