Desi Witch

- Seeing your friends after months and knowing that nothing has changed.
- Drinking Oyster Bay and making fun of Rakhi in Basera, with BFF.
- Having beautiful warm sunshiny days in the peak of winter.
- Having BFF curl your hair and dressing up all posh-like to go to the mall.
- Getting an unplanned but always desired tattoo
- Buying more handbags than I'll ever need.
- Seeing that BFF has dropped a few dress sizes and realizing that you're not jealous but thrilled!
- Going to Borders and Barnes & Noble and soaking in the joy of being around so many books.
- Watching R.D. Burman songs from Saagar, Yeh Waada Raha and singing along.
- Recording songs with MBF [male-best-friend]
- Drinking Dunkin Donuts Coffee Coolatta.
- Being woken up by BFF's 6 year old with a hug every morning. Yes, every jet-lagged morning.
- BFF, IBF [instant Best Friend, yeah A - that's you.] and me giggling like little children even though we're in a very grown up Irish bar.
- CBF [childhood best friend] making a long trek from Virginia just so she can spend a day with me.
- Making peace with close friend that you thought you'd lost.
- Looking across a table loaded with pancakes, waffles and other heart-attack inducing goodies and seeing the faces of people that must have been related to me in a past life and knowing that they all love me. And that I'm blessed to have them in my life.

I met a woman today. I didn't think I could fall in love again - but I have. I want to sit at her feet and worship her. I want to kiss her genius hands. See, I had a lady come home to cook for me today. She's a middle aged Gujarati woman who cooks like my mother does. In 3 hours, she had made 4 different and complex vegetable dishes and more than 2 dozen chapattis. And then she had the dishwasher loaded and the kitchen spotlessly clean. YES! In 3 hours! Just making the chapattis would have taken me about 6 hours. And they would not have been the perfectly round, moon-shaped, gorgeous , delicious pieces of bread that she made. And the vegetables! I never thought turnips could taste that marvelous. And oh the aloo-methi, the gobi and the doodhi! I want to write poems singing her praises. Something like:
Dear Dear Cook,
You're # 1
In my book.
I'm the fish
You're the hook.
The chapattis you made
My whole world shook.
Hiring you was
the best Project
I undertook.
Dear Dear Cook...

[Note to self: Consider alternate career in poetry writing.]

All day I have been marveling at how lucky I am to have found her. I've also had mild panic attacks and pangs of fear stab my heart. What if she gets so many clients that she will refuse to come to my home every week? What if there's another terrorist attack on the tube and she's travelling on it? What if she wins the lottery and doesn't want to do this anymore?
I know I'm being irrational, but that's what happens when you fall truly madly deeply in love. Also I cannot imagine going back to cooking again.

Because witches make potions, not parathaas.