Category: Memories
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I Set Out to Organize 155,919 Photos. I Ended Up Organizing Memory
I had 155,919 photos spread across five devices. Three iPhone exports, a MacBook backup, folders from a Vista laptop I haven’t touched since 2012, and whatever survived a Windows XP machine that once lived under my desk. All of it dumped into a clunky hard drive carrying years of documents and memories. I wanted them…
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Blunted Grief
As is my morning routine, I call Amma as I walk. She mentions it has been twenty five years since her mom passed away and it hits me with force that I have not thought about my grandma in years now. I sheepishly add a reminder on my calendar — a way for me to…
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Mother. Daughter. Mother.
“Skipping time” Amma calls out to my prepubescent youngest child who is upstairs talking to a friend over Facetime. I am in the kitchen doing dishes, amused by the interaction. I hear the sound of jumping upstairs as Laddu counts and jumps a hundred times. She is out of breath but rushes proudly to her…
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Ten Years. Many Lessons.
This week marks ten years since we went from being a couple to parents of twins. Each year I struggle with marking the day. Obviously, it is of import to me. It also is of import to my children in ways I cannot measure or understand. I consciously stay away from anything celebratory. I…
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Spaces
I walk around my home, my iWatch tracking my steps, urging me to walk 11 minutes more at a brisk pace so my move goal could be met. I walk, my arms swinging, my eyes tracking my children as each play in their own way. Laddu is astride her soft, stuffed unicorn, urging it to…
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Present And Past
I absently look at the white board calendar in the mudroom as I pick jackets for the kids from the cedar chest. Pattu is wiping the last of the month with her fingers and dabbing at her sleeve when she thinks I am not looking. I smile and urge her to change into school clothes.…
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Paying Tributes Over Time and Space
I eye the phone longingly. My fingers itch to dial Amma’s cell phone number but I desist. I can picture my family this morning. All of my dad’s siblings and their spouses gathered to observe the yearly anniversary of my Thatha’s passing. I imagine the kitchen busy, bustling. I can almost see my aunts and…
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Recreating Traditions – Deepavali 2016
It is dusk, the light giving way to the dark as the shadows lengthen in my family room. Laddu is on my lap. I want to lie down and sleep but I am sitting ramrod straight, keeping a wary eye for gurgling noises before she throws up. Ammu and Pattu sit in matching pista green…
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Nostalgia
Dusty. The tar roads felt soft to my flip-flops as I walked to the house for the first time. The summer heat scorched the city when we moved from cooler, less humid climes there. It was a modest house. I remember lying awake at night as the rain pelted the windows and listening to frogs…
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Meaningful Melodies
Today’s prompt over at Writing 101 takes me back a good decade or more. To a time when I had just discovered music beyond what I saw on television or heard on the radio. It brings back memories of rainy evenings spent browsing the music section of a store I frequented then. Of being lost…