Today it has been two Sundays since Diwali and the fatigue of the hoopla seems to be lifting like a dense grey fog, letting you catch some glimpses of the blue sky. And I clarify at the very start, this is no whining, complaining piece though two weeks before the festival of lights, my house felt like a room full of alligators. It’s another matter that these creatures had morphed into kangaroos, hopping and jumping all over to scrub and polish everything to a speckless glory, to an unbeknown level of cinematic dazzle. This time, like always have been pledging for a decade now, decided it was the last time I would be a part of this exercise in exhaustion. The tragic truth is that, for so many, festivals that become carnivals, are nothing but passports to sadness, low spirits; genuine cheerfulness lies in your garden where daisies simply spring up and where some peonies take a fancy for the grass leaving the flowerbeds to graze over the carpet of green! Anyhow, your two maids with their sole incentive, start with the bathrooms, cleaning your tiles with the softest of cloths foaming in detergent, later to be shone to a gleam, with plain water wiped down from top to bottom; sinks, mirrors and yes, even pots, the ones you yourself do on a daily basis, are done without a backward thought. Was it not only two days before this mission cleaning that you had gingerly, rather timidly, reminded the duo that their own toilet needed cleaning and your timorous statement was met with visible irritation? At that moment, you honestly think that you should drive into a tree! Anyway, after window-cleaning (and here must add my abode has far too many windows!) you are told that now the next stop would be the kitchen and the pantry while you are suggested, as in instructed, that new bedcovers, table-mats, runners for the side tables etc. should be bought since last year’s ones had already been used two times over. Here you smile quietly to yourself—this was not about Jacqueline Kennedy, who’d never repeat a dress worn once! And, you must be taken for superbly stupid, since the main maid, has been undergoing treatment for a pinched nerve in the back, takes countless offs on account of her condition, informing you in a voice straight out of the grave, that you’d have to rustle up everybody’s breakfast since she can’t even crouch out of bed, and every month, religiously visits Safdarjung hospital for a repeat prescription. If month after month, since February I believe, the medication is the same, and your limping walk remains intact, why not abandon the line of treatment, and head to some other apothecary?! As I said, a good fortnight before Deepawali, begins the hip-hop and the raw-boned back, bearing the entrapped nerve, vanishes a la Houdini! And to repeat, this mademoiselle must take you for being whole-heartedly empty-headed. Now she climbs the ladder, runs up and down the spiral staircase (mention corkscrew flight of steps since its too many ascents and descents, wears down the fleet-footed) with colt-like sprightliness. But back to the kitchen—all cabinets, cupboards, shelves are emptied, wiped, dusted, with every single utensil bathed. Uselessly stacked stuff put aside for the alleged Lady of the House to decide what has to be given to the kabadiwallah, who yes, is also doing numerous rounds with his wooden wagon harnessed to a cycle, crying out with a full-throated loud cry (you would think he’d need a hefty dose of lozenges at the end of the day to soothe his hoarse throat) to dispose off the junk collected over the year for Lakshmi Mä to come a visiting. This high-gear activity where if it wasn’t the season of illumination, one would have worn oneself to a shadow. Now, all this high-burst of zest, wherever does it flow from?! (Of course, with this high-decibel safai abhiyaan, there is no time to run the kitchen, so you find yourself throwing together supper!) The answer to working oneself to the bones with the robustness of an ox, is a simple 5-finger exercise. Simply put, it’s all about money, money, money and whether you have it or not, you are cornered. So, beg, borrow, steal but this “rightful” amount has to be coughed-up! You might even tell the supposed staff to take care of themselves, stop burning the candle from both ends but…but then they dip their eyes into yours with an overwhelming quizzical look that, at least in my case, decomposes you. Now the maali, too acquires a serious disposition for gardening. Weeds, that you have been, in a kind reminder voice, telling him to root out, are done so now like greased lightning. Flower saplings, at the most humble price, are planted like an arrow from a bow, else the refrain is that the flowers are 30 rupaiya a piece. Pots are scraped of the moss and painted with the loveliest brick red powder and Nanak Chand, who elsewise is always fleeing from the garden, post his evening chai and biscuits, is single-handedly pruning your having grown mountainous Ficus tree due to an over a year of neglect. And now where he borrowed a 14-feet ladder from, remains a brain-twister! Soon your garden, including the backyard vegetable one, abounds with palak, dhania, tomatoes and bhindi inconceivably sprung up. I truly believe that the maali’s hyperkinetic fiddle-footedness pushing them into a frenzied premature birth! Or if I stand wrong, then Sherlock Holmes should be brought in to make head or tail of the matter. Your driver—provided by the office—however, cares a toss, being the King of Lethargy. He too, come Diwali morning, demands his pound of flesh. He sits, until you have to dash off for work, in the garage, under a dirty whirring fan, which he doesn’t think it’s his duty— Diwali or no Diwali—to clean.
The house is all dressed up but what about yourself?! And an unironed lehenga awaits you, but only after you have gifted near-designer sarees and cash to these dancing maniacally kangaroos. Following Diwali skeletal work is done. Was I so myopically weak-minded that I couldn’t see her immobilized back, her quite wheelchair ready condition.
A covenant to myself: next year I shall celebrate Diwali bolting the house 15 days in advance, and take myself anywhere for a retreat.
(Dr Renée Ranchan writes on socio-psychological issues, quasi-political matters and concerns that touch us all.)