My precious cousin let me know over a cup of coffee and a computer screen that she was missing my funny posts. I thought she wanted to say that I was a silly, intellectually superficial, ditzy female and I had no business writing on grave matters and that I totally sucked at serious writing. Big time. But I guess she chose to be diplomatic. Our family is rather big on 'Respect- your- elders- and- hold- your- wayward- tongue' stuff. So there.
She was not the only one. Some of you had subtly let me know the same thing. So since then I'd been searching for my long lost sense of humour. I have actually forgotten when I saw it last. Probably it was when I inadvertently caught a few scenes of Rahul Dulhaniya Blah Blah Blah. But later I realized the show had actually made me angry. Or perhaps it was when I watched the Parliament in action and some goons tore the papers and tried to uproot the mics in the Rajya Sabha. It was straight out of a badly written hilarious soap opera but wait, it was more disgusting than funny. Was it when my 14 year old daughter let me know that she wanted to have a tattoo? Uh-huh. That time I was trying to save myself from a cardiac arrest and some trauma to the brain. Who cared about the elusive sense of humour? Wait, I got it. I saw it last just two nights back. It was when my husband brought home a friend for dinner and let me know our guest would be staying the night. Wasn't the situation outrageously funny? Here I was, dashing around the house trying to clean it up, changing the sheets and cleaning the pot, making dinner, helping my daughter prepare for her Hindi exam the next day (God help) and teaching the other one some much needed table manners. The situation decidedly smacked of hilarity. But then I lost it.
I really valued my sense of humour. It was one of the few things my father gave me. Apart from a good education of course. He gave my brother his house and his car, he gave my mother happiness and exasperation and he gave me his sense of humour. A fair man, my dad. So you see, my humour is practically a family heirloom. In the good old days of no television, my family would sit in one room and my father would crack us up with his pathetic puns. We did not have much money, but we had a lot of fun. Of course my daughters these days enjoy the fun as well as the money...sigh, what can I say, the world is foolish at times.
But currently I am desperate. So desperate that I have started reading romance novels and watching a serial named Bidai- babul -ke ghar -se- tere -ghar- tak- par -pyar- to- ho- gaya- kam-do-hanso-ke jode- mein. Or whatever. I am yet to figure out who is getting married to whom and what do the men do in the serial but I know I will eventually solve all the mysteries. And in the process find my humour again. About the serial, I have already figured out the more outlandish the bindi, the more chances of the female to be the vamp. Now I just have to figure out where my funny bone disappeared.
So, if any of you happen to find my humour wandering about on the streets of Mumbai, hold on to it tight and inform me immediately. If not for mine than for my friends' and cousin's sake.
I think they need my father's gift more than than I do.
I think they need my father's gift more than than I do.
