Sunday, December 21, 2008

Days of my Life

What a frenetically hectic time of year this is. The floor tiles took 2 and a half days to put in but almost double that time to clean up the dust and dirt that resulted. The Assembly election results surprised everyone with the Congress that's been kept down for two terms coming back with a bang. It made me realise that Mizos don't do things by half plus we do things unanimously. When something's the flavour of the people, everyone jumps on the bandwagon not wanting to be left out.

The day the votes were counted, something terrible happened that we'd long been dreading. One of our dogs Mami died after a week long illness. She was 11 years old and absolutely devoted to my sister P. Was a constant, ever faithful companion. Never left the room without her mistress and only deigned to trot behind her wheelchair when absolutely necessary. Her passing numbed us all. Rest in peace, little one.
On the evening of the first day we began working on the floors, someone stole my sister M's cell phone from the dining table. We can't imagine who could have had the audacity to slip in and calmly pick up the phone with its charger. That cheeky bit of burglary coupled with Mami's death, and the fact that our dogs are somewhat elderly anyway made us decide to put in a steel gate. A few thousand bucks poorer, we're now happily planning to use it to put up Christmas lights.

Then a couple of days last week, the Sunday School kids had a special camp just before their confirmation as full-fledged church members. My responsibility, alongwith 6 or 7 others, was in the kitchen, in the food dept. and preparing food four times a day for almost 100 people and cleaning up after them is no joke, believe me. We literally spent time washing mountains of dirty dishes, cups and spoons et al, and then immediately sitting down to peel and cut potatoes for the next meal, slicing veggies etc etc. E-x-h-a-u-s-t-i-n-g. And it was so cold and dark in the kitchen too.

It's hard to believe there's only just a couple days left for Christmas. Everything's so pretty and beautiful again. Everyone seems all agog with expectations, and there's so much goodwill being generated. It's a bit sad though that with cell phone connectivity, the old tradition of sending and receiving Christmas cards has almost disappeared. Of course, simply sending batches of instant sms-es on Christmas day to near and dear ones is so easy but there's a certain something in receiving lovely paper cards. Ah well, some things change but some good things abide still. Merry Christmas, everyone!


Wednesday, December 03, 2008

Poll Day Woozeheads & a Winter Love Song


Mizoram went to the polls yesterday to vote in a new house of legislators for the next 5 years. Since Monday we've been hard at work around the house putting in burnt orange-brown floor tiles and the house is a mess of workers, water sloshing all over the floor and cement dust coating everything within sight. So my sister and I had to clean up good to go cast our votes. At the last moment I realised I didn't have my regulatory electoral ID card with me and couldn't remember where I'd left it. It wasn't where I thought it was supposed to be. Not in my wallet, not on my table, not in my drawer, not in my wardrobe. I frantically rummaged through my messy room, swearing I'd really get down to cleaning up as soon as possible as I keep meaning to. The dratted ID wasn't in sight and I wondered if I'd have to skip exercising my franchise this time. Then as I breathed a quick fervent prayer, I remembered my bedside Bible. I often store really, really important things there and gloryosky, there was my ID card nestling between the front cover and first page. Like they say, the Bible always has the answer to your prayers!

Here's a beautiful love song I just recently heard and love to pieces. Song for a Winter's Night written by the Canadian singer/songwriter Gordon Lightfoot, hauntingly sung here by Sarah McLachlan and Jewel with footage from the movie King Arthur (which I haven't watched yet btw). All the snow makes me über cold and I can't believe they're all actually moving around in those thin pieces of clothing! And while we don't exactly have snow in this part of the world, well, turns out Lightfoot wrote these lyrics not in the middle of a Canadian winter with snow falling outside but during a thunderstorm in July.

If I could only have you near
To breathe a sigh or two
I would be happy just to hold the hands I love
On this winter's night with you
And to be once again with you

For you, baby...