Bring life back. But how? Where to begin?
Like a flash, it occurred to me that the five elements that make up life must be set right at the house. The Air had been taken care of with all the dusting, cleaning, tidying up and painting. The air inside the house is now breathable.
So next element was the Fire. The gas company had delivered the cylinder but there was no stove that is in a working condition. The only stove that escaped the burglary was an old four-burner stove. All the burners had been either stolen or missing with only the burner bases intact. There was no grill to cover the burners for cooking.
So the hunt began first at Mysore and then in Bangalore. After struggling with some ‘may fit’ purchases, I decided to remove two burner bases (one small and one big) and take them to the shops to find a fit. After struggling to find a fit in Mysore, the search got expanded to Bangalore. Same struggle, same result. Finally, one stove company came forward to replace both the burner bases and the burners. That prompted the next task of carrying the stove to the shop. I thought a trip in the auto should do it. But I was not ready for some of the unexpected trips.
The burners got matched, but the two grills I had were needed to be fixed to the plate. The same shop said that they can do it by drilling the holes in the plate and find new ones for the remaining two burners. After getting that done, found out that the grill height for cooking was not matching with the burner’s height. So the grills that I thought could do the job did not. The same shop promised me to find some grills for the stove, but said that they may have to drill holes on the plate once again to accommodate a different type. I said yes as the stove was old anyway. So the saga of getting a stove burning at my place ended up finally with a four burner stove with lots of holes on he plate. I consoled myself that I could do use the holed up plate as a shredder if need be.
The third element, the Water, was take care of by getting a nearby shop to supply the water bottles to the house. I thought this was one of easiest tasks that got finished quickly.
The fourth element, the Earth, had to be looked after by someone. Every inquiry that I made for a housemaid returned with some horror stories that I thought can made in only Bollywood. I left this task as the last thing to do.
There was another immediate need – the fifth element: my mother. She was getting very frustrated with the failed attempts to move back to Domlur from the retirement home she was staying at. I was very surprised at this frustration as I thought I would have done rather the opposite – delay moving back. But then I realized that she lived in a different era than mine to enjoy the facilities provided by the retirement home. I realized that even the five-star facilities at the retirement home (VLN Prabudhaalaya) was no match for her way of doing things. VLN was also eagerly looking forward to see the house getting ready for her to move back in, perhaps for the reasons of their own. There was pressure from my sister to close the accounts at VLN at the end of the month no matter what and she was prepared to look after her for a week or so to help me equip the house.
Bringing life back was almost at its last step. As the hot water from the solar heater was doing an OK job, I put the water heater purchase as the last item to shop. A must have washing machine and the fridge to meet the needs of my mother was very high on the list. The next came the television as it would help her to pass time. I was trying to re-create VLN facilities at home for her.
I was making progress, but progress was slow. The next step was to make the move to the house to see how it feels like living – before my mother could move back in. I thought if an able-bodied person like me can survive, an elderly and a frail person like my mom might be able to survive with some degree of confidence.
Finally, I thought I have conquered all the demons that otherwise would have gobbled up the house. Now was the question of having confidence in testing out the livability, without any survival guide.