11 days of 4 am –and counting

and the experiment is still on.

more ladders than snakes…

this is the only major change I am making in my lifestyle — waking up early, and plenty are the things that are falling into place … that are related or unrelated to waking up at 4 am.
the top four ladders are …

1. I have a lot more time free …

I watched the golden moon rise into the night sky as the sea breeze blew right here in Besant Nagar, I drove errands half way across town and back, I’ve pruned the kids’ clothes shelf by half, and the shoe rack by a third.

2. I join the dots…

we had a puzzler of a personal crisis in my friends’ circle — and it was (trumpet alert) moi, who stared at the picture, spotted the wrong turn that my friend had taken and (here I go again, trumpet alert 2) and provided the neat solution. Excusez moi. this is me MiM. I never do solutions. I am crisis, herself.
so. taken aback .

3. and make calls: this is also a blip. going against the pattern from the weeks before. I don’t make calls all that much. but this week, I have been dialling and dialling to trouble shoot (oh, the non self-effacement of it all. yes. this was trumpet 3). excuse me while I step aside to polish my superwoman halo.

4. and be on the same page as the Universe, who I think is in harmony, with me…

or is it because she wakes up at 4 am too?

margazhi resolutions

two days into margazhi and I have a theory already.

this is the month to get your life firmly in place and you get 30 days ‘without the option’.

somethings are supposed to be a given.
wake up at 4 am.
bathe at 4.10 am.
draw a kolam at 4.20 am.
pray .
say the thiruppavai
eat an early breakfast
chores and
by 9 pm you are early to bed and fast asleep because you rose early.
**
I am trying to get on the margazhi bandwagon.

On the first day, I was so worried about zzzing past the 4 am alarm, that I woke at 2.45 am, bright-eyed and bushy tailed. By 6am, I had meditated, showered, drawn kolams, shined the silver, run the washing machine, written three lists, said 30/30 of andal’s poems, cooked breakfast and lunch, made idli batter, and filled water bottles, and CALMLY woke up firstborn and babyparam, and drove them early to school, CALMLY.

The kids were up 45 minutes earlier than usual, and they couldn’t tell the difference in my newfound calmness.

But I had so much more left of my day, in the afternoon, evening — some of which I RUINED by watching kiran and aamir with KJo on youtube. I quite like KaranJo because he giggles. And I have always been pro-giggling since childhood.
kiran rao, I thought, has a lovely smile. Aamir Khan was tres annoying. I am, irrationally, going to dislike his onscreen persona because I don’t like him in real life. so long Taare Zameen Par.

And then I walked on the besant nagar beach, and met two people I knew by sight from 15 years ago; all margazhi’d, I said hello instead of my more preferred social stance of crouching behind baby param. and one conversation was all in French, from my days in the alliance francaise. alors.

the margazhi thingal, as andal puts it, was a lovely day!

—
and today I was on day 2. up at 4 am; chirpy to be awake. making our doorstep a kolam’d one, while trying to figure out the meaning of the second verse…as I chanted it over.
I couldn’t . And I wiki’d it and ctrl v, here is the bit that appealed to me..

aiyamum alms to those who don’t ask (but need or deserve)
piccaiyum and alms (bhiksha) to those who ask
aandhanaiyum liberally
kai kaatti we will give

uyyum of sustaining ourselves
aaRu way
eNNi contemplating
ugandhu happily

**
some happy contemplation for me, as I was thinking of three turtles named Egbert, albert and Robert — all from firstborn’s stories from his recent field trip —

and if you are ever in crocbank here’s a headsup: one of the turtles is a lazy eater, the other likes his chin to be tickled and the other bit firstborn’s classmates finger mistaking it for a leaf…

firstborn is in the red full-sleeved tee

this is not a sponsored post

I think sri sri says it best about homosexuality… and he takes only three minutes to make his point.

this is my view too.

I liked devdutt pattnaik writing on the subject too

http://devdutt.com/articles/mahabharata/on-krishnas-chariot-stands-shikhandi.html

—

only ma who has kept her ear on twitter knows all about the aston martin crash in Mumbai. people like me who read the newspaper didn’t get a whiff. did you guys know?