The Fortieth Anniversary

Walking through the enchanting streets of Karaikudi, the richest town in Tamil Nadu, which is known for its exotic architecture and cuisine, one would stumble upon exquisite heritage Chettinad houses and mansions. The grandeur of these buildings is inexplicable. Though few buildings have lost their grace over the period, many mansions are still being well maintained. This town plays an important role in old trading economy, thus the houses here are built lavishly by importing materials from all over the world by wealthy merchants.

The entrance of "Krishnan residence" is adorned with a simple yet elegant "Kolam", which leads to the front porch of the house. The porch has a seating area and two majestic wooden pillars adjacent to the main door, one at each side. Beautiful peacock designs are carved out on the  pillars intricately. Above the main door, a statue of "Godess Lakshmi" seated on a lotus, is sculpt. Then, there is the most important part of a Chettinad house, the courtyard. The beams of sunlight spilt in the courtyard and the living room. A beautiful swing is hung in the courtyard, facing towards the entrance of the house. The courtyard is surrounded by living room, kitchen and bedroom on each side. The living room is decorated with various bronze antique sculptures and collectables like statue of Vinayaga, peacock, Nataraja, flower vases, hanging lamps et cetra. Selvi started collecting these articles since her marriage, She loved organizing and maintaining them.

"Selvi. Selvi!" Krishnan came searching through the living room. Krishnan is in his early sixties, a petite man with dusky skin tone, wrinkles on his eyes and grey hair.

"Aachi is in the garden" said his grand children, Sarath and Sruthi who were playing in the courtyard. Sarath was the eldest, 10 years old and his sister, Sruthi was 6 years old. They both loved playing throw ball.

Krishnan went to the back yard, Selvi was sitting on the steps leading to the garden.

The garden was her favourite spot in the house, she spends most of her day there, watering the plants, cutting off the dried branches. (Any one who knows her would say that the plants are her first children.) The fragrence of flowers engulfed him. The garden was filled with flowers of vibrant colours on one side and various fruit yeilding plants on the other side. There was jasmine, crysanthamum, roses (there were 4 different types of roses alone.), hibiscus, jungle geranium. One the other side there were guava, lemon, banana,mango and papaya trees. There were also few vegetable plants like ladys finger, tomato, green chilli and moringa. At the center was the star of the garden, the tulsi maadam which is found in every Tamil house hold. It is considered as an auspicious plant and usually planted in the courtyard or in the garden of every house and worshiped by lighting lamp.

-"What are you doing here?" He asked. She turned back and smiled at him. She had an extra glow in her face today, not the usual glow due to the turmeric applied on her face. Her diamond nose stud shined in the sunlight as she looked at him.

-"Come on, sit with me." She said and scooted to make space for him. There was a plate filled with flowers from the garden which she would later make into a garland for the idols in the pooja room and also a pile of papers were there by her side, probably old inland letters.

-"So you remember what day it is today." He teased her with a coy smile.

-"Ofcourse yes, 40 years ago today, we united in wed lock. It seems like yesterday, doesn't it?"

-"Yes, time flies. All these wouldn't have been possible without you. You were my rock through all the highs and lows." Selvi listened with a smile as he went on. "I still remember vividly the first day I met you. I fell in love with you that very moment. It was a carnatic music concert. Your voice is so divine Selvi, one could spend their entire life listening to your songs. You were wearing a peacock blue saree and your thick black hair flew all the way down till your hips. You mesmerised me with your smile and voice. From then I came regularly to all your concerts and sat in the first row, you used to smile at the corner of your lips every time you stole a glance at me."

-"You asked for my hand to my father, just with the fact that I smiled at you. It is tenacious of you to take such a move. What if I had said No to my father?" Asked Selvi.

-"Oh, my dear Selvi. Your eyes expressed all the love you had on me. One day you sang "Alaipayuthe Kanna", don't you think I know that you sang for this "kanna"." He teased her. 

-"Enough now!" She blushed.

-"My selvi looks as gorgeous even now as she was as a spinster." He teased her.

-"Oh! Come on" she gave a coy smile.

-"These are letters which we wrote when I was in Burma for business, aren't they?" He asked.

-"Yes, I have tressured it all these years. Today I felt like going through all these letters. Long distance relationships are not as easy as it is today, letters where the only source of communication and I would wait for your letter every month. Our elder son Raghav, was 2 years old when you left for Burma. It was not an easy task to bring him up alone."

-"You raised him well Selvi, you have raised him as a gentle and caring soul. It was not easy for me neither, to leave you two here, but I had to do that to take our busniess to a better position so that we can afford a good standard of living. I missed being around you every single day." He said.

-"You are correct, that sacrifice has also made our relationship even stronger in a way. It taught us lots of values for the rest of our life." Selvi continued by holding his hands, "We have had a lot of happy memories too in this home. Remember, when we used to play with Raghav in this very garden. He loved planting with me. He would sit near the sapling through out the day waiting for it to blossom on the same day we planted." She laughed.

-Krishna said, "We have had a lot of lovely moments here to cherish for the rest of our lives. You started your music classes here, raghav was born here, his birthdays, graduation, marriage. Even our grandchildren were born here. Nothing is fullfilling as seeing those two grow up with us! Now come along with me dear, I want to show you something." Krishnan stood as he was speaking and helped Selvi get up.

He took her to the pooja room and asked her to look bring the "kumkuma chimizh" (a container used to store auspicious kumkum, usually made of silver or bronze.) placed on the shelf. She was astonished as she went in and saw it, she turned back at him with her eyes welled up with tears.

-"You managed to find this some how!" She cried with joy. It was a bronze article with the figure of radha and krishna with his flute, carved in it minutely and studded with stones on the sides. Radha and krishna symbolized love.

-"Happy anniversay, dear. How do you like the gift?" He asked.

-" Like? You know how much I love this. This kind of kumkuma chimizh used to be with my mom and ever since she passed away I always wanted to treasure this on her memory but I couldn't find it. This means a lot to me!" She exclaimed choking with tears of joy. He took the kumkuma chimizh from her hand and applied kumkum on her forehead. Their happiness knew no bounds, he loved making her happy.

-"Now sing a song for me." He said waiting for her to sing eagerly. - "Sure."

In the kanada ragam she sung: "Alaipayuthe..... Kanna..."

She went on with joy in her face like a child who got a candy. Her laughter was priceless to him indeed.