Mountains in our Lives

People in our lives are supposedly always temporary - passing clouds. They come, bring you the experience that you need to have and then they leave. The duration and intensity of these experiences vary in different degrees, but ultimately they end in one way or another. Then, there are the people you meet and you know at that very instant that life is never going to be the same again. They change the course of you life, influence the choices you make and walk with you to your destiny - at least for some time. 

The people we become is however not our choice for most parts. Each and every one of us is a collection of thoughts influenced by the experiences, environment and belief systems that have been planted within us. Of course you can choose to argue that to change this is also our choice but again the choices provided to change into is also circumstantial, again influenced by the environment, situations and the cumulative thoughts that make up this world(our own personal world) that we live in. Facebook shows this very clearly, your feed always reflects the person you are, just compare that to someone who is on the polar opposite and of your lifestyle and environment and you would see completely different world. 

Knowing that we are never our own person is both comforting and well as scary at the exact same time. Does this mean that there is no original thought? - I could read that sentence with 2 different emotions and feel completely different about it. 

It also brings allot of gratitude knowing that the people who helped shape my life have been stellar examples of courage, fortitude and balance. Pretty much like the mountains, they stand tall giving you the direction you need, sometimes long after you have scaled them, showing you that everything can change but if you are deeply rooted and grounded you will be ok. 

This week I've had one of those mountains on my mind, as M and I spoke about his grandmother and I thought about this woman who has inspired him so much, I remembered my own personal mountain, Anggamal and how she had such an important role to play in my life. The last time I wrote a blog about her was in 2007, the pain of separation was still pretty raw then and apart from thinking about the great times we had, I was not ready to look at how she shaped my life, how she brilliantly crafted the life around her without taking credit for it. How she was a perfect balance of giving while never loosing sight of taking care of herself.  I wonder what it would have been to be in her shoes.. how she managed to just fit into that role that I am pretty sure was not her choice and yet be able to shape it into something so wonderful. How she worked with traditions slowly kneading it and spreading its comfort zone far into uncharted territories. How she took a life that was basically shoved at her and owned it. 

How much strength it must have taken being an educated woman to marry a man who you knew was probably so much less than you deserved and who also comes with a ton of baggage. But yet she did. She took it on , all of it. The 5 kids who were close to her age, his drinking issues, his lack of ambition and foresight and she turned it into something great. How much patience she must have had to work with a man like that. How smart must she have been to be able to inspire him to change. 

 A few lessons I am pretty sure I have learnt from her i think are:

When life throws you Unripe mangoes - Make that super awesome pickles and give it out to all your friends 

I have learnt that if I truly want something, I will get it or a better version of it. ALWAYS. Just like when we waited for those sweet ripe mangoes from our garden every year and throughout the year we would wait and get maybe the rare odd mango that would serve as after lunch desert but if we had patience, there would come a time when there were so many mangoes that we would never be able to finish them. They were huge and fleshy and sweet. They bring a smile to me even as I think of them now. However with them came loads of unripe mangoes that would also fall. This would turn Patti's kitchen into a part time cottage industry making mango pickles. As a child... who likes pickles? but thinking of them now makes my tongue tingle. I learnt that with everything you want with all the sweet that you get in life, you will always have those rock hard sour moments that make you questions if waiting for mango season was worth it. Learning to work with whatever the world threw at you and making something out of it, is definitely a huge lesson I learnt. This showed so much in her life, taking everything to stride and never for once showing a sign of weakness. Maybe I was to young to comprehend her moments of weakness, but to me anything could come into Patti's life - She would make that same problem a cup of tea sit down with it face to face, and find a way to make it work. 

Balance - Never loose sight of the most important person in your life - YOU!

Indian women, or Indian mothers rather, have always been associated with sacrifice. Never thinking about themselves, always focusing on the family, never even giving space to think about their desires save the annual purchase of a saree here and there. But not Patti. She knew how to treat herself well and this is a huge lesson in balance that I have learnt. While it is true that she took care of all of us, she fed us, kept the home tidy to perfection, I never ever remember anything EVER being out of place in Pattis house. Patti was very serious about taking time off. She did not only take the occasional trips to Kuala Lumpur but also traveled abroad on holidays. I remember telling my friends in school that my grandmother was on a holiday in Australia and getting wide eyed responses from the other kids. Not just big trips but small things like having an ice cream when she felt like it and only the expensive ones - because she could, taking all the time in the world to craft a gourmet meal for a bunch of kids who probably did not know the difference. Just sitting on the steps of the house in the evenings. watching the cars pass by ... I miss that so much... just doing nothing with you was awesome Patti. I have learnt to not be guilty for putting me first, for taking care of myself so I have enough to always give , because there is no way you can give from an empty vessel. 

Children are just grownups in little bodies 

Its funny how while I always remember being comfortable with Patti, I never remember being treated like a kid. It is weird how she did this. I was afraid to cross the line and yet when I did make a mistake, I was never afraid of owning up to it. She listened to me as if everything I said made sense to her, like that crush I had in school was perfectly logical, like that fight that Kimberly and I had was as important to her as it was to me, like that teacher who was not fair to us in class really had no right to do that. She made everything matter and that gave me such confidence that my thoughts were mature that my opinions mattered. 

To the rest of the world she was always on my side, like when I drove Appas car and met with a small accident, how she was on my side convincing Appa that the other driver was in the wrong when we both knew it was my mistake. She taught me how to maintain that balance of discipline with children yet constantly letting them know you are there for them. 

She also knew how to handle teenagers in such changing times. I bet my aunts would have never had a chance to go out with guys, but when my" boyfriends" turned up at 9 pm on their bicycles wanting to grab a bite at the stalls across the road, she never blinked an eye. That trust was everything to me. This made the boys her friends as well, many times I would find them at Pattis house having a chat with her even before I got home. She was super popular with all my friends. How was she so progressive you ask? I think it was only because she CHOSE to be. She chose to trust us and we knew for a fact, that if we were up to no good, she WOULD FIND out. Somehow things never got that bad. 

 

Planning is Everything - Baby Steps, one day at the time 

This part I am yet to learn, and I only found out after she had passed away. As we went through her stuff, my dad and I found books where she wrote down every penny she spent for the house and for the kids. Perfect book keeping style. I always wondered what she used to write in those books just before tea and stumbling onto those books gave me that insight into her amazing financial planning abilities. She knew where very bit of money she went. She was also a pretty good investor, making my grandfather buy the land our home used to stand on when no one ventured to that part of town. Hardly a couple of years passed when that location boomed into such a central location serving as a landmark to many even till today. That ability to have a plan and stick to it come what may is something I am still learning. Honestly if Patti can make someone like Mr. Govindasamy do the things he did, I am pretty sure I can also convince anyone if I just have the tenacity to stick to a plan and not give up. 

You Do not need to be in the Forefront to make the changes you want to see. Sometimes it is better working in the background. 

I do not know if this is true, again i was too young to observe Patti's relationship with Tata, but from the stories I heard from Mum and Dad, it seems like they had a pretty regular Indian marriage where apparently they key decision made every day revolved around what was on the menu the next day!

Of course Tata loved to entertain and I am sure showing off his young wife's cooking skills brought him pride as well. She did all of this dutifully - she told me while she was ready to deliver my dad she was making the Deepavali turkey curry because her husband would not hear of not entertaining on that special day. But did she make changes, she sure did. It is clear that every strategic decision made in that family was hers, that the economical progress of the family was hers and the way all of us were brought up was also her decision. I learnt that sometimes you do not have to challenge the norms to make a change, sometimes it is easier to work with what you have behind the scenes knowing the change will happen. You need to realize that the change is more important than the acknowledgement that comes to you. You ego is not as important as the greater good of the family.

I could go on and on... and indeed this experience is not only unique to me, each one of us have our own mountains that stand tall guiding our path reminding us of the people that we are . Knowingly or unknowingly, we too become those mountains, we also contribute to the collective thoughts that build this world, every single day, by the way we make our choices, by the way we choose to live our lives. We become those same mountains, deeply rooted, strong, firm and a constant reminder to reach for the skies. 

I love you Patti, I hope you are proud of the woman I have become. 

*Damn I probably made Tata look like a bad guy, but I promise this is all circumstantial to the time of when it happened, Im pretty sure he was nice too, and I got a ring from him so  i guess for 3 years we had a pretty good relationship*   - Yes Jerry Boy , I got it and you did not :P