This year so far has been a year of BIG changes for us. It started on the new year's eve with a move to another apartment only 2 miles away from our current apartment because we wanted to be eligible to apply for the lottery school Milikan plus in Santa Clara. Knowing our luck we should have known better before playing any kinda lottery but like I said above , you would do anything for your children so not only we believed hard that we will be the one chosen in the lottery against 80 others but we also incurred all the insane moving expenses to move into our new residence in the city of Santa Clara. You never know what would have been unless you tried it , right (?) we told ourselves as the movers finished bringing the last box up in our new apartment sometime around 9 PM (really we did not schedule them to come in PM hours but apparently things got messed up and they ended up moving someone else in the AM hours). Being this the new year's eve and thinking everyone deserves a little break , we did not make an issue out of it. Tipped them well - they worked really hard and it was new year's eve. Looking at those boxes we wondered if we both liked drinking, this would have been the night to just let go. Turned out we could not find the glasses to even have water. Well, oh well.
January 1st doubles our joy since its also our little boy's birthday. We woke up really late and stayed a bit more in the bed for birthday & new year wishes, kisses and tickles. Headed out for birthday breakfast and had best pancakes and omlates ever. The waitress brought coffeecake for Avi to cut when she learnt it was Avi's birthday. Avi enjoyed all the attention in the restaurant. Later we picked up our favorite cake and cut it one more time in our apartment full of boxes. Thank God for my ever so wonderful husband who came up with a brilliant idea and made Avi's day super special by making a land-rover with empty tape rolls (used as wheels), a tin box (used as body of land rover) and a paper cut-out man holding a small US flag (which Avi found as we started opening the boxes). We counted our blessings , kissed our children, said happy birthday , happy new year and good night as we curled up in front of the fire-place and slept in the warmth of burning wood. Was having the fire place in this apartment worth all the expense and pain of moving ? (it turned out couple of months later that Avi did not get his name in the lottery) - may be !
In February kids and I traveled to India. Originally a two month long planned trip turned out to be four and a half months stay. The stars aligned and joyous event of my sister's wedding got planned in May. Wonderful times of celebration !
We savored the times with our family but heat not so much. Kids fell sick many times and I better not recall those really dreadful nights of Avi's stomach -ache and vomiting. If you are a mom, you know there is nothing more horrific than watching your child in pain. I missed Anurag terribly.Thankfully the sickness turned out to be all heat induced diarrhea and fever ( the doctor's assurance that it was a very common illness during summer did not laminate the fact for me that the kids suffered so much and lost a lot of weight).
The greatest outcome of our long visit is that my boys are talking in Hindi. Its AMAZING how Avi who understood a lot but never uttered a Hindi word is now primarily conversing in Hindi. They got to celebrate Holi in India, spent a lot of time with their Baba, Dadi, Bade Nanu, Badi Nani, Nanu, Mama, Mami and Masi and a lot of other extended family. As Anurag says, those memories and bonds are going to stick with them and not the bout of diarrhea.
Meanwhile here in USA, miraculously our request for transfer to NC got approved. We have been wanting to settle down here for a long time and it finally happened. I will bypass the details by just saying that sometimes things really work out and when they don't, having faith that such was not meant to be gives us courage to move on.
Now we are proud home owners in one of the best rated cities to live in USA and our children will be going to one of the top three, a blue ribbon public school in NC state. None of it guarantees happiness I know but for now I have it. The rest will follow.
