While you were sleeping

The advent of winter brings with it the early morning chills and my need to sleep in a little late, hugging the comforter a little tighter. It was one of those chilly mornings, plus I had worked late last night and I was also on vacation. All I had hoped was to sleep in a little late without waking up to the shrill cries of the alarm clock. 

However, my slumber was prematurely cut short by a sudden shriek, "Devammmm! Devadhi Devammmmm! Where are you?" 

It was the kind of shriek whose frequency could tear through any medium, shake the ground and cause tsunamis. The shriek that would wake Akbar from his grave, no matter how deeply buried (in the ground, not in sleep) he was. Buried I was too, under layers of winter bedding, comfortably sleeping. But that shriek got my eyes wide open. 

Where was I? In whose home? And why was someone shouting the name they had for me? My memory had gone out of focus for a few seconds. It must be a nightmare, I thought. I keep getting nightmares all the time, bad dreams where my teeth are falling off or I am losing my voice. I tried in vain to go back to sleep.

Within less than a minute, the shriek came again. "Devammmm!" Like contractions during labor increase both in their intensity and frequency with time, the shriek only kept getting louder, more intense and out of hand. Feebly, I tried croaking, "Yes, I am up!" However, my vocal cords, just like me, had been abruptly woken up and their power was no match for the voice that was calling out my name. I could dig my head deeper into the pillow and say, screw you! But the (radio)active power of her voice could penetrate any lead chamber. My feeble voice was no match for these vocal cords that have been practicing Carnatic music for many decades now. There was some latent power in its timbre, it could bring back the dead to life.

Maybe she slipped on the bathroom floor and needed help. Maybe she was hanging from the pillars and could not get down. Reluctantly, I extracted myself from the comfort of the bed, my joints creaking unceremoniously, the warm and tousled comforter still luring me to spend fifteen or more minutes napping. I wondered if this voice had a snooze button. I hurriedly groped for my glasses and put them on, unwillingly crossing the narrow corridor and making my way downstairs, to the source where this baritone voice was coming from. Maybe the owner of this voice swallowed a set of Bose speakers for breakfast by mistake that morning.

"Coming! Coming!" I tried to find my voice before the call "Devammmm! Devadhi Devammm!" traumatized me again. There I find her in the kitchen, all fresh and bathed, vibhuti smeared on her forehead, slathering dosa batter on a cast-iron skillet. 

"What happened?" I asked, groggy and irritated. "Why are you bringing the roof down?"

"Nothing much," Gundamma says in her most calm, casual and charming voice. "Just checking if you are awake or still sleeping. You can go back to bed."

So she screamed her vocal cords out just to see if I am awake or asleep? I will not be able to sleep without getting nightmares for several months now.

sunshine