Objects of Our Affection

Deepika Khatri I bought my first piece of furniture at the age of 23. It was for the one bedroom-kitchen I shared with my college-hostel-turned-roommate in an SRA building in Mumbai. It came with a single bed frame and a small wooden cupboard. A counter top served as the kitchen. A foldable table doubled up as dining table and workspace. Attached to the wall, its singular leg tucked into itself to breathe space into the room. Long yellow mulmul curtains demarcated the kitche

Manisha Gupta When I was ten, I had a powder-blue chair. It was three feet in height—low enough for my feet to feel the floor; high enough for my mind to touch the sky. The desk - the master- was flat, like the sky. Creamy painted clouds floated on its surface. A rose-pink plastic container stood like a lighthouse on its corner. It was home to my collection of pencils. The chair always knew its place. It was in a committed relationship with a matching blue desk. It always sto

Sanobar Sabah Amma was the only grandparent we knew. My father’s parents died before he went to high school. My mother’s father died when my naani - my Amma - was in her early thirties. She never married again. Amma built her two-storey home in Patna with the savings she had. A part of it was rented out - that rent along with the government pension she received, sponsored her children’s education and eventually, their marriage. My earliest memories of Amma ka ghar are of

Alaknanda Sengupta My father lived his life in straight lines. He was an obedient son, a dedicated employee, a dutiful family man. For many years, he worked in the design department of Tata Motors (then TELCO). The vehicles were sturdy, reliable and designed for rough Indian roads. So, when he took it upon himself to design sofas for our living room, they were made of solid wood, in straight lines. The backs were ramrod straight, with armrests at exactly ninety degrees. Eveni

A poem Reema Ahmed Aaraam aur kursi ki prem kahani Aaram aur Kursi- in Laila aur Majnu ke beech aake ye mui duniya hamesha shor machaati hai Aaraam kab se bhatak raha hai, kisi Shireen ke Farhad ki tarah, apni Kursi ki baahon mei gum ho jaane ki tammanna liye Inke beech ki doori kaam, waqt ki kami, aalas ki tohmat roopi dushmanon se ghiri hui hai Ye dushman Aaraam aur Kursi ko ek nahi hone dete. Maano inke milan ki ghadi aate hi duniya ruk jaegi, shaam dhal jaegi aur neend bh

A poem Sucheta Tiwari Blue chair New chair (Keep away your shoe chair) Reading corner Books are on a Pile high as a hill there Put in a cushion and a throw Catch me sinking, lying low Feet raised up, I'm nice and snug For many hours- just a blink In the greater scheme of things Now milk and drool Stain the footstool No time to read The child must feed Things that get lost are always there- Just lying on the nursing chair Next thing I know It’s tippy toes And belly crawls And

A poem by Raju Tai

Naresh Kumar ज़िंदगी के इस पड़ाव तक पहुंचते-पहुंचते जाने कितनी ही चीजें इकट्ठी हो चुकी हैं जिनका हिसाब लगाना थोड़ा मुश्किल है । पर किसी एक चीज की बात सोचना चाहूँ तो एक घटना याद आती है। 2011 में, मैं अपनी पढ़ाई खत्म कर दिल्ली में नौकरी कर रहा था। छोटे से गाँव से उठकर जमशेदपुर, फिर पढ़ाई के 7 साल राँची और अब अचानक दिल्ली। कुछ ही दिन में समझ चुका था कि मैं यहाँ के लिए नहीं बना। अब मैं ज्यादा से ज्यादा दिल्ली अपने कैमरे में समेट लेना चाहता था, शायद फिर कभी ना लौटूँ, इस वहम में। सुबह

Anubhuti Patra Would you call this a chair at all? As a child, I was confused about whether this was an “arm” chair or “ aaram ” chair. It seemed like the adults around me used either form of address as they pleased. Doesn’t “ aaram ” chair fit better, though? Especially if you are of the right size and can sink into it and catch an afternoon nap. As a five-year-old when I first encountered it, I found the rattan too slippery. I was too small and too thin to feel comforted

Dhwani Vij I was given a ring By my ma When I moved away from her. “This belonged to your dadi” she said, “She wore it everywhere." Yes. Even when her world shrank to her bed. “I know, ma. I can’t picture her hand without it.” At that moment, The moment ma gave it to me, I put it on my finger. I should have waited. I wasn’t ready for the ring to fit my hand so completely. Who is ready for their hand to resemble those who perished? Ma looked at me, I looked at the ring.

Aditi Garg Questionable luck in her hand, yet Unflinching in her stance, I Envy her—me, a titular queen in awe of the real deal, Even as she gnaws at her cuticles, thankfully No one notices her tell. I am but a mid-worth tender, Offering her her win today; elsewhere when she Fights, her heels don’t really Dig in. Her hands have a practiced ease, Impossible to learn without years of Assured agility of someone Married to errands; while I stiffen in the deck barrack— Off a f

Subbubond Dear Re:Thadi Reader, Trust this letter finds you in good health and cheer. It is not that I write letters often but it is something I want to inculcate. Many of my relatives were prolific letter writers. I have heard that a letter from them was akin to reading a story book, with drama and family characters. At times my father’s letters would include the full recipe of a dish that my mother made. My uncle’s letter could precisely describe the aroma of the jasmine f

Pranjali I have never been able to fit in a chair, at least not in a way that one is supposed to. My entire school life I struggled to remain seated and still. At home, a chair was almost always a table and a table, frequently something to sit on. I would be found reading, writing, painting or daydreaming half hanging off the edge of the bed. Only in my college hostel life, I discovered my comfort space – a flight of steps. Often with friends, but mostly by myself, that is wh

Anoo My love for craft, upcycling, refurbishing, and repurposing old things comes from my mother and my paternal grandmother. Growing up I watched my grandmother upcycle everything from food to fabric to avoid waste and to stretch every resource available to her. From her I learned the values of economy, efficiency, and resourcefulness. My mother gave me the gift of creativity and a love for craft and making things with my hands and heart. She had many interests that she purs

Srishti बेड, डबल बेड, किंग और क्वीन से भी पुराना अपने तकत का सीन उन्नीस सौ तीस, चालीस, पचास की बात इक्यानवे में माँ के घर आई थी बारात टीवी, अलमारी और रुपये नगद दहेज में आया लकड़ी का तकत चार पाओं, हैं दस फट्टे कैसे बिठाए हट्टे कट्टे? बैठे क्या, हम उछले कूदे अम्मा के जो तीनो चूज़े कुश्ती लड़ते रोते गाते चादर डाल के घर बनाते Math का टेबल, accounts का ट्यूशन Crush का ‘hi’ और ‘I like you as a friend’ सब कुछ तो देखा है इसने ‘कहाँ चलेगा’, कहा था किसने? बाबा का आना जाना देखा नया घर औ

Gurpreet Kaur It was a mug. It was bought from a queer book shop in Toronto. The first ever queer book store in the world, called the Glad day book shop. I saw this cute quiet mug sitting somewhere in a corner in Glad day. It said “ Queer & Tired ”. It was an orangish shade, an orange moving towards yellow shade, near the boundaries of the letters, giving them nice shadowy shade. Not the Sanghi orange shade thankfully. Orange and yellows that were queerly coming together. Th

Mansi Yadav Nani’s Swing in Kerala There is a photo in my parents’ room in which the three of us are on a swing in Nani’s house in Kerala. I thought it was the trip when I was 1.5 years old and had broken a leg. So I asked mumma if this was the same trip and guess what she replied, “Nahi.” So basically, I have it all confused in my mind and that photo was actually when I was 3 to 4 months old! But the point is that even if I look back today when I’m 20 years old that one swin

Ajay Kelkar For much of my career, I never thought about the spaces I occupied at work. They seemed incidental—merely functional, a container for the more pressing tasks. But if we truly consider it, we spend nearly 80,000 hours working: 40 years, 50 weeks a year, 40 hours a week. That’s 80,000 hours in spaces that nurture or drain us, often without us even noticing. I had moved from a fashion-forward retailer to a bank, so the attire changed to blue-grey shades and blue-grey

Viprasha Dang There is a certain sanctity I associate with desks. Whether it is the one I write on at home, a work desk that bears the weight of deadlines, or even my dining table that I momentarily treat like my work corner, desks have always felt like extensions of my mind. They anchor me. Perhaps it is the quiet formality they carry, the implicit invitation to sit down and mean what you do. My brain has been trained, or maybe innately designed, to believe that truth begins

Savvy Soumya With age comes maturity. With our age, our ruinous-ness matured. If we have gone together to buy curtains (me) and a lamp (him), both of us will end up buying both curtains and lamps…and many other things. Our mutual shopping is not based on needs. It isn’t based on science or commerce either. It is an art. The art of mutual destruction. The inexplicable art of mutual destruction. One such inexplicable episode is the furniture swap. Something our parents have gra