Zen and the art of enjoying family bliss

I stood outside my daughter's school for a long time the day before yesterday, wondering how I had passed by the same place so many times in my youth, and never dreamt that I'd be waiting there someday on the sidewalk, amidst the noise and the milling crowd and traffic  with such quiet, glad anticipation in my heart. And this morning I have been pottering around the house with mop and brush and duster and cleaning fluid, sprucing up my Kolkata flat, while my wife was flitting around, talking to me about all sorts of things as she does too rarely, and I can't have enough of. And having long and fun conversations in between with favourite old girls and boys over the phone and face to face about everything from new college experiences to expanding tutorials to movies to the globally famous ongoing quarrel between the old economists Amartya Sen and Jagdish Bhagwati. It's cloudy and windy, the lush green rain-drenched vista from the balcony is as appealing as ever, and I have been having a grand vacation, despite the migraine, despite hardly going out of doors. Rab tussi great ho, as the Punjabis say: You have allowed me to know bliss with so little.

Oh, and playing the fool with the neighbour's dogs. Catching my breath after running around to grab them both together for the ten second photo op...