Roti (Food for Thought) (Part 4)
The very basic need of an individual to sustain in the physical form to satiate our hunger. And a larger need is to satiate our emotional hunger to learn, to explore, to travel within to find our core purpose. There is a much broader concept of food for thought, of the changes required to function in this rapidly changing world. As I spent the last year across geographies in several homes and hotels, it meant that all emotions – happiness, sadness, fights, disappointments, and celebrations, I get to experience them while I am being transient. Celebrations or grief are very deep emotions where the familiarity of the place mitigates the occasion.
I was in quarantine in California when I heard about my cousin Padma’s death. I was all alone without having my sister or a close friend who knew Padma as well to hold onto and share the grief. I simply could not get out of bed and continued to stare out at the strange scenery out of the window and play out the most familiar details of our years of friendship.
On another occasion, I was in Washington DC staying at a friend’s place when I learnt of my friend Jane Dauber’s deteriorating health from cancer; I sat in an unfamiliar home, on a sofa that was strange to me, sobbing away. A week later, I was in my friend’s place in the bay area when I heard of Jane’s passing away. In the early hours, I sat in the backyard of their home and thought of all the fun travel Jane and I did, of our working together at Intel, of our lives as single women, of sharing stories of the people we dated, eventually married, of our children, of exchanging experiences, of supporting each other's' dreams, of long lapses of time between encounters and diving into deep conversations as though not a minute had gone by even after long separation. I pulled out photos from our dinner in 2018 where I met her daughter along with our other friends and celebrated our walk on earth.
Each of these places has entrenched in me deep sorrow, pain and despair of the loss. With every move from one home to another, from one hotel to another, there was a shift of place, there was a different story of sadness associated with a different place. At your home, you might have a window through which you look at an old tree, or a favourite pillow you hold on to or an old, soft couch to snuggle into, to experience the sadness bubbling within you. But when you are travelling, you are making new markers of your sorrow in these strange places.
And this is not only for the losses; it’s as much of an adjustment to celebrate joyous occasions. That same sense of impermanence makes celebrations a little awkward as well. Case in point. Hindu festival Krishna ashtami is a celebration of Lord Krishna’s birth and Ganesh Chaturthi is a celebration of Ganesha’s birth. When my son was young, my brother in law would plan his travel from the UK to India to coincide with Ganesh Chaturthi so that he could be with my son to perform the puja. While I am not the one to take an initiative to do the puja, I was always happy to watch my son perform the puja, join my friend Vimala or visit my sister on these festivals. Being away from home, I was nostalgic of these festivities in familiar places. That’s when I received a video of the celebrations that my friend Vani Kola hosted for Krishna ashtami. Vani’s mother used to celebrate the festival in a grand way when we were kids. Vani wanted to ensure that she made great memories for her mother while she was alive. So, she celebrated the festival just the way her mother did and created a video and shared it. The video took me back in years and put me back at home with my family. That’s when it dawned on me – The only way to console yourself from the sorrow of loss is to know that you did everything you could to create great memories while the other person was alive. Despite our busy lives, I made my best effort to spend time with Jane and my friends and we took the time to be together when it mattered. Vani’s video reminded me of the importance of taking the time to show those who love that they really matter.
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I made it a point to create experiences worth remembering in years to come. For instance, I celebrated Ganesh Chaturthi with my friend Anu by performing our own version of the puja and helped make coconut barfi. It’s not about religion but of rituals – these little things we do to deal with our sorrows or celebrate festivities. It’s about latching on to momentary spaces while you are in transit as a response to the sorrow and the festivity alike.
In business as well, I had to give up the familiarity of our beloved office space, have brainstorming sessions at borrowed spaces in friends’ offices, tape zoom meetings and use collaboration tools to share ideas and learn to match the magic of writing on a white board. It’s transition from a firm state of familiarity to a fluid state of space and time. Just as I found perfect places to mourn for Jane, host an improvised ritual for Ganesha during my travels, I also found a way to run a business without being bound by an office address. As I write these thoughts, I am reflecting on the new avenues that are waiting for me to explore both within and without. I am dreaming of what I can create/ curate experiences for others that can bring a smile on their faces even when we are not together.
My son and I have many memories together across myriad hotel rooms, road trips –some tough arguments and some fun and frolic in addition to the ones we had at home. Our love spreads across zoom calls, WA forwards, text messages and road trips as much as hanging out in person. Just s Vani’s video showed, it’s about what we do while we are alive with our loved ones, it’s about how we show up for our teams in times of duress or delight is all that matters. Let's celebrate our togetherness without any physical constructs, our camaraderie in cyber space be the soul food and let our moments of happiness or sadness be our choice ingredients. It’s as though we are planting our memories wherever we happen to be and sprout trees across the globe instead of planting a forest in one spot.