Cheating on Valentine’s Day.

Typically, I stop eating after a heavy brunch and only take in zero-calorie stuff like water, plain soda, and black sugarless coffee till the next morning when I break my fast with strongly brewed spiced tea. Once a week, on Fridays usually, I cheat by eating through the day, having a few drinks, and generally engaging in debauchery of every culinary variety while telling any sort of moderation exactly where to get off.

Today was Valentine’s Day. Now, I am at an age when people are genuinely surprised when I say I like to ‘celebrate’ it and spend it with my love (‘To begin with, uncle, what love at your age? And secondly, would you stop embarrassing yourself by behaving as if you are under 20, and spare us the awkwardness? Thank you very much.’). That said, given that I am truly getting on in years and that Misbah was surprised I even remembered the day (she actually laughed and told me she’s never celebrated it), I had allowed it to pass while I worked hard at the office, to arrive dead tired by eightish to a sleepy mother and her granddaughter, both having gone gallivanting through the day (it was Aaji’s & Kym’s day out), having stuffed themselves to the gills, played Uno (amongst other such pointless games), and having decided to sleep on the living room floor by laying out the mattress and about a million cushions and pillows all over (don’t ask). I prepared to sleep. Everything was normal. Or so it seemed.

Suddenly, the phone rings. ‘I am outside. Open the door!’ Huh? I let Misbah in. She’s looking resplendent in a saree (I’ve been after her to wear one, and to my surprise, she’s been claiming she doesn’t know how to drape one; apparently, she found someone to drape it, and here she is, smiling), me looking a little silly in my pyjama-kurta. I usher her into the bedroom. ‘Happy Valentine’s, my dear’. She’s got gifts for me (a 16-page love letter explaining why she loves me), for Kym (bookmarks and stars), and for Maa (a photo frame with her and Baba). She looks at me and asks innocently with her big, beautiful eyes, ‘Are you planning to sleep?’

And that is how, ladies & gentlemen, we find ourselves at the club, listening to what is surely a tone-deaf singer belting out ‘Kabhie-Kabhie’, with tables with pink tablecloths and even pinker balloons tied to them, full of couples of all ages holding hands, and very much in love. My cheat day has just shifted from Friday to today. And I don’t care.

Happy St Valentine’s Day to you all. By the way, it is also the birth anniversary of Sant Tukaram, a poet of love if there ever was one. It’s all so apt.

And so, as today ends, we begin the rest of our lives. Love all. Once again.