Umbra by Kishore Murthy

Two weeks ago, on a Monday afternoon I noticed the sky was overcast. I step out on the porch to check it out after all it was sunny like two minutes ago. On the far end of the horizon I could see lurking some bad ass dark clouds.

After my previous experiences with the weather here I did not want to take any chances. I decided to head out immediately and pick up my daughter from day care. It was a good thing that I did for it started to pour, not cats and dogs but monkeys and gorillas five minutes after I got back home. A crazy cocktail of high speed winds, lightning, thunder and rain.

Now my worry shifted to my wife who was waiting for the shuttle back home. And just as I was thinking this, she calls and informs me that the shuttle is late. I tell her to go into one of the shopping malls or something and wait until the weather calms down. I switch on the TV to catch any updates / warnings on the weather.

POOF! Before I could even tune into the right channel the power goes out in sync with a lightning flash… a brief silence followed by loud rumble of thunder.

I am now on high alert with my imaginary antennae out, while my daughter happily sucks on her bottle of milk. She seems to have no care in the world whatsoever. But I have seen the news before… shit happens and it can happen to anyone. Half hour passes and the weather seems to get better. I get a call from my wife, she is finally on the shuttle and manages to get home safe. Phew!

We sit around waiting for the power to come back and trying to keep our ever-active daughter engaged.

What next?? The fire alarm for the building starts to scream… with so many previous false alarms we cuss, moan and groan and manage to get ourselves outside. Our wait is answered by sirens in the distance and the fire truck finally arrives. This time around it took them a little longer than usual and it was only one truck. It was a fire truck from the Fairfax county and we find out that the fire department is having a busy afternoon.

And yes, it was a false alarm AGAIN. The apartment maintainence better fix it once and for all.

To think this to be end of our woes would be stupid. We still did not have power and it was now dinner time. I switch on the stove as per my wife’s instruction only to realize that it doesn’t work. Argh! The F#@#$#@ thing has an electric start.

I head out to the CVS nearby to buy a box of matches but the store is closed as there was no power… and they were not the only store to be closed. Back in India power cuts are so common that almost everything has a back up / alternative and life goes on. But out here the power cuts are so rare and the dependence on electricity so far reaching that life seemed to have practically stopped.

Luckily Giant was still open and I run in quickly to grab myself a box of matches and a flashlight. I did not know when the power would be restored. In the last storm some of the neighboring counties did not have power for more than 24 hrs. I wanted to be prepared.

I had done the grocery shopping that morning and I prayed that the food in the fridge didn’t go bad. The worst thing is when food in the freezer defrosts and then refreezes. Its almost inedible.

We had our dinner, my wife made some real good Quesadillas. Anju passed out for the night. The sun set around 8:30 something pm and the power was finally restored around 9:00 pm as light slowly faded.

Its been around 2 months since I moved here. I am trying to adjust playing the role of Mr. Mom to my 9 month old daughter while the wife is working… it will be so until we can find a day care provider for Anju. I can then get back to studies, finish my exams and get the damn certification. I miss the hospital and I miss it even more when I tune into Discovery Health. I have to say that the programs on Discovery Health are just fantastic. Kudos to them. I think they should start something like this for India.

Taking care of an infant and doing things around the house is so tough. I have much more respect and admiration for my mom who raised three children and was a stay at home mom / housewife for over 30 years. Kudos to her. I really want to do something extra special for her this Mother’s Day. Any suggestions?

The neighborhood we are in is very beautiful and the convenient thing about it is that there is a shopping complex bang opposite our apartment complex. Starbucks, Giant, Subway, Mac Donalds, CVS Pharmacy, etc all just a 2 minute walk away. This has made our life so much easier.

When we moved in, the weather was too cold for my taste but gradually it has warmed up and I feel much more comfortable now. Recently the cherry blossoms were blooming everywhere… what a splendid sight it was. It made my walks even more pleasurable. Now the flowers have fallen and you see green leaves sprouting in their place. There are lot of birds that visit our balcony and hang out in the trees that face the balcony. The other day my wife went out and bought some Petunia plants and a bird feeder to hang on our balcony. We don’t have any bird feed in the feeder yet… it so happened that the Home Depot out here does not carry bird feed anymore but sell the bird feeder. So far, I have seen Black Birds, Doves, Sparrows and Red Cardinals. The Red Cardinals are my favorite.

We lost four Saturdays to the DMV (Dept of Motor Vehicles). The first visit my wife took the car to the DMV to get it registered, etc. The place is crowded on Saturdays and people turn up very early to queue up. The second visit was to get myself a driver’s license. We landed there half an hour before the place opened… there were already many people in the queue. I got to take the written part of the test and the vision screen but could not do the road test.

Apparently they do only 10-15 road tests on Saturdays… the number seemed to change depending upon who was working that Saturday.

The third Saturday was the worst, we were there an hour before the place opened. There were only a couple of people ahead of us in the queue and I was the sixth for the road test or so the paper I filled in told. The people at the DMV screwed it up completely and I was called in 9th… that meant an extra two and a half hour wait. So, by the time I did the road test we had been waiting for four and a half hours. Waiting that long with an infant is such a pleasure, right? And to add to the misery I failed the road test.

On the fourth visit we were at the DMV an hour and fifteen minutes before it opened. I was the fourth on the road test and I finally got my license. The craziest thing was the fact that on all occasions the person at the counter who took my application and the person who did my road test was a desi .

I got to visit the Woodland’s Hotel in Fairfax recently. It felt good to be sitting with family amongst desi’s eating desi food. Both the times I have gone there I have had the buffet and it has been authentic and really good. I think my cousin who came with us also thought the food was excellent too.

The buffet has a lovely spread of both South Indian dishes and North Indian dishes and on Sunday’s they even have chat items like Pav Bhaji, Pani Puri and Bhel Puri. One can eat only so much… so obviously I did not try everything on the buffet. MY personal favorites were the Idli chutney, Vada sambhar, Bisi Bele Bath, Pongal, Pani Puri and Gajar ka Halwa. The only disappointing dish was the Masala Dosa as there was no masala/red chutney smeared inside the dosa. So basically it was just some dosa rolled with alu palya in it.

Last month I got to attend an exhibition of paintings by Dana Johnstone who is a close friend of my wife Jessica. The paintings on display were brilliant and I think even our little Anju enjoyed it.

My visit to Harris Teeter’s was an overwhelming experience. We spent nearly 2 hours there and by the end of it I was very very loopy and disoriented. The store was huge and basically had everything… just name it. All through I could hear my wife say “Now you see why I would get so frustrated when we went shopping in India”. The number of choices available just blew me away. There were even food counters and salad bars… I think one could live in that store, never come out and be very happy.

Last weekend we visited some friends in DC, they live on Capitol Hill. The weather was sunny and beautiful and I got to walk around in the city. It was a lovely experience… I even saw a Blue Jay. We had lunch at a Mexican restaurant, Las Placitas. The food was great and I enjoyed it to the very last bite. The weekend before that we went to a park along the GW Parkway. We took a much needed long and wonderful walk and Anju got to play in the grass for the first time… she thoroughly enjoyed it .