I called Ba on Tuesday night. No reason. Nothing happened. Which, it turns out, is the best reason.
It was around nine here, so morning chaos there. I could hear the pressure cooker hissing, the TV running some Gujarati news channel, my aunt yelling about somebody's shoes. I sat on my fire escape in the Lower East Side with my knees pulled up and just listened to the noise of a house I haven't lived in for six years.
We didn't say anything important. She asked if I was eating. I lied and said yes. She told me about a neighbor's daughter's wedding I will never attend, described the lehenga in such detail I could have sketched it. I told her about a dress I'm working on and she said, "good, but are you eating," because in my grandmother's universe all problems are nutritional.
Calling Ba on a Tuesday and saying almost nothing has become my favorite ritual. There's no agenda, no big news to deliver, no homesickness to perform. Just two women on opposite ends of the planet keeping each other company through the phone.
I used to think love had to be eventful. Grand gestures, airport reunions, the SRK-arms-open thing. But the older I get, the more love looks like this. Background noise. Someone asking if you ate. The comfort of being known without effort.
There's a Gujarati word, "khabar," which means news but also just means knowing about each other. We didn't exchange any real news. We just kept khabar. We stayed informed about the small weather of each other's lives.
When we hung up, the LES was doing its Tuesday-night thing — someone laughing too loud outside the wine bar, the J train rumbling somewhere east. I felt steadier. Forty minutes of nothing had quietly rearranged my insides.
I keep waiting to feel like an adult who doesn't need her grandmother. That day is not coming, and I've stopped wanting it to.
Call the person who asks if you've eaten. They are asking something much bigger.
Love,