Nostalgia About Mornings

I am 43 now. I live in the USA and burn my midnight oil every day. That's my normal.

Even as a village girl in India, I was a night owl. I read story books or painted late into the nights. May be the less chaos at night, gave me quality solitude and productivity.

I never liked waking up early in the morning. It made me feel groggy.

My mother, on the other hand, woke up early like most village people. She did not like it if I lingered in the bed. She thought it's lazy. She feared guests would visit and will find the laziness unfeminine.

She would have done a string of chores already, and she would try to get me out of bed with different interesting ways that might tempt me to wake up.

Let me share, as I take a stroll down the memory lane into the 1990s.

She would say, “See how the sun is rising behind the large mahua tree. It looks like a red orb.” I would dismiss it, saying, “What’s new? It happens every day.”

Then, on some days, she would tell me that many mushrooms have popping up in the backyard straw pile, and if I didn’t pick them soon, someone else would. That was too exciting to ignore. In a few jumps, I would be near the straw pile, digging through it, to collect the umbrella-like full mushrooms or the dark buds. Counting the haul was so fun. It happened only few days in monsoon season. Not to be missed.

Some days she would say that a storm had passed the night before and lots of mangoes had fallen in the backyard orchard. I could go pick them up in a bamboo basket. I would run out immediately to enjoy the gathering. Collection is fun.

Also, some days, she wanted me to climb the guava tree and pick fruits, for my father was going somewhere, and will take for some relative. I would oblige. Tree climbing and fruit picking was enjoyable.

Other days she would bring even more exciting news: our cow, who was pregnant, had given birth to an adorable calf. Who wouldn’t want to see a newborn calf, jumping excitedly around the backyard barn? I would be there to see the newborn calf. To find out if it's a boy or girl. To know it's color.

And then there were days when she told me that tribal women from nearby villages have arrived, to sell wild fruits gathered from the forest. That, too, was exciting enough to pull me out of bed.

There would be jujube, date palm, wild persimmons, tubers, and many other wild edible things in their bamboo lathe baskets. It was fun haggling and listening to their jungle tales.

Here, I have painted that nostalgia of rural Indian mornings and my mother’s clever efforts to wake me up. I feel lucky to imagine, reminisce, and to paint the memories that bring nostalgic pangs. It is a relief.

Decades have passed. Now the tables have turned.

I wake up every day early, the first in the family, to get my daughter ready for school. It's not fun but is a necessity, I can't skip.

I miss those days, when there was a loving mother to wake me up. The things I took for granted now ache.

I narrated these stories to my two little children. They were enchanted. Living in Californian suburb, with few similarities with my childhood, it seems exotic to them.

Time and place change everything.

Now I share the tales with you. Thank you for reading. I hope, you loved the story and the painting.