A Bare Necessity!

Credits: the-arcade.ie

Baloo was happiest singing “Look for the bare necessities, the simple bare necessities; forget about your worries and your strife…” as am I when I watch him! I wish life was just as simple (I have heard it can be) but somehow I find a lot of things have become bare necessities including mobile phones!

Yet, the basic necessities I am about to talk about are those that we need but do not wish to admit when we are on the right side of forty! Most people call it the wrong side but you’ll know when you get here that this is when the fun begins! I know you’ve heard about mid life crisis (how do you think this blog started?!!) but believe me, when you look back, every period in your life has had crisis and chaos but when you cross forty you are better equipped to handle it or at least shrug it off.

Credits: specsavers.co.za

Credits: optiwow.com

Getting on with my limited list of two material necessities, one of which I am yet to lay my hands on. The first one is glasses! Reading glasses and Shades are both bare necessities and though we like to flaunt the latter since that defines style, the former gets the world to know we are old (or at least on our way to get there) and is very often not used especially when we just get them (.5 is hardly any power…1 is hardly any power and so on) - you know all about denial, I presume! 

And what a fallacy is that!! How can we think we look young if we are in the super market, dressed to kill and holding in our tummies (only applicable to the slightly overweight!) when a handsome hunk or a pretty lady walks by. (It is actually liberating to stop holding your tummy in, knowing it won’t make a difference, especially in front of the camera, for once you reach a certain level of obese you stop fooling yourself and the pretence ends.) Do you really think they can’t make out when you narrow your eyes into slits to read the price or the expiry date on the selected item and after much turning, give it up?!!  Whom are we kidding?

The good news is, they don’t give a damn! As an afterthought I must add that I haven’t seen a single handsome hunk at the super market. Come to think of it, when I am eyeing food that I’d like to stock up, I wouldn’t notice one if he hit me on the head!! Why, we even cut a sorry figure in the restaurant, my husband and I, when we cannot read the bill and 8 and 3 and 6 all look alike! We never carry our reading glasses along! It is perhaps a subconscious thing because glasses or not, neither of us look below 40!!!

Credits: peebuddy.in

The second bare necessity for me is a pee buddy! If you love travelling long distances by road, it is a must, at least in India and I still haven’t got it! The highways do not have toilets and the few that are available in petrol pumps are usually terrible. Well, my bladder was strong once upon a time and while the men would happily ease themselves on the roadside, I would stop drinking water and my will power would get me to hold till I found a decent one. I cringe at the idea of easing myself behind a bush-what do you do where they aren’t tall or thick?? With my bladder and will power not being as strong as before, and with the threat of a UTI, if I drink less water I need to solve the problem till toilets comes up on the road. The pee buddy I hear is a disposable contraption that you attach to yourself and you can pee like a man! I get a feeling that I have talked about this in one of my previous blogs but I haven’t managed to get hold of one so the obsession is still on.

My little niece who was about two and had no idea about how boys take a leak, was soaping her hands in the wash basin of our bathroom perched up on a stool, and facing a huge mirror. My absent minded son, all of three, walks in without noticing his cousin and turns to ease himself. My wide eyed niece runs out of the toilet, straight to her mother to tell her what a naughty boy he was and she was told “Well, that‘s how boys do the job”!! She stared in disbelief.

Now imagine the scenario where my husband, son, daughter, dog and I are travelling and we stop en route to take a leak, all in line!! The truckers are going to stare the same way as my niece! God forbid, we might be responsible for an accident!

You might be thinking that there are loads of things that are bare necessities post forty and that I have made a wishy-washy list and to an extent I have but actually, there aren’t so many things-at least, for me there aren’t (thankfully)! Health related things like I mentioned above, yes, but not many material things I can think of.

The non material essentials would include peace and quiet and freedom to do what I please taking things like a family and a home as a given.

Peace and zero volume early mornings while I drink a litre of water, sitting on the balcony watching the birds and enjoying the fresh light breeze, something I took for granted, and I no longer get is a bare necessity for me for it sets the mood for the day. With Joey, our nearly four month old Labrador pup, that is impossible as he wakes me up with a lick or a nip and follows me, tackling my ankles as I try to reach the toilet, my grogginess gone in a jiffy. When we make it to the balcony eventually, he always manages the noisiest toy which could be an irritating plastic Pepsi bottle and makes sure the din is loud enough for me to down the water in a hurry! So for those of you who get that peace and quiet in the morning, appreciate it and enjoy every bit of it. I am appreciating the licks and that happy and eager doggo face despite the noise and complete lack of peace! After all, he makes up for it by giving me all of his attention!

In India, we still have the luxury of getting help at reasonable costs and this has made us comfortable and dependent. This is one basic necessity which none of us here can do without. A dusty country, except in hill stations perhaps, sweeping and swabbing, dusting etc on a daily basis is mandatory and if that gets taken care of then we can indulge in reading, writing, baking and whatever else we choose to do. Post 40, this is a bare necessity, with dipping calcium and Vitamin D levels and erratic hormones, what would we do without our “Bais”! My help calls herself Super Sangeetha and tells me at least once a day how lucky I am to get her and even as I see her cutting corners, I always agree with a smile!

Credits: Pinterest.com

A companion to speak to at the fag end of the day is another thing we take for granted but is a bare necessity, my friends, especially over 40!! This is true for everyone but more so for people like me who are homebodies and refuse to have a friend circle they meet daily or even weekly! I go without seeing friends for a year! There are times when we cook up devious plans to torture our companions and hope to execute them someday, perhaps, but blessed are we to have someone to share our joys, sorrows and insecurities with. More than our lovely children who will soon leave us to build their own lives and more than our parents who are complete in each other, it is just this one person who can bear our onslaughts and reciprocate in kind; who has seen our worst and still sticks with us and with whom we have no barriers and no walls.

Credits: Pinterest.com

Credits: Pinterest.com

Apart from all this, is one of the greatest essentials, the only bare necessity that can stop our minds from getting restless-a sense of purpose and even better spiritual growth! To know who we are, what we stand for and being able to serve a cause that is larger than our limited life and those of our near and dear ones. The satisfaction that comes from serving, to whatever extent is possible while doing your own thing is parallel to none.

And with that I wrap up my 60^th blog!! I thank you readers for keeping me going and though I’d like to write frequently, it doesn’t really happen (same as exercising) but I hope to change that in the future (ditto with the exercising!). Take care, be good and have loads of fun with more than the bare necessities with only two months to go in 2019!!