The Band

In the season of weddings in India, or Nepal, any night of the week may be the auspicious day for a particular couple to begin their ceremony celebrating their commitment to marriage and family, to tradition; celebrating their hopes and dreams for love, and a happy and prosperous future. You always know when the wedding season begins, even without a calendar, because you can hear the garish brass bands, joyfully broadcasting their tunes for the benefit of all across the valley. The band begins at the groom's house, then travels across town or from the next district to the party at the bride's family home.  After observing the formalities, the bride leaves her mother and father in ritual mourning, and travels quietly to her new home with her new husband's family.
When my daughter got married last month, she did all the planning (and paying) herself with her fiance. She and the boy found each other (yes, it was a "love match"), they arranged for the dresses, rentals, food, tent, photographer. My husband and I got to host the party at our house, but the couple will be living on their own very soon.
The groom's cousin is part of a band (a bass, a guitar, two vocalists and a percussionist). At the bachelor party the groom and his cousin finalized arrangements for the band to play at the wedding. Our house backs up to a creek and a park, but we do have neighbors on the sides, and I was worried about disturbing the tenuous peace. So we communicated up and down the block that we were having a wedding there, in case they wanted to made arrangements to be away.
The whole celebration turned out beautifully. The day was perfect, the lighting romantic, the food delicious, and the band was fabulous. I heard they learned 30 new songs for this party, an eclectic mix of modern and classic pop, songs from the playlist my daughter was going to play electronically up until a few weeks before the day. The bridal party and guests danced to their hearts' content under the stars on the soft grass.
Over the next couple of days several of our neighbors thanked us for the entertainment. They told us they pulled their patio chairs out and drank wine in their yards, and enjoyed the music. Unlike with our neighbors in India, though, everything was quiet by 10.

I Come From...

I come from the big white brick house, at the stop sign;

     wait, no, I come from the house on Poo Corner, made with stone and mud mortar.

I come from 200 Rothwell Drive in Glen Berne, in Stanton, in Newport, in Wilmington, in New Castle County, Delaware, USA.
     Well, not really, I come from Yreka, California, oh, wait, I come from Lamachaur in
     Pokhara, Nepal. Or maybe I come from the mountains in Northern India: Landour,
     Mussoorie, Uttaranchal, India. Ecuador? Upstate New York? St Croix, USVI?
     Arden Hills, Minnesota.
I come from baked chicken in a well-seasoned corn meal coating, with baked potatoes and broccoli.
     Just kidding, I really come from daahl-bhaat with dahi and nimbu ko aachaar.
I come from walking in the park.
     No, hiking in the Himalaya.
I come from Bob and Hazel Buckner - always far away, always involved, always close at
     heart. I know they pray for me and my husband and children (and their significant
     others, present and future) every day, as well as my siblings and their families.

I am not really from anywhere, as you can see; no, I'm from anywhere.

Crowded

Writing prompt: "The train was crowded..."
I've been in crowded trains before, most notably during the strike in 1979. Ko Man Singh, our driver, had to physically lift my mother and me through the crowds onto the train in Lucknow so that I could get to school on time.  Since then I've tried not to think what it was like for my mother coming back alone.
But right now, my brain is crowded, with pain. My whole body aches like the flu, because our cat Furrgus died.  Sweet memories of how happy he was to be let outside and the knowledge of how inevitable it was that he would get run over because he was deaf jostle and shout in my head. How he was so ravenous when he came to us as a tiny kitten rescued off the city streets, how he flopped down on the ground whenever we pet him, how he liked to help everyone with our projects whatever they involved (home improvement, lesson prep, sorting the mail), and how much laughter he brought to our family with his silly, relaxed personality, so much in contrast to Stella's high-maintenance mode. They finally figured out how to play off of each other without squabbling.
It all happened so fast, and now he's gone, leaving this painful ache.  We all agreed how it was better this way than any other way--instantaneous death, no half-dead questions to answer. But it still hurts so incredibly.
And on top of that, the month of May had already been crowded.  A couple days before Furrgus, I finally had to surrender and replace my 5-year-old "dumb phone" with a "smart phone" ('not sure who's really smart).  We all did a lot of traveling and packing, what with graduation in Boston and end of the year in Minnesota, visiting Grampi in between.  My office moved from 30 years of renting space into our own new building.  We spent two entire weekends at church for special events, with no day off.  I started a new term teaching English at Wilmington University (grammar and writing: my favorite!), and also started and finished my own training for online teaching.  ...All good things, just, there's only so many good things you can pack into one mental month.
I end with gratitude: thanks to be traveling on this crowded train, even though it's a bit uncomfortable at times.
Because that's the only way to go that makes any sense.

Delaware Himalaya

From the crest of the bridge, if I look out from my car, I can see a little rise of the earth on the horizon. Delaware's so small, that little hill is probably in Maryland! Everything else is flat all around. I can almost see the ocean from the top of the bridge, too, and it looks flat from here. For now, I will imagine the mountains that I can't see, rising beyond that little hill, in the Poconos, or the Appalachians, or the Adirondacks.
At the gym, I choose the "Variety" workout. Do I want to enter my age and weight to optimize my workout? And what do I want to monitor: strides, distance, or ___, whatever that is. For now, I will pretend the little blinking lights on the screen are leading me up Himalayan paths, over passes where I get a lookout to the peaks in the next range. I can pretend there's a tea shop at the bottom near the rushing mountain stream next to the wide-based resting tree. I can spot the village half-way up the next range where we hope to rest tonight, and I catch glimpses of the trail winding through clearings and between rocky outcroppings.
For now, I can pretend the smash mouth they play at the gym--to inspire fitness and sweat and performance? is the Himalayan thrush, and the call of the shepherds gathering their stock. Or maybe it's the kids singing as they walk to school in the morning.
I try not to get distracted by the soundless images advocating medications or sports snacks, explaining in too much detail the current traffic snags or last night's shooting in the neighborhood. Self-important, they flash on TV screens strategically placed at every vantage point. I wish it were a Himalayan condor soaring past at eye level, looking for a meal in the shadowy valley floor. I wish it were a rhododendron bush in full red bloom. I wish it were the neighbor ladies gathered on their front porches to clean the rice and pick stones out of the lentils for tonight's dinner.
For now, the handles I grasp for the "arm blaster" cycle booster can stand in for a sturdy walking stick I picked from the forest that will steady my feet on the sometimes treacherous path, on to the next resting tree or a stopping place for the night. If it's a particularly worthy walking stick, I will stand it in the corner when I get home, near the door, to remind me the mountains are out there.
The other day I wanted to wear my sari, and my blouse was too tight! 

Wedding

Creative writing prompt:  And then I saw it...
the perfect sari for my daughter's wedding.  Oh, no, not for her. She already has her dress, in the Western style. She's marrying a local boy.  My other two daughters will stand with her: they already have their dresses, too, in light pink.  There were two saris there on the sale rack in the light pink, one with silver decorations and one with multi-colored.
The tall Punjabi saleswoman draped it and I looked in the mirror.  Something wasn't right.  Maybe it would have worked when I was younger.  I was disappointed.  My husband was disappointed.
I turned back to the rack.  It was the top of my budget range.  I couldn't go anywhere else.  I'd seen possibilities in the first two shops, but I had thought this one was perfect.  Right next to the two light pink, a bolder pink with delicate silver beading caught my eye. I had thought it was too dark.
Shopping in India is a community affair.  You never walk in and pick your own size from a rack of all the same style. There is always a salesperson to advise you, and usually some bystanders giving opinions too.  If you do successfully negotiate a purchase, you are likely to get any number of curious bystanders asking how your bargaining was (or commenting on its deficiencies).