A slight chill in the air, marvelously lit homes, people dressed to kill and city abuzz with heightened activity – that has always been the magic of Diwali for me. Now as I see, city streets narrowing down amid the sea of shoppers, the jostle around, the bright glow of satiated souls and the heat of the I-have-a-dress-to-kill smiles are not allowing the winter chill to settle in. And though I despise all forms of heightened activity unless they are my own, this is the time of the year when I do not mind. A rather appropriate description would be that I do not have the time to mind. For, when God asked me to choose between astute planning and acute dreaming, I think I chose the latter. To cut the long story short, my life is full of last-minute mayhem. And Diwali with its majestic length and multilayered breadth, often finds me squarely in trouble.

 

 

The pre-Diwali activity in an Indian household is usually to turn the home upside down, clean every little speck of dirt out of the house and paint the home ‘red’. This is also the time for exuberant exclamations as in no time the home can turn into the lost and found office. That is the time when one truly realises the length, breadth and depth of one’s own house! Oh! It is so huge, so myriad and so near, yet so far! It keeps connected varied lives, assuming character of each of the persons living. So my own house has a certain child-like vibrancy, a little intellectual quality, a little lazy ease. In short, it is pretty messy. Thanks to my child’s semester exams being dragged to the very last minute, I hardly had the time to pour my heart into cleaning as much as I should have. My efforts at removing cobwebs were required elsewhere. But it took much longer than planned, as it always does – this business of revision for exams! Though, I did do my best to turn the house upside down and found so much of my wealth back. But that work was again more a product of acute dreaming than astute planning. Sometime, it went so acute, I felt like I was going completely obtuse. So, a little out of my own willingness and more due to the strong pleadings of those who felt they might soon get caught in the web of angles; I let the better sense prevail. Now that the festival has settled in, some undone corners, some unattended areas and some will-do-later things, are unsettling me, though. But then, what is Diwali, if not for the last-minute rush.

 

Most of our collective memories are abound with these! Like the last minute shopping, I did yesterday. My affection for the word ‘shopping’ turns into sheer love when a race against time is won within time. Of course, one has to deal with the master of the house whose frowning brows personify a budget going deficit, but I have also mastered the art of screaming ‘absolutely necessary.’ And women, you know, have this conviction that they can be quite convincing. Now that the D-Day is tomorrow, I have not even reached the half-way mark of my acute planning. The pending chores will need more than a day and since I do not have it, I am making a can-be-omitted list. But each of the chores is presenting a strong case against being left out.

 

What to do! This Diwali, too, like the previous one, I can put the blame squarely on COVID. Let the generations to come know that with a little presence of mind, mankind can put even a pandemic to good use. So to any corner left unattended, to the sweets that did not see the light of the day, to the delicacies that never reached the fry pan, to the decorations that still languishes in the twisted layers of my mind and to all the very many things that could have been..., on this Diwali, I say, “bura no mano...pandemic hai!’ Of course, there are many who might argue that coronavirus pandemic is waning and no cause for alarm, least of all for completing house work. I want to remind them of the lasting effect of the pandemic.

 

No, no I am not talking about body aches and pain or any such trivia. It has made all of us humankind lazy. It has also somehow taken away the anxiety related to laziness. It has told us ‘life is short, relax when you can.’ And a true blue Indian that I am, I am for relaxation, almost always. After all, Diwali is all about light - Being light is a part of it, is it not? Alas! one look around and my anxiety returns. There is a sea of people in the markets. Yesterday, I saw shops flooded, malls inundated and salesman drowning. It seems like people have struck back with a vengeance. They intend to let no excuse come their way in celebrating Diwali. I want my Diwali to be light but not completely weightless. So, I must act and rejoin my usual race against time.

 

I can omit nothing from my can-omit list. I just can’t! As I ponder over my predicaments, a certain gentleman, usually unshakable, is uncharacteristically up and about, doing things that I usually do. My kido, too, is growing up, reminding me of things that I forgot to do but which she has already done. I have just thrown my can-be-omitted list to the bin. With efforts pouring from all corners of my troubled square, I will, in all likelihood, celebrate Diwali with enough lights and lightness. All this troubles or more appropriately, thoughts of trouble, have made me realise that Diwali is all about lighting lamps in the darkness. Lamp and darkness are two realities – not so contrasting as they seem. Rather they complement each other. One’s presence becomes radiant because of the other. They say, “Had it not been for the light, you could not have seen the darkness.” So, here am I, giving my pandemic-acquired laziness a little push into action. There are loads of things to be done, but I am in no hurry. Like a small lamp that politely asks darkness to give way, I radiate my ‘to-do’ list, as the two bright lights in my home, run around to make my Diwali light in every sense of the term.