A message to all my readers When I first began writing down my stories in this quiet space, it was nothing more than an open diary. A place to put memories that needed somewhere to rest, reflections gathered over a lifetime, and thoughts that felt too personal—or perhaps simply too ordinary—to share in conversation. Conventional wisdom often suggests that personal musings rarely accomplish much on the wider internet. There are no frameworks here, no quick advice, and no polished agendas. Just the raw textures of life as I have experienced it: the sudden turns, the quiet routines, the moments of doubt, and the steady work of beginning again. Recently, as a small corner quietly crossed 30,000 reads, I paused to look more closely at the numbers. What moved me was not just the milestone itself, but where those visits were coming from. While some readers join from home here in India, so many of you are reading from entirely different corners of the earth—from Singapore across the seas ...
A t no time did I comprehend this old saying could be so exceptionally appropriate for all of us? For a very long time, Queen Mother ruled the roost from the dining table. She would sit there and indiscriminately pursue her instructions, the amount of water I added, the flavor of the ingredients, the position of the pan over the flame, and so on. I barely got a break till I decided to end all this and shifted her throne to the side where she could not see what I was doing. With a badly bruised ego and the hurt of being deposed, she continued to grumble and fumble and stepped down reluctantly. Working from home introduced a new cook in our dwelling, my son. All this while he stayed in another city, and we continued to praise his newly found culinary skills through WhatsApp. This WhatsApp is not a 3D app that shows us the food beautifully presented, while the rest of the kitchen does not matter. I was scandalized when ‘besan ka chila’ was being prepared. ...