“Diyar Mama, I am lyving hose. I lov yu.” My daughter is four, she has just been presented with the baby brother she thought she wanted but is finding she doesn’t. At first, she leaves us tiny clues to show how she really feels — weeping snottily, urging us to give him back to the hospital; placing him in a carton in the balcony, hoping he will grow wings and fly off. And asking, theoretically of course, if one can flush a baby, like potty, down the toilet. When this subtlety goes unnoticed, she leaves a note, packs her bag with her favourite doll, a carton of apple juice and a box of crayons. She is at the lift, pressing random buttons and noisily drinking her juice when her misspelt “Dear Mama, I am leaving house. I love you” note is found and she is traced. Kisses, promises and chocolate cake persuade her to reluctantly come back home. “I am lyving hose” becomes a shorthand for friends and family — the tiniest love letter from someone who is trying to find you, but is thwarted. “I am lyving hose” — a plea — please please love me too. **** “Down in a valley, covered with a rock Take off your shoes and smell your socks!” I am eight. I have lived with my grandparents till I was 6 and I’m devoted to them. I am living far away with my own family now and I miss them. Especially my gentle grandfather, with whom I would spend hours in the garden, helping him plant seeds, pushing them down with my tiny thumbs and watering them lightly from an old tin, and watching gawp eyed as over the next few weeks, stalks miraculously appeared and then subsequently a riot of flowers. One summer when we visit, I present him with a “memo book” — a book in which you get signatures from people you admire, like the head girl and the tennis captain. And your friends write messages so that you can remember them. He is flummoxed by this ask. He asks many questions about what sort of message he should write. “Something I can remember you by. I think of you and I cry,” I confess. “We have to fix that. You should think of me and laugh,” he says. A few days later he gives me the memo book with this inscription in his calligrapher’s handwriting. The days come and go and then the years come and go, I don’t know then that I will miss him fiercely all my life. But it always makes me smile — this little love letter he researched for my memo book— this injunction from my formal, proper, someone who would never ever dream of doing it himself grandfather— to an 8-year-old me — to take off my shoes and smell my socks. ***** Dear Kalpana didi, happy mother’s day. My son is in preschool and has been told to make a card for mother’s day. The kids all dip their little hands in paint and print their palms onto a card. The teacher writes the inscription and the kids put in their thumbprints as signatures. The teacher recounts everything mums do for kids and what they must be grateful for. They cuddle you when you are scared, and they make you your favourite food when you are hungry. They are always ready to play with you and they hardly ever scold you. My son knows one person who checks every box in that list. And so he addresses the very first love letter of his life to Kalpana didi, the housekeeper. **** Lost and Found “What do YOU want? That’s what I want.” I’m lost. Or maybe I’m found. But finding myself means abandoning everything that came before. Including my concept of what it means to be a responsible adult, a dutiful daughter, a caring parent, a loving partner. So I continue to be lost and found. I do nothing. This takes up my life, preserving status quo becomes the way I mark my days. My mother, who has never ever let us take the easy way out of any situation and who will walk through fire and climb Mount Everest all in one day and who used to tell us when we were kids, no matter where you are, I see you — sees me. I am visiting her tiny little home in the hills and I go for long runs and come back red eyed and restless. She tries to speak to me but she and I are both unschooled in how to talk to each other about the deepest parts of ourselves. One day she hands me my morning cup of tea and a small yellow post-it. On it she has written, “What do YOU want? That’s what I want”. I am undone by her kindness and her love. With these simple words, my mother finds me, dusts me off carefully and hands me to myself. **** I’ve packed lunch for you. Anytime you call is a good time for me. Don’t worry about the kids, I got it covered. It’s Mum’s 80th, you have to come. There’s beer in the fridge. I see you, I love you, I got you. If we look carefully, we find love letters everywhere — embedded like sparkling little jewels in the plain metal sheets of our everyday lives. In WhatsApp conversations and notes on the fridge, in hurried phone calls and in emails, in popping around for a chat, in serious heart-to-hearts, we pour out our love for each other. In words that wrap around like a hug, that speak over and over again of how loved we all are and how precious in the scheme of things. Happy Valentine’s Day. Vatsala Mamgain loves food, cooking, dogs, running, trees, reading and telling long-winded stories
