It is when faced with the bad and the ugly that one remembers the good.
We were living in 338, Defence Services Officers Enclave Part II, Dhaula Kuan New Delhi. My daughter Nandita had then just become very unwell. The psychiatrist at the Military Hospital had started her treatment with an anti-psychotic. He told us that there would be side-effects and to bring her to the hospital when the side-effects started. When the side-effects started I wrapped my daughter in a shawl and blanket and we took her to the hospital where she was given an injection. We brought her back home in the early hours of the morning.
At noon my neighbor whom I did not know at all came carrying a tray with a hot meal. She said that she had tried out something new and wanted me to taste it. I thanked her. A few days later when I dropped by at her place to return the dishes, she discreetly asked me,'Beti ki tabiyaat theek nahin hai?' I just nodded. She never mentioned the topic again whenever we met. She brought her mother and grandmother several times to our house in the mornings when they were visiting her. The mother and the grandmother wore colourful pleated skirts (ghagras) and buttoned raw cotton kurtas. They used to bring Doda barfi made in pure ghee for my daughter. That was when I got to know that she was from Haryana and that her husband was a JAG officer in the Indian Army.
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