Of jumbles and read-ons

On a whim, I said to the child

Here, let me teach you how to do The Hindu crossword.


Y'know, 'cause every self-respecting Tam has to know how to do The Hindu crossword. And only that. Not the TOI one (oo mama). Not the Telegraph (shudder). Not the Deccan Herald one (ugh).

Before you ask, yes, we subscribe to The Hindu. Also the TOI. Our newspaper/magazine subscription story is a long one. I don't want to talk about it now. Suffice to say that we don't seem to have much control over what gets flung on our doorstep (dislodging, in the process, about a kilogram of mosquitoes).

There are few things you are better at than me 


The child tells me, in passing, while skipping a pink coloured skipping rope haltingly. Discussion (calmly now) led to the conclusion that I am better than her at most things (at this point of time). In fact, at all things except swimming. I quickly added a 'at this point of time' tag to it, knowing full well that its untrue. Hanging out with her in the pool today, for example, in five minutes, she had touched the bottom, wormed her way up, hung out upside down in the middle of the lane and criss-crossed me a hundred times. I was clutching the ladder and going 'Cat and Mouse' 'Cat and Mouse' in my head, meanwhile.

I am definitely good at this crossword business, so learn you from me.


I tell her. I learnt some of the stuff that is known in CW folklore, from my dear friend airspy. Yes, despite being a professor, I admit it. Some class time in college was spent by us on this activity. I have spent hours on the damned thing in my younger days, thats for sure. Not all of it in class. Oh yes, before you ask, my parents had The Hindu as well. Mum still does. Of course we drink coffee as well. I missed the centum by a mark or two, if  you must know.

Most people hate math Amma


The child informs me, playing in distracted manner with the sudoku. I should go up in flames at that surely. I tell her thats utter nonsense and its virtually impossible to dislike math. Forget hating it. It is the most beautiful thing in the world. Without numbers, there is nothing, and so what if some rote memorisation of the multiplication table is required? It is only a matter of time before you are fast enough to figure the thing out without memorising, I argue.

Let me help you guys take this one over the line


The husband shows up on the scene with his jargon and his brazen confidence. We forget about math and focus on words now. Sometimes I feel I love words more than numbers. Only sometimes though. I point to the inherent symmetry in the grid, surprising the child, who hasn't noticed it (or, it is not a rule followed in children's crosswords, possibly). There are a lot of anagrams, as usual. "Jumbles" the family chooses to call them. The occasional read-on clue. Really, there is nothing too remarkably clever in the CW. Is it a reflection of the times? The lowering of standards? Or have I become just super good at this.

What is this? Two girls in love before marriage? Super funny Amma


The child says. I choose not to comment on the clue itself, but pencil in the answer. She cracks up big time. She calls her father back to the dining table - the scene of our crimes. "Prema Rita L" do you see, she sniggers. Assuming that he doesn't understand, she goes on to explain. The two girls are Prema and Rita, and love is L. "Prema Rita" she has been going on after that, laughing each time, "What a clue!" Her innocent eyes light up when something makes sense, when I guide her gently to the answer. Its thankful that I know the end-point now, and can walk her to it, and I can almost see the bulb go off in her head.

You are growing up so fast, child


Pretty soon, I will NOT be better than you. At anything. Math, Skipping, Basketball, Crosswords even, perhaps. For years my dad would ask me to help me figure out the CW. I learnt fast and he couldn't catch up with me. He would make a big deal how it made no sense. Truth is, its silly, not the most intellectual of puzzles out there, but it is a lot of fun, once you figure it out. As you surely will, child. Before I know it, you will be really good at all these things... And all grown up... And off to college... And actually knowing what 'premarital' means, and implies.. It is all so scary at times...

Growing up with a well

I grew up with an aunt. You could say she was a big influence. Mum worked, dad was a workoholic, my grandfather lacked the energy to deal with me beyond a point, my school was for short hours and I had plenty of time to hang around at home. I kept myself completely busy doing this and that (craft, gardening, reading, whatever) but also had enough time to watch at close quarters the working of the woman who ruled our kitchen and pretty much our lives for many years.

We had a well. Water from the well was used to re-wash things that the maid washed. The whole pulley arrangement and drawing water from the well was big fun, especially during that brief age when it was just then a sanctioned activity and had not yet turned into a chore. We had all of those things associated with the kitchen - that stone grinder thing, that long metal-covered wooden stick for beating, a small stone for working on the skins of the groundnuts, a cutter for breaking arecanuts into small pieces, and many other things besides. None of the modern appliances. Many of my early memories are of the elaborate making of sweets and savouries for various festivals; and that smoky smell that pervaded the house after death ceremonies. It did not take long to learn the rules of the game - no touching; no salivating over foodstuffs till they are offered to god; no eating up of too many pieces at a time (this last one from my mum, always on the watch out for my health, and possessing two eyes in the back of her head in addition to the two eagle-like ones in the front).

Unlike my sister, I had no trouble in following the traditions and sticking to the rules. I found nothing to really object to. It was a big game for me. Every year I learned more of the rules by heart and would recite it parrot-like to anyone who asked (mostly they laughed at me for this). There was a linearity in these things that I liked, or at least found no reason to resent. Like washing your feet after peeing, nothing wrong with it I would think, in fact its kind of hygienic to do that.

Every month, after making a humongous deal of having her period, the same aunt would pack a 'wire basket' with some stuff (clothes I suppose) and head over to the cauvery to bathe. This involved something of a bus-ride, to go from Mysore to Srirangapatna. It could not have been convenient, especially on the way back due to the touching rules she had to follow. But I used to go along with her, for company. Possibly I was chosen because I never cribbed about it. In fact, I enjoyed it. A nice bus-ride, a busy water front, and, that sense of responsibility when she left her basket with me and waded into the shallow water, oh and also possibly love, I did really love her, despite her frequent dark moods.

A lot of fun was made of me for this business. My uncles would tease me to tears by insinuating that I had to go to the river because I had my period (or at least thats what I thought they were saying, I have never been good at figuring out when people are poking fun at me). My sister would smirk and snigger every time I came back. My mum would hide her smiles knowing I would cry. Even today some of my relatives will bring this up and laugh, how I would accompany my aunt every month to the Cauvery (I still don't get it, it is still not funny!).

If you cut to now. I don't do any traditions. I have made absolutely no effort in recent times to follow ANY of the traditions I grew up with. Even if you try to feed me the logic behind it and I can hear my grandmother's voice trying to justify it in various ways (aunt would never bother to justify these things, she steam-rolled over all objections), you will rarely hear me argue but I will not agree (in my mind). I think I must have broken every single rule that I memorised back in my childhood (and that includes cutting my nails at night, sometimes even at midnight).

It was not a drastic change, it was slow in coming, and when it did it had little to do with reading or erudite discussions with friends or my parents (at least my dad had no truck ever with any traditions). It has been, up to this admission here, almost entirely internal. I saw the inequities that even simple traditions breed. That not-so-subtle drawing of lines. The us and them. I saw the true position of widows (it felt as if I was watching a movie). I saw that marriages are not a union of traditions, but rather, the pitting of one set of traditions (unjust in themselves) against another (equally unjust) set. There are many more things. But mostly, over the years, I have seen that there is another way to live. That without particular malice or hatred to anyone I would like to live my life without having to deal with this baggage that I was born with...