Diwali this time !!

After nearly 10 days I am back in the office.. feels nice to be back ....

Had a nice time during Diwali with my nieces.... It was a bit subdued because of many reasons ...

In the past, Diwali used to mean other seemingly less important , but nice things ....

It conjures up so many images & thoughts in my mind...

Our Ten commandments for the Ultimate Diwali Celebration

1. Thou Shalt take all possible time in selecting your Attire !!

Getting Diwali dresses was of prime importance.... We would spend hours selecting one single dress and me being the most choosy among my sisters used to annoy everybody with the time I took for choosing.. and when I finally choose one and show it to my sisters... there will be a really disbelieving look telling me "u took so much time for this??!!" .. but nobody dared to comment lest I start searching for another one again...

2. Thou shalt take all possible oppurtunities to take out your Diwali dress & admire it every time !!

Just getting the Diwali dress never used to satisfy us... We used to make all pretences for admiring it .. Special invitations used to be given out to friends for seeing the Diwali purchase and in the process u get a good excuse to see it again..

3. Thou shalt get crackers and keep it under the sun for proper effect !!

The next most important things were the crackers ... We (me & my second sister) were staunch believers in keeping the crackers really really dry... A long drawn out process used to follow.. An old tray would be pulled out from somehwhere & dusted .. then the crackers were neatly stacked in that .... and taken out of the house & kept where we thought there was adequate sunlight ....As if this was not enough ... either one of us had to keep vigil on it ( whatif somebody stole it.. u can never be too careful).. and me being the youngest was always saddled with the watchman duty.... All for something that would go up in smoke .. Such thinking was beyond our scope at that point of life and so I used to be really sincere & keep watching out for imaginary thieves....

4. Thou shalt sit calmly & watch while Dad divides the crackers !!

This was almost a ritual that happened in our house .. there being four of us, dad used to take up the task of dividing the crackers among us a day before Diwali.. He would sit there in front of the crackers & very slowly & agonizingly (because of the anxiety it caused) divide the treasure among us.. and it was always a real good job (which is really difficult with 4 pair of alert eyes watching him carefully)

5. Thou shalt get up even before u start sleeping on Diwali day !!

This was really hard to digest... because it contradicts my most basic necessity... sleep...
My 2nd sister was a slave driver and I dont know what kind of satisfaction she used to get out of waking only me out of the 3 of us.... She is the kind who remains fresh all the time,gets up early, gets ready soon & expects others around her also to do the same... As the 1st & the 3rd never used to listen to her .... and me being the ultimate sacrficial lamb who used to do her bidding .. got up & ofcourse did as she said...

6. Thou shalt be the first one to shatter everybody's sleep in a 1 mile radius !!

There used to be a big competition as to who will light the first cracker in the street...A 100 wala (considered to be really cool then ) would be unwrapped & laid out ready for Dad to light it.... Poor dad still groggy from sleep would try to find out in that dark where to light it .. and when that work is over he will go back to find where he had lost his sleep...

With the inauguration complete.. we used to fire away our quota of crackers & when it feels it is getting over .. try & pull out from somebody else's share...

7. Thou shalt fire only Bijlis in the Diwali afternoon !!

Afternoons used to be sacred only for a spl type of cracker.. BIJLI .. these were the kind which u can light in your hand & throw it up where it used to burst .... This was a daring act for us then & we used to make a lot of hype over it.. unoccurred daring acts of the cracker bursting in the hand itself were narrated to Mom....

8. Thou shalt sweep the entire street for making a bonfire in front of your house !!

People who never used to touch brooms before in their life used to jump in with gusto for sweeping the entire street .. the more cracker papers u have .. the better... when the social service is over.. The heap would be burnt & crackers that were discarded earlier would burst half heartedly when thrown inside the heap....

There is a sense of anticlimax after every diwali night ...

Actually it was fun only because all of us were there together then ....

This time it was only me & my 2nd sister & her daughters....

Even though we tried to recreate the same atmosphere it just wasnt the same without the other two.

Nevertheless my niece enjoyed thoroughly and was trying to show her bravado by bursting crackers for the first time...

and the sparkle in her eyes were brighter than all the sparklers around us ....

This is what makes u feel eager to celebrate Diwali even though the meaning of it has matured and changed the way you have ....

Signing off
Sundari