Hinchko

She gave me a piercing look, her eyes wide, moving from left to right rapidly. I sat there like a blob staring into nothingness. She got agitated. Her neck starts to shake from left to right, accompanying her eyes, turning red. I put one leg down, pushing away the ground, with the other one still cross-legged. Now her hands joined the parade as she started shooing me away. Indolently, I shifted to the right rested my arm on the bright yellow bolster, shining bright as the sun peeked into the foyer. She lifted up the pleats with one hand, gathered the pallu of her saree in another, and sat with grace on the thick cushion draped in a shiny silk peacock blue cloth. The tinkling of the small bells filled the room as the chunky brass trimmings suspended from the bulky iron hooks on the ceiling started to jiggle. She looked up, stared at my grandfather’s photo on the wall, shifted her glance at me, and pulled me close in a tight hug.

As we pushed away from the green marble floor, our legs moved in unison, rested our backs on the intricately carved backrest, and laid our arms comfortably on the wooden armrest.

It is our own little cocoon, safety net, and pedestal to just sit and look out the door wide open for hours. We listen to the honking of the vehicles at the traffic signal, the barking of the street dogs, grunting of the cattle, vegetable sellers with their hand-pulled carts pitching buyers, and keep an eye on every person that enters the heavy main gate into our house.

It is always the urgency in her and the nonchalance in me that bothers her. But here on the wooden hinchka, passed on from generations, we share different energy. Perhaps, it is the memories it carries, as much as that soothing rocking motion and the creaking noise it makes.

Maa rushes to the foyer as she hears the tinkling of the bells from the trembling brass chains. She stands staring outside at rustling leaves as the wind blows and the night sets in. She grabs the elephant adorned on the brass chains for support. She screams at the top of her voice, calling out to Dharam to come and sit with us. She snaps at him as soon as he walks into the room for staring at his phone while he goes on gulping his dark chocolate ice cream.

We were all gradually settling in for our late-night gossip session. Papa walks in with a fruit bowl in one hand and a Dabba full of khakhra in another. He perches on top of the sofa in vajrasana. Dadi snaps at him to stop making those chewing noises, just when some of papa’s friends join in taking positions on the sofas and the cool marble floor till the foyer is filled with the loud chatter of everyone. They don’t automatically sit in the jhoola – there is a sense of them as thrones, reserved for the masters of a gujarati house – but when they do, it is with a palpable sense of pleasure. There is an automatic sense of relaxation, and it is hard to get into a heated argument in a jhoola.