As with Art, So too in Life.....

I’ve been working hard. There’s a lot to be done in preparation for a forthcoming drawing workshop. I’m nowhere near done with the course work and there is not long to go before we begin. 

The other day, early in the morning one participant sent frantic messages, wanting to withdraw because she said she couldn’t draw to save her life. Prompted by some guidelines I had sent she was feeling terrified of sharing, what she had deemed as inadequate attempts, with others in the group. When signing up, another person had sent me a monkey with hands over eyes emoji, indicative of feeling a sense of shame, saying she hoped she didn’t make a fool of herself. Noting their fears, negotiating the apprehensions and placating dread and frayed nerves, put me in touch with my own nervousness. 

I may have been teaching for three decades but I’d never attempted this format. My on-line master classes are a one to one, face to face, albeit virtual encounter, where we have conversations and much is explained that way, along with email and other feedback. Those are more intense ten week courses. My on-site class-room teaching or workshop modules also have an approach that is both visual and interactive. I had to try and put all this into a ten-day module that would be understood via WhatsApp.

It wasn’t easy. I had to think. I had to re-think and re-do. For the first time, I actually did all the exercises I had planned for the participants, so as to  identify what kind of issues they would face and how to suggest they tackle those hurdles. What materials they’d need and how much time each exercise would take.  It really has been a hugely involved process. Much more preparation for teaching than I’ve done in years. It’s been invigorating and challenging but not without doubts and fears. 

I was stressing over typos in the information pdfs. No matter how many times I went through them, some prepositions got left out or a vowel missed here and there. I felt like the monkey emoji with its hands over eyes. How could I be so careless? Why did these things always escape me until I had already shared the information. Blah blah went on the endless tirade of my inner critic.

My body responded with neck and shoulder ache but I would not tear myself away from the computer until the shoulder spasms got unbearable. I was terrified of not being ready in time. Of not being clear and precise in my guidelines and more. 

Sunday’s have always been a holiday from work. But since the lockdown, days run into weeks without a break and there’s no sense of a weekday or weekend. It had been an intense week and I was feeling mentally exhausted. I was trying to relax and unwind but my mind was buzzing. I was restive and relaxation wasn’t being achieved so, by early evening I decided to cycle. 

And that was being bold, given that I’d barely managed much exercise since the lockdown started. Fearful of overdoing it, bogged down with cooking and household chores and a general sense of foreboding. Constantly being reminded to boost the immune system, I was floundering in terms of how much exercise was good. Should I push the body as one was used to doing - where the inevitable bout of viral flu wasn’t averted, or should I be more careful, exercise some but not get too adventurous. With fear underlying every day, it was always a difficult choice. The last thing I wanted was to fall sick. In Goa, going to hospital was another huge dread.

It is mid-July and Goa has had good rains - apparently more than half the average monsoon quota. The sky was overcast. It hadn’t rained much all day but just in case, I took my rain poncho along. These days I don’t wander far. I cycle close to the complex in and around the neighbouring lanes of Bammonwado. Doing endless rounds of an approximate 1 kilometre circuit that I’ve measured for the satisfaction  of noting the mileage I’ve done. Every gadget I had previously bought to do this, conked  out and I got tired of buying them, so andaza is now the best jugad. 

The number and depth of the red laterite, rain filled puddles had increased since my last cycling run about two weeks ago. The murkiness of the water ensures you can’t tell how deep they are so I was cautious for the first couple of rounds. The road wasn’t busy, neighbours were out walking their pigs, some children were cycling and one woman was whistling for her pet Bulbul to return home. It was all peaceful and quite usual.  The pigs who had been wading through deeper pools were covered with oil slick and mud, and were a snorting sight. A couple of years ago, I had seen some of them as tiny piglets running to save their tender lives from coming under my car wheels. These were now really quite tandarust......I just can’t find a more apt word in English. Healthy would be one way to describe it, but that really doesn’t say it all the way tandarust does. 

The six fat pigs and I passed each other a few times, I tinkled my cycle bell to ensure they didn’t dart out of the hedge growth suddenly,  and accidently knock me over. I certainly didn’t relish the idea of falling over or onto those hefty fleshy bodies covered with slime and dirt. They however, stoically kept their noses in the weeds chomping away. The odd one looking up, only occasionally. Either alerted or irritated by the ringing sound of the cycle bell.

All of a sudden,  the already grey sky darkened. Heavy clouds appeared and the wind charged into the lanes of Bammonwado. The tall coconut palms swished and swayed with mango tree branches  predictably more stoic in the wake of the breeze. Everything began stirring.  Dried, brown  leaves that had been swept to the side of the roads and those yet green and growing on shrubs and trees rustled.  As I cycled on, a group of women standing and chatting - apparently cousins catching up, looked up at the sky and warned me to go home. Rain, they said. “It’s going to rain heavy now.” I wheeled off the road, onto the mud of their parking area, got off my bike and put on my raincoat. I was looking forward to the shower. This year, I had not cycled once in the drenching rain and welcomed the opportunity with glee.

But instantly my mind started it’s harangue, reminding me that I had work to do. I couldn’t afford to tire myself by over exercising. Much less get wet and catch a cold. I knew all that, but even so, this evening, I threw caution to the wind. Or rather, Vayu’s velocity inspired a sense of freedom and playfulness that had eluded me all week long. Actually any sense of play has been progressively fading,  with the shadow of Covid-19 looming larger and bigger with each passing week, month and day.

In that moment, caught up with the romance of the cool monsoon air kissing my face and arms, I felt liberated and had a kind of epiphany. Reminding myself to take a leaf out of the list of instructions I was preparing for my would be students/participants. If no drawing was wrong. If mistakes were often the salient features of an expressive line made by chance; if the whole point of the exercises was to enjoy rather than strive for perfection, then I should do the same. So what if there were typos I couldn’t correct? So what if I didn’t manage to get it all right and create a perfect module. I could  leave some things to chance. And so, I didn’t turn back after my usual Sunday 10 km run, I cycled on uncaring of the consequences. 

It drizzled a bit. The red puddle indents in the black tarmac rippled with tiny circles growing larger and larger. There was anticipation in the air. I was revving up with excitement, driving more adventurously right  through the deeper sploshes rather than skirting around them as I had been doing before. People who had been sitting outside, went indoors to take shelter from the possibility of a heavy downpour. It certainly looked like heavy rain was on its way, especially with the fierce wind that was whizzing through the village. Passers-by put on their rainwear and carried on walking, cycling or riding  motorcycles. 

The elevated pinnate fronds swayed and seemed to assist the wind in blowing more clouds our way.  And then, as swiftly as they had brought them in, they swept them all away. There was no heavy rain. The sky just cleared up.  All this while, the village dogs hadn’t barked and the hunky pigs had kept their noses down, foraging without demur. Nor did Monica’s pet bulbul return home in fear of the rain. The animals didn’t show any sense of anticipation or anxiety such that I or other people had. It was as if the dogs and pigs and birds knew better than us humans, that there wasn’t going to be a downpour anytime soon. 

My ride through the grimy wetness of the road had covered my ankles and forelegs in mud. The drizzle had wet my purple raincoat and my cycle tyres were swishing with the dampness of wading through squelchy patches, while some rusty metal parts were creaking in protest.  

It hadn’t poured. I wasn’t drenched to the bone as I would have loved to be. It wasn’t a perfect evening of heightened fun that had alleviated my stress and cleared away the worriness blues. But I felt rejuvenated by the good physical workout.

I came home, had a nice hot shower and wiped the bathroom dry. I was tired, but in a cheerful mood. I had enjoyed the outing and exercise. Though I love writing, I haven’t been able to write anything for months. With illness and death foreshadowing everything. With despair more than hope,  groundlessness rather than any sense of knowing underscoring each day,  it’s been almost impossible to recount things as before. To even want to. Yet this evening I felt inspired and energised enough, to write this little story

I had left it to chance and that was the best part of cycling today. It hadn’t rained too much. I hadn’t got drenched and courted the much dreaded  cold that could be symptomatic of the dreaded carona virus that has all of us in a bind. But it was the thought of cycling in the rain - the memory of exhilaration felt from previous monsoon cycling stints that had buoyed the spirit.  And I began to experience a sense of play. This opened up my heart and mind in a way that mere exercise does not. 

And so it was that I realised, that just as in the act of drawing, so too in life, taking a chance plays an important role in the ‘marks’ we make. 

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