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COVID-19 Diaries: Reminiscences
Jackfruit. The item remained on our shared grocery list for weeks. Each grocery trip, my finger would hover over it, tempted to strike it off knowing how rare it is to find it locally. Yet, it would stay, a reminder of how random cravings for things from my past can take hold and not let…
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COVID-19 Diaries: Anniversary
Nineteen years is a long time. It is even when you factor in the first few years when you are getting to know the person, the next few years when you are struggling to build a family, the years after that are consumed by nurturing this hard-built family. We have both grown. We have both…
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COVID-19 Diaries: Politics, Race, Children
There is a pain between my shoulder blades that is nagging. It has been a week. I lower myself to the ground so my upper back can find something firm to rest upon. My kaapi is by the side. I snack on cheese curls as I scroll through my feed. Hasan Minhaj’s video has been…
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The Race Conversation
Photo by Ketut Subiyanto on Pexels.com “What is the meaning of race?” My elbows are flat against the kitchen island, my face level with my girls. “Run?” “Bring children up?” The twins come up with every possible meaning but the one I was curious to know what they knew. We drank our kaapi, set Laddu…
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Milestone: Fifth Grade Graduation
For the last day of the school year, today did not seem any different from the three months preceding this. When the school decided to close on March 13th, there were no goodbyes, no last day pictures, no walkouts to cheering children, no teary-eyed parents waiting in the wings to ferry their children to douse…
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Adoption: Do Not Adopt Unless You WANT To
Collected in The Smudged Hyphen (2026). I woke up to a message on FB with a link to this Buzzfeed article on Myka Stauffer. Prior to reading the article, I had no idea who she was. It is a reflection on how little I am connected to the world of influencers and their ilk. I…
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COVID-19 Diaries: Ceding Control
Waiting. This word in itself sums up the entirety of my existence these days. I am waiting for many things. Sometimes, it feels like all of my life is one big wait for something to happen. Everything is scripted in my head, the joys, the grief, the anticipation, the highs, the lows. It is frozen…
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COVID-19 Diaries: Moments
She is seated on the kitchen island, a tad too big, still small enough as she watches her Appa eat sautéed brinjal and warm rice. Every now and then, she would look inquiringly at her dad and he would oblige, the way parent birds feed babies. “Is this your dinner?” her question is thoughtful. Her…
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COVID-19 Diaries: Emotional
I have broken down every alternate day this week. Some days it’s been a full meltdown replete with ugly crying. Other days, it has been that heavy feeling in the head, with the tears hovering right inside my eyelids, threatening to fall. Today, the emotions are of a different kind. I received the final versions…
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Film Review: the half of it
About twenty-three years ago, I created my first personal email account. It was an account that I shared with my best friend. It was also an account that saw a lot of emails go back and forth with “pen pals”, people we did not know. There were no smartphones, no way to scan and send…