The snow had mostly melted by the time I arrived in Jari, however the cold hadn’t left. It somehow lingered over the floors, the air, and even the clean, well-equipped walls of the residential quarters. Everything smelled faintly of pine and of paint.
It was my first week at Imperial Residential School, that snuggled in a remote Himachali town where the clouds lazed and conversations moved slower than one’s memory. The school was generous: a private desk, working geyser, curtained windows, even a pantry nook. Yet something about the room felt unfamiliar in its perfection — like a hotel you didn’t know if you were allowed to call home.
I had come to teach Sociology to senior secondary students. But all week, I found myself living it.
On my third morning, I passed the staff lounge noticeboard and paused at a pinned quote by Durkheim:
“When mores are sufficient, laws are unnecessary; when mores are insufficient, laws are unenforceable.”
It reminded me of the small flat in Mumbai I had just left behind — with its fan that clicked on third speed, with its one steady inhabitant: my father. After my mother died, we hadn’t spoken about grief. We just folded it neatly into our routines.
There were no rules. Just mores. Unspoken codes.
Like not bringing up memories after dinner. Like finishing chai in silence.
The market road here was barely a kilometre long — a pharmacy, a kirana, and a woman who sold rajma in dented tubs. I bought 1 kg onions, a packet of salt, sugar, and half dozen packets of Maggi. As I turned to leave, the shopkeeper said:
“Yahan thand mein sab aadat daalni padti hai.”
You have to get used to everything in the cold.
I almost replied, “Even silence.” But I just nodded.
Back in my room, I boiled water in the electric kettle which my father had insisted that I should carry.
“Ghe na, lagel tula. Instant comfort,” he’d said, tucking it into my bag.
Take it. You’ll need it.
I made tea. Out of habit, I poured two cups. One sat untouched on the shelf. I didn’t know why I did it.
Or maybe I did.
That morning in Mumbai came rushing back — the sound of the spoon in his cup, the familiar hum of the fan, and his voice through the half-closed kitchen door. I had gone to fetch my towel. I stopped when I heard him speaking softly on the phone.
“Ti nightey aaj. She finally got the posting. Excited aahe, pan thoda tension pan disatay...”
A pause. Stirring.
“Nako re sangus, kaay fayda? She needs to go. I’ll be fine.”
It wasn’t meant for me.
But I heard it anyway.
And it stayed.
I thought of Goffman, who said we wear masks in social roles — frontstage performers managing impressions.
In our house, Baba had been the quiet patriarch, the stoic widower. I had played the capable daughter, the scholarship girl who didn’t cry easily.
We had never broken character. Not even once.
The next morning, for the first time I walked a trail beside the school. There were pine needles that carpeted the path that disappeared in the dense subtropical pine forests. I stood in a clearing, looking out at the valley that stitched with terraced fields. The clouds were close — thick, unhurried.
I took out my phone. Debated. Then called.
He answered on the third ring.
“Haan bol, Anagha.”
“Hi, Baba. Had breakfast?”
“Ho. Paratha kelela. Tula avadto na? Pan ektyane khava lagla.”
I made your favourite paratha. But had to eat alone.
I smiled. “You never puff it up properly.”
“Tujhya shivay mla te jamnaar ahe ka?”
Can I ever get it right without you?
A pause.
“I heard you,” I said quietly. “That day. On the phone.”
He didn’t respond at first. Then:
“Tu aikat hotis? You weren’t supposed to.”
You heard? You weren’t supposed to.”
“I know. But maybe I needed to.”
We hadn’t spoken like that in years.
“I wanted to say something that morning,” I admitted. “I just didn’t know how.”
“I didn’t either,” he said. “Kaahi bolaycha hota... pan shabda sapdat navhte.”
I had something to say... but couldn’t find the words.
I paused. “Not unnecessary. Just… unfamiliar.”
Another silence. A warm one.
That night, I was just tossing and turning with the memories which I had buried long ago.
The window curtains were swaying gently enough to let in the hushed moonlight… radiating Ma’s photo that sat calmly near the sill — the one that wore untiring smile, soft eyes, framed forever in the comfort of nostalgia.
But I remembered the day I stopped believing that smile.
I was fifteen. That day I returned home early from my tuitions. The light in the hallway was off. The bedroom door was slightly open. I heard Ma’s laugh — not the motherly one, but the one that I was not able to recognize — the one that drifted through the crack. I peeked in.
He was holding her hand. Not Baba. Someone else. A colleague, I would later piece together. Her arm rested gently on his shoulder, and for a second, I saw her — not as a mother, but as a woman.
She didn’t see me. I backed away like a thief in my own house, my throat burning.
I never told Baba. I didn’t tell anyone.
I locked it away — not because I forgave her, but because I couldn’t bear to see Baba undone.
That night, I had promised myself: I’ll never leave him. No matter what.
Not just out of guilt. But love. Fierce, protective, daughter-love.
And now, I had left him — alone in that flat with its third-speed fan and silent dinners. A promise broken under the pretense of ambition.
I felt the cold again — not from the Himachali winds, but from the gap between memory and loyalty.
Durkheim spoke of moral obligations not written in law. This was mine. A daughter's vow to be the cushion against a truth too heavy for her father to carry.
That evening, I placed Ma’s photo near the window. I had packed it without thinking. She looked the same — serene, a small tilak on her forehead. The curtain moved in the breeze like her sari used to during long-distance calls.
I made chai again. Two cups.
Baba called.
“Tar mag... next Sunday?”
“So then… next Sunday?”
“Paach vajta. If you want to keep time.”
At five. If you want to keep time.
He laughed. “I always do. Tula bolayla shikaycha ahe. Mala aikayla.”
You need to learn to speak. I need to learn to listen.
In class, I wrote on the board:
“Culture is what makes us feel at home — and what we take with us when we leave.”
One girl raised her hand.
“Ma’am, is that from the textbook?”
“No,” I smiled. “That one’s mine.”
We teach theory to understand society. But sometimes, it takes a foggy afternoon, a forgotten towel, and a father’s quiet voice on the phone — to understand what lies between silence and love.
I had overheard him at the edge of goodbye.
And that made all the difference.
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