Back on Track

After 14 long years, I was able to come back to some of the religious aspects of my life that I had enjoyed when I was a child. Thanks to my wife, it felt good and promising. Felt hopeful in more ways than one.

During my child hood, thanks to my parents mainly, I have always enjoyed "Vinayaka Chathurthi" - the morning shopping for Lord Ganesh's clay idol, carrying a wooden plank (palagai) with me to carry it back home, the colored paper umbrella for him, the arugampil for the lord, my father driving the idol vendor mad with his bargaining, decorating the idol at home and more than anything, the amazing "ammini" and "uppu" kozhakattai my mom makes. After I left India, it remained just in memories. At my wife's suggestion, we went to the Shiva Vishnu Temple where kids made the idol themselves from a mould (wife did the major part for us), took it back to the temple a week later on the day of chaturthi with a small paper umbrella over him and my kid did all the ganesh homum/pooja along with other kids, offering akshathai etc to their idol, we brought the idol back home, offered him "sweet" and "ammini" kozhakattai my wife made. To top it all, a grand finale, the "Ganesh Visarjan", immersing the idol into the ocean for good, was held by the two San Diego temples combined at La Jolla shores. Some 150+ motivated San Diegan devotees from across India turned up on that hot day, sang bhajans before taking a procession of the idols into the ocean. The usual beach crowd of sun-bathers and surfers were surprised at this new event and some started photographing as well. The usually cold Pacific was surpringly warm and pleasant with the food and buttermilk after the visarjan finishing it all on a high note.

At my wife's behest, this year, I even went to the temple for the Avani Avittam in traditional dothi and vibuthi instead of doing a half-baked-upakarma at home.

Attached is the photo of Lord Ganesh (idol we made) gracing our home. Also shown is the kozhukattai-es in the second rack.