The Sweet Spot

“The heart of human excellence often begins to beat when you discover a pursuit that absorbs you, frees you, challenges you, or gives you a sense of meaning, joy, or passion”, says Terry Orlick, the author of “In Pursuit of Excellence”. I knew that for my better half, Anil, this pursuit was Sports, but often joked around that his finer taste in the Spirits was contending for the top spot. In a surprising turn of the tide over the past few years, a new “Zen Zone of Woodworking” has taken a lead, with the latest sensation being the Glenlivet Bird Feeder. I had seen the signs of this pursuit scattered over the past few decades, never imagining this underdog to charge to the forefront, victorious!  The pursuit of this zen craft started innocently with assembling furniture, a need for every new migrant. It took another small step when our son chose “woodworking” as a summer camp hobby , and then picked it up again in junior high, when we started assimilating some tools. Our daughter was inv

Our favorite game for a Family Game Night was “The Game of Life”. The game had just enough decision making for young minds to fathom, offset by the randomness of spinning a wheel that brought in the elements of luck. With its capitalist bent, in that, the wealthiest ends up winning, it opens up a healthy debate on the values we hold, an opportunity to discuss with children and gauge motivators in their lives. I don’t look at the game as a realistic simulation of life, just a fun way to introduce money management, with concepts of loans, insurance, stocks and paychecks intertwined with decisions about buying homes and starting families. In an interesting twist, recent versions added rewards for doing good, or adding fun life events and allowing adopting a pet. The game has a thought provoking concept of "life tiles". For example life tiles had events such as “Find a new Energy Source” or “Create a new teaching method” (the full list is at the end of the post) and the $ value a

“My favorite was the aluminum colored dress which was glamorous enough to wear to the theater , which we randomly picked from the catalog , but later found it was the same our humorous neighbor with a mustache and smoldering eyes, living in the gray contemporary house, had been marveling about”. I feel liberated writing this sentence and not having to worry about my english teachers in India finding at least ten spelling mistakes! Each of the words in bold is spelled differently in India. Moving from English to American, I struggled with “aluminum”, still sometimes pronouncing the ‘i’ in “alumi n i um ”. But I gladly dropped the “me” from “program me ” or the “u” from “labo u r”. Switching the “re” in “met re ” made sense, and I was ecstatic that a P a ediatrician was officially spelled without the first “a”.  In America, it wasn’t just the language that is simplified. Names were simplified as well. At my first workplace I was introduced to Bill, Liz, Steve, Amy, a c

I was running late for a conference call with my favorite canine. I had learned that not every dog is comfortable with FaceTime or video calls, but this particular one made eye contact, picked up visual cues and reacted to sounds of interest from the other side of a smartphone. Leia is a shiny black dachshund-chihuahua mix, and at less than 10 lbs, she carries a lot of weight whether present physically or virtually.  She was our house guest for the month of December, while our son was away traveling. True to her name (she is named after Princess Leia from Star Wars), she acted every bit a princess during her whole stay with us. And now an important part of calls to our son include a meaningful conversation with Her Highness!  Leia responding to a Wolf call A typical call with Leia starts with saying her name in a tone she recognizes and saying her special words like "Dawai" (medicine in Hindi). Yes, "dawai" is her favorite word due to her interest in the t

“Little Women” movie was out in theaters! It was a very special moment for me for multiple reasons. The novel “Little Women”, by Louisa May Alcott, on which the movie is based, was the first novel I ever read. I was in fifth grade then, and very impressionable, and had found the book, written almost a hundred years before my birth, to be quite progressive. It was inspiring to see that the girls in the book all had dreams and interests and talents that they followed passionately.  I recollected a lot of that novel despite having read the book so long ago. I was excited to see how they picturized it, and wasn’t disappointed. Another reason the movie was special was  because it was filmed in the area that we have lived for the past several years, in Concord, Massachusetts, where it was kind of based in the novel to begin with. While watching the movie as an adult, I reconnected with my reflections as a child, filling in the blanks of questions left unanswered or “aha!” mom

The crabapple trees in my yard are awake after being dormant all winter; now covered with bursting buds and fresh young green leaves, where only recently their bare branches were adorned by white powdery snow. I bought this pair of saplings in a sale, some ten years ago, after the associate at the store narrated how the berries on these kind of trees attract birds, among many more of its virtues. The trees haven’t disappointed, starting to flower in spring with pink buds, blossoming into fragrant white flowers. The flowers are a magnet for bees. The leaves fill up into a lush, darker green into summer, as the flowers peep through, slowly turning into clusters of pink mini apples. Towards the end of summer the berries turn red and become glossier and shinier through early fall. True to the associate’s story, it attracted all sorts of local birds. The first few years of having the fruit, I assumed the berries were ornamental, and at best food for the birds. With every passing year, t

Anyone who has ever wanted to make a good time on a long distance road trip must have encountered the “Pacesetter Companion”. This is that one car which speeds up behind you when you are in the fastest lane, possibly tail-gates you, and if you maintain speed, accompanies you until your next rest stop. You make way for them, but you keep pace behind them. And as you both maneuver the highway traffic, sometimes you stay ahead, sometimes they catch-up and overtake. Both have the same goal, possibly the same destination. Total strangers, they keep you company and help you set pace until you part ways. This past February, I was faced with a challenge. In the middle of winter, I was to drive my daughter’s car 1200 miles, from Iowa to Boston. There would be two of us driving, but I was looking at myself as the primary driver, as my daughter was a reasonably new driver. For many people it is like “meh”. For me it was a challenge! We had done many road trips before, but I had never b

I was a little concerned to hear that my son routinely orders takeout during the stay-in-place order in California, sometimes using doordash, sometimes the restaurants deliver. He convinced me it was safe. Moreover, thanks to the technology industry workers’ ability to work from home and continue to be productive during the pandemic, he said it made sense to support local restaurants by ordering takeout and supporting the economy. So far, I had been apprehensive in ordering restaurant food during the virus outbreak. On his insistence, I looked up safety precautions connected with takeouts, such as ordering hot food, requesting the delivery people to leave the package outside, using gloves to bring the food indoors, wiping clean the containers with clorox, removing the food into personal containers, discarding the takeout containers and finally microwave/heat the food before consuming it. These days the longer the list of precautions, the more comfortable I felt. Takeout seemed like an

The strict border enforcement brought about by the COVID-19 pandemic reminds me of a time when I got into trouble for not paying attention to the rules of customs and border control closely enough. In these worrisome times, it is also a fun, sweet story, of a lesson to pay attention to border and customs rules. During my dozen or so trips to Canada, I had been stopped and pulled aside a couple of times at the border, for rather unexpected reasons. Once it was when our family happened to be traveling separately on two flights, and on entering Canada with my son, they asked for a permission slip from my husband. I found out there had been multiple occurrences of kidnapping and absconding to Canada, so they had to be sure. The second time was due to an expired Canadian visa. But this third time, I did not expect to be pulled aside for a beautiful, albeit a little wilted, due to a week of travel, bouquet of red roses!  That day, I checked into my flight back to the US and passed i

A Treasure in the heart of Burlington “The Treasury”  announced its grand opening on March 1st, 2020. For many, it is yet another Indian fine-dining experience. Though for me, the announcement meant the culmination of the never ending wait to experience the culinary masterpieces we were anticipating... ever since we first heard about a fine-dining restaurant, many many months ago. “The Treasury” has been a dream for its founders, Archana & Prakash Khot and Sujata & Devendra Patil, to bring a unique fine-dining experience in the Greater Boston area, and boy, have they delivered!!! It took its time opening, but like  every project that requires perfection, these partners did whatever it took to plow through the hurdles to bring to us foodies, what they had promised to themselves. The restaurant is opening in the Wayside Mall in Burlington, MA. When I first approached it, I was pleasantly surprised to see an entrance with two doors- one that opens to a trendy casual sea