Three missed calls. My mother, back to back to back, which in our family is code for either a wedding or a death.
It was neither. She just missed me. She'd made undhiyu — a whole winter dish in July, out of season, out of longing — and she called to tell me she wished I could smell it.
I was on 30th Avenue in Astoria at the time, waiting for a friend outside a dumpling place, and I called her back standing on the sidewalk. And then I just — went. Right there. Tears down my face on a Tuesday in Queens.
Homesickness doesn't warn you. It ambushes you outside a dumpling shop.
She didn't ask why I was crying. Indian mothers don't ask, they just talk louder and softer at the same time until you calm down. She told me about the neighbor's daughter's engagement. About the monsoon coming early. About how the parrot on our balcony in Ahmedabad still shows up at 5pm sharp.
I've been in New York almost three years now and I keep waiting for homesickness to graduate into something manageable. It hasn't. It just gets craftier.
Some days it's fine. I love this city stupidly, embarrassingly. And then my mother makes undhiyu in July and the whole scaffolding comes down.
My friend found me still on the phone, red-eyed, and just sat on the stoop next to me. Didn't say anything. When I hung up she handed me half her dumplings and said, "Better?" And it was. A little.
We walked to Astoria Park after and watched the Hell Gate Bridge go gray then gold. She let me be quiet.
I think being an immigrant daughter is just this. Loving two places so much they take turns breaking your heart.
I'll call my mother again tomorrow. I always do.
Love,