Peace and settlement...

I moped around for a day or two before finally seeing some sense. The moment of illumination happened as I drove back from dropping R at the station. The beautiful dense foliage in a stretch of road I aptly call the grove lifted all my drooping spirits and helped me accept the quiet happiness of the present. And that was it! I have been in a better frame of mind ever since and getting involved in coming back to mainstream life here.

As a part of that, I called up all the people I knew and had nice long chats and caught up. One among them was Uma. She invited us to drop by the school anytime and that's what we did. We went at about 11:30 when all the kids would be out playing, and Winkie was super excited at the prospect of seeing Ab there. Uma saw us alight from the car and came running out and scooped her little student in a big smashing hug! The man was so mighty embarrassed and his face went beet red. That over, we walked over to the backyard where everybody was playing. The minute all the little people sighted him, they all came running over in one loud chorus....Akhil!!!! It was time to turn red again, and one of the mother hens scooped him up in her arms (yes she's taller, much taller!) and Ab stayed back a bit and showed off on the slides. It was funny to see the reaction because it was obvious they were tuned into each other's presence.

Winkie got dragged to the playsets and he got into the act himself and then everything was just like before. I sat with Uma and we chatted and chatted and caught up with Thambi playing nearby. It was a gorgeous end-of-the-summer day and it was nice to come home to all this...that I had so woefully left behind many months ago.

Life is good!