Support Systems

It’s that time again. I’m off to another break from a life with zero support system and on to a few days of respite. It’s just the three of us at home, 365 days a year. No off-to-my-mum’s-house breaks with simmered responsibilities; no solo-time breaks for Aniruddh. It’s always been like that. Our short, and occasionally long, vacations are the only kind of breaks we ever get to have.

Planning begins months in advance, usually on the last day of an already ongoing vacation. Packing begins weeks in advance. Clothes, footwear, accessories, even activities and toys for Kush are easy to set aside. He’s been screen-free so far, and my plan is to continue this for as long as possible.

The difficult task is picking out our books. Books that all three of us carry. It’s like picking out a song you want to listen to when in a certain mood, a certain moment. You shuffle and manually scroll but you need that right song. You don’t know which one it is but you’ll know it when you hear it. Only in this case, you anticipate for a mood for some time in the future.

Choosing my books for a vacation is like that. There’s the wait at the airport and the flight itself. Then there’s the actual vacation. How will my pace of reading be affected? Do I know if the weather will match the tone of the book I’m going to be reading on the 3rd day of the trip? Will I be able to fall asleep on a bed that’s new to me, finishing off a chapter? Do I even want to have the book lull me into sleep? I know not. I never do. I find it’s always a difficult decision.

Our vacations always fall into two categories: leisure and slow paced, or active but still slow paced. What I mean is we try and not rush from base to base. By leisure I mean a "stay put at a resort" or a hotel vacation. This is one of those. It’s slightly easier to pick out reading material for these. There’s a lot more time to read.

Or so I thought. A few months earlier, I finished Elena Ferrante’s Neapolitan Quartet. I had to start on the first book twice before I could finish it. Books two, three and four followed immediately after. What a journey it was! I haven’t been able to really move on to another book. It was decades ago that a set of books had such an effect on me. Remember the frenzy and excitement during Harry Potter? The 5th, 6th and 7th book release periods had me breathing and dreaming of the wizard world. That was how I met Aniruddh.

The Neapolitan Quartet. Various characters set in descriptive scenes of the Neapolitan neighbourhood. The deep attachment to the books I felt seems unshakable. It’s not to be confused with the story or even the character stories being relatable. That would be what Elizabeth Strout’s books were for me. Relatable. Ferrante’s quartet was moving. The growth of the characters across the four books, the increasing awareness of self in pockets of everyday happenings, the development of each of the characters’ lives spanning decades in subtle but in extraordinary ways, still. And towards the end, the last scene of the last book bringing you back to the first page of the first book, how the four books affected me.

I started on a couple of novels after I finished The Story of the Lost Child. Even as I turned pages, I couldn’t get a grip on any of them. I’m currently on Zikora’s story in Dream Count. I remember enjoying reading Chimamanda’s previous three novels. This one doesn’t hit the same. It is the book? Or is it aftereffect of Ferrante's translated literary piece? 

In the past couple of months, I’ve picked up a sizeable number of books from bookshops and a couple from my aunt’s stash. I am hoping to find a read that will shake me up from the deep stasis I am in.

The Booker Prize longlist Playground was picked by Aniruddh. My first pick for this upcoming life-routine break. It seems like a read that will be different from the Strouts and the Mitchells and Ishiguros. A good break during my break? Troubling Love is my choice for a flight read. I picked this in the hope that a Ferrante book will ease me out of Ferrante’s hold. It’s one of those things that don’t make sense until they do. I’m sure there’s a word for it. Dream Count is my back up.

Aniruddh and I have learnt to be increasingly self-sufficient as parents. Our long vacations, our short breaks, our mini-dates while Kush is in school, our family weekend meals at the table, our board game evenings, even our music mornings on the JBL cinema base, and of course, our books, have collectively become our support system. 

Am I going to have a life like the Grecos or the Carraccis or the Cerullos? Full and vivid? How will the story of my life read to me?