The good old summer

“For Chanda Ba-the Calpurnia to our Scott, Jem and Dill.”

Growing up, I feared two things the most. The first one was a rather obvious choice for kids that age- the dark and all of its supernatural denizens whose question of existence has since ages riddled mankind. However, the latter was a little less obvious but an equally dark figure with features so blunt and robust that it definitely did not fit the description of a woman. She was our beloved Durga ba.

I was merely a day old when she came to us in the summer of 2001. She was eighteen then and still had rough edges, a round face which was the color of dark chocolate and eyes so white that they didn’t reflect light.

A few days after my birth, my father dropped me and my mother at my maternal grandma’s place so that she could concentrate on me completely with a promise to visit every day and take us back after two months. Probably, the idea of having a child around worried my mama so much that he ended up calling Durga ba to help everyone out with me and the household chores.

 Durga ba was an excellent cook and was skilled in almost everything. Hence with her scrumptious food and agile fingers, she won over everyone’s heart quite quickly and soon became family.

At the end of the two months, my father took me and my mother back home leaving everyone at mama’s place poignant and desolate. But they overcame that grief just like everybody else does and for weird reasons, Durga ba stayed behind and continued to do so for the next fourteen years of her life.

Roughly a year later, my mama had a son which was followed by the birth of my younger brother. Thus I found my summer playmates.

During those days, summer was the only season we waited eagerly for -as it meant a month-long break from school and days so long that you had enough time to run about and go wild. Soon after my prickly heat and the myriad of water bottles floating around in the school with the same orange color liquid had announced the arrival of summer, I remember mother dropping me and my brother at our mama’s place on the very first day of our summer break, returning to pick us up only on the second last day of our month-long vacation. It was our summer time ritual.

Summer meant long days and short, crisp nights. It meant running about in the big open fields behind our mama’s place, poking the large mango tree in the backyard for some ripe mangoes or shaking the low branches of the berry tree for some ripe berries even when the ground was painted black with them. Summer was for our many cycling adventures, our endless search for the lost shuttlecocks and cricket balls in the fields past sunset (thanks to our brilliant sportsmanship) or trying to fly a kite when there was no wind around; all the while with Durga ba watching our activities meticulously from a distance.

When night fell, the three of us would be found indulged in some indoor game, creating our customary ruckus. On some nights, me and Durga ba would squeeze ourselves on the tiny swing and sitting under the clear star lit sky, we would watch the boys run around-chasing fireflies while my companion on the swing occasionally reminded them not to hurt the fireflies or her flowers.

In spite of how delectable it sounds; summer was an equally hard time for me. With Durga ba always around, I had a hard time growing up and was constantly ridiculed by her for my unladylike manners. She used to mercilessly chop off great chunks of my hair in fear of any possible lice aggression (leaving me bald inmost case) , make me wipe my plate clean by forcing me to eat the vegetables which mother normally could never make me do with her mere strength, asked me to scream less and not to howl like the boys, scolded me for asking a lot of unnecessary and stupid questions, mocked my skinny figure, reprimanded my poor knowledge on cooking and other household chores and compared me to one distant cousin of mine who could cook and wash at least her undergarments. When we went on evening walks in the neighborhood, she made it a point to blare out the stories of my mischief to all the passersby.

She would often tell me how my life would change once I hit puberty and considered it the only way for me to turn more lady like in my demeanor. In fact, she was so firm in her belief that she once lectured me on how a girl’s life changes physically and mentally once she enters her adolescent life. She even showed me a sanitary pad which I nonchalantly waved in front of my two younger brothers in an attempt to look cool and ended up getting the beating of my life.

But apart from her tyrannical presence, summer was as easy as a breeze.

My birthday which was in the month of August and just a few days after school reopened was always a sweet little affair. I recall mother coming to stay at mama’s place for at least a week with all her tools and work with Durga ba to sew me a perfect birthday dress. They both worked on my grandmother’s old sewing machine and called me at various times to ask my opinion on the color, length of the dress and what lace to be used and to take my measurements. It would often irritate me for I had to leave my game with the boys in the middle but I never protested.

On my birthday, there were three cakes-one having eggs and festooned with all kinds of creams and bought from the store, another eggless one bought from the same store for the vegetarian guests and lastly, a simple cake baked in the old round oven and decorated modestly with gems and pieces of Dairy Milk chocolate by Durga ba. I was to wear my mother's and Durga ba's creation that evening and greet the guests. Often, the dresses would be so heavily sequined and studded with so many tiny mirrors that the guests would furtively glance at their minute yet elongated reflections while praising the beauty of these dresses. Sometimes, in the middle of the party if I looked at her, I would find her smiling satisfactorily even if I was howling a moment ago. In fact, she would encourage me to go wild that day which made me doubt her principles.

With all the good food, bright lights, colorful balloons, confetti and elegant dresses, my birthdays then always felt like a grand occasion.

My life remained the same for the next twelve years or so and as predicted by Durga ba, changed considerably once I hit puberty. I no longer liked running about for long hours in summer and preferred sitting on the verandah steps and talking to her on myriad of unimportant things instead.

And just like the tiny cubes of misiri melting slowly and unconsciously in our mouths, summer melted into our youth. And just as easily, we grew up and all of it became a song.

Now, her demeanor towards me became milder. She no longer ran after us begging us to climb down the trees as now no one climbed them up, gave me light lessons in cooking which I weirdly enjoyed, no longer chopped off my hair, no longer scrubbed and bathed the three of us under the summer sun while tiny bubbles and the smell of Clinic Plus floated in the air.

A lot more changed once we grew up. I visited mama’s place less and if I did, I was found giving monosyllabic answers to their questions. Perhaps she was happy with my transformation.

As said, my brothers changed too and we no longer sought each other’s company and for the first time, the house felt tranquil even with the three of us around.

Years rolled by and so did those memories and soon we realized that we could no longer fit in our tree house. Suddenly, one fine morning, Durga ba announced that it was time for her to leave and go back home and no matter how much we tried to coax her into staying back, she stood firm in her decision. It was time to say goodbye and none of us was ready to do so.

When that day finally came, we didn’t give her a great goodbye gift or throw her a grand farewell party. In fact, I didn’t even go to drop her at the bus stop and instead wished her happy journey on the phone. When she was gone and no matter how the same our life felt, a tiny void formed in all of our flaky and even tinier hearts.

Once she was gone, she fell in love, got married and soon had a baby daughter. With this, she visited mama’s place even less frequently. During the initial years, we called her almost daily but with time, they became less frequent and soon we reached a point when we called her just once in four months. Naturally, we were forgetting her with each of us trying to make the best of what little we had for our future.

Even though with time my birthdays became less fancy, the earlier three cakes came to be replaced by a simple cake baked by mother and the number of people actually remembering my birthday became few; there was one thing that didn’t change. Durga ba was and had always been the first one to wish me on my birthday and this was true in my brothers’ cases too.