The Year of Reading Women

When Guardian declared 2014 as the year of reading women I was hoping to marry this project with my other one - OBOC. I've succeeded partly in the sense I've been reading a lot of women but not all necessarily connected to OBOC.

As part of OBOC - Morocco I read "A palace in the old village" by Tahar Ben Jelloun, a story about Moroccan immigrants in France. When the patriarch character decides to move back to Morocco after retirement and build a home, a "palace" for his grown-up sons and daughters and their kids, will his children honor his wishes and return to Morocco, or have they been assimilated by France that the scheme looks to them completely crazy? It is a touching novel that talks about the immigrant experience, aging, cultural wars, and values.

I then did a quick reading of Boris Akunin's Murder on the Leviathan -a Fandorin mystery. Can't say I enjoyed it, so am not sure if I should put a checkmark against Russia.

I also read "Gandhi Before India" by Ramachandra Guha which is a must-read for anyone curious about Gandhi and Gandhian philosophy. I enjoyed this book even more than "India after Gandhi" by the same author. Now I await his second part of the biography of Gandhi.

Am sorry to say that's all the progress I made with OBOC. But I have had more success with reading women. I finished Atwood's Oryx and Crake trilogy with MaddAddam which I thoroughly enjoyed! Then for the first time I read Louise Eldrich's Painted Drum, and Zadie Smith's On Beauty. Loved both their styles! Right now I am eagerly awaiting the arrival of Eleanor Catton's Luminaries which won the Booker this year. I think the last time I was this excited about a book was when I was waiting for MaddAddam. I hope the 800 pages investment will be worth my time.

So here is how my summer reading list looks

FICTION

1) Eleanor Catton - Luminaries (the only one that is part of OBOC)
2) Alice Munro - Runway
3) Toni Morrison - Beloved
4) Kate Mosse - Labyrinth

NON FICTION (Unfortunately don't have books on my current pipeline written by women)

1) Am wrapping up Journey to the Ants by E.O.Wilson
2) Birds: their life, their ways, their world
3) Ken Burns' book on National Parks

I have given myself till end of August to wrap up these 7. Let's see :)

Open Sesame ... to the 40s!

Me, my frizzy hair turning slightly grey, a face that has never seen makeup, all of my wobbly bits, and Bengay are together marching proudly into our 40th year. Before you mistake me for someone who has just "let it go", let me assure you that on the contrary I follow a healthy vegan diet, have an active lifestyle combining yoga with a decent gym routine, not to mention the weekends when I strive to do something that lets me and my family soak in some nature. Yep it takes all of that to even have what I have. I just never cared about how I looked and more importantly what others thought about how I looked and never bought into the world view that women somehow magically go from looking like Jennifer Lawrence for, I don't know, 40 years and then overnight in their 70s turn into Meryl Streep/Judi Dench with no stops in between;  That is not going to change suddenly today.

This post is more about 2 events in my life which if you had asked me 20 years back I would've never thought would happen to me, and yet they did happen to me, and one incident makes me feel old, and the other makes me feel much younger than I ever felt before.

The first takes me back exactly 20 years. I was then 20, zipping through the streets of Chennai with a two wheeler sans license, so much so, my dad a conscientious citizen, and stickler for rules decided to take off from work one day, made me skip college and insisted on accompanying his procrastinating law breaker of a daughter to her driver's license exam. I was mortified as my dad (who BTW could never even ride a cycle and sat behind me as I drove him to my license exam) stood there urging the inspector to actually test me harder before approving my license. "How come she was not asked to trace the infamous 8", he asked the examiner. "Dad, whose side are you really on?", I yelled! Despite his machinations and reservations I was granted a license with a 20 year validity. The day the license arrived, my dad took a hard look at the date and said, "Fat chance when you turn 40 I am going to be there to get your license renewed". We had a good laugh and forgot all about it, until today. My dad passed away 11 years back after a 3 year painful struggle with cancer. At 20 if you had asked me to imagine my life without my dad I would have had a hard time. I spent every spare moment with him - doing crosswords, talking about books, discussing Melville movies, or him poking fun at my taste in music ("Kurt Cobain sings and looks like the guy begging in the Chennai local trains!"). And here I am, a wise old woman of 40 who has no plans to renew her two wheeler license as her dad is not here to make her do it. I can't believe so much time has passed and when I think of him I realize that I have suddenly grown up and turned into an adult, and if I can say so myself, a responsible one at that, and he completely missed my metamorphosis and one of the most important events of my life - the birth of my daughter!

That was another thing I could've never imagined when I was 20. My daughter was probably the first baby I ever properly held in my hands! I never for once thought I possessed any maternal instincts or skills. I was surrounded by other girls (especially some of my cousins) who were skilled in multiple ways around the home, and whom I knew would make amazing mothers someday! As for me, all I ever saw in my future was interesting work, combined with lots of travel and lots and lots of reading and music. All of that happened along with the chance meeting of a wonderful guy who has been my partner-in-crime ("husband" seems so archaic) for the last 15 years and whose partnership with me, my dad on his death bed thought of as a silver lining to his otherwise cloudy last days. Our daughter arrived almost 9 years back to fill a void that I didn't think existed in the first place. She forced me to learn a bunch of new skills, mostly on the job, improvising all the time. Instead of making me feel old, she actually keeps me young as I am re-discovering the world through the eyes of a curious 8 year old. My dad would have revelled in her company. Her taste in music and her passion for books are two qualities which can be directly traced back to him.Through her I got a taste for western classical music which I never thought I would. I frequently go on adventures with Percy Jackson, Taran the wanderer, and shall I dare publicly accept, little talking magical ponies. When she read "The Red Pony" and her heart went out to Gabilan and Jody, I realized why I love Steinbeck! Travel with her is pure unadulterated fun as she is game for anything(including wearing adult size snow shoes, trying to find a trail in deep snow, with no lunch, no dry socks and a couple of adults who were out of their element in snow...all when she was 5!). When she plays DJ on our driving trips we move from Disney songs to Mozart to Edith Piaf to Radiohead to T.M.Krishna to Illayaraja seamlessly. Thanks to her I am a better birder, hiker, reader, cook, mom and person.

So as I turn 40 i am not going to fret about my first mammogram, my first grey streaks, or start fearing the weighing scale. The past 20 years have had its ups and downs, but I have had more to be thankful for than not. I can say all experiences I've had and people that I've encountered have added to my 40, and I am having an open mind about what the next 20 will bring. Honestly between work, "what can I make with Parsnips", "Is that a Falcon or a Kestrel?", and "Was it Colonel Mustard in the study with the knife?" - my brain is on overdrive already that I am not going to waste precious moments or cells worrying about a number and if I look the part.