Solitary Bliss: How I willed myself to get better

“To keep my mind preoccupied, I set myself a schedule, which was to appreciate and look at the paintings one by one, to recollect how they came to belong in my collection.”

As the first wave of the pandemic appeared to subside, I began travelling again, picking up from exactly where I left. I was somewhat relieved that pending projects could now be completed. Around us, the world was opening up after months of silence and to my joy, at Tollygunge Club, Kolkata, the marquees were up as usual on the lawns, crowded with smiling club-goers. In Hyderabad, I was able to visit the glorious Qutub Shahi Tombs one morning learning about the magnificent complex from the conservationist Ratish Nanda. At last, life was returning to normal, we thought, already planning our summer holiday to London.

Having made, by then, several trips across the country, we were getting our confidence back, because after all, we had travelled without any consequences so far, but life’s ironies are many and I caught the virus in April when I was back at home in our condominium. Too late we learnt that cases were surging in Haryana and in Gurgaon the multi-storied housing complexes were now declared areas with the maximum cases of Covid.

Initially, it was with a sense of shock and disbelief that the news registered, I had almost convinced myself, that all was right with our world and the pandemic was history, but sadly that did not appear to be the case anymore. In the past months we had witnessed with dismay the reckless gatherings at religious sites and the massive political rallies which seemed to willfully ignore warnings of health experts as they went ahead with their plans; now the second wave had struck and it was a tsunami far more dangerous than the earlier one, felling many more victims in its wake.

Despite the fact that I had taken both the preventive shots of vaccination, I found myself to be Covid positive and had to now take every care not to spread it further. Fortunately, I had access to excellent doctors whom I consulted as soon as the symptoms made themselves known, and following their recommendation that I stay in home isolation, during the fortnight, I retreated to my room to isolate. And that was how I battled the infection, obeying the doctor’s advice but also practicing pranayama while willing myself to get better.

Ravi, my husband, had taken charge of our household and I was given all my meals and medication on time  - everything left on a table outside the door. Later, I came to know that kind friends and our wonderful neighbours sent us meals and everything else we needed regularly, at our doorstep, since the family was also in quarantine.

In my Isolation Room, in the meanwhile, I was an obedient patient, trying not to lose hope even when news filtered in about friends and family members elsewhere getting infected, some even sadly, losing their battle with Covid in the end. Looking back, I ask myself if there was a mantra that kept one positive throughout this difficult period? Well, there was, actually and that was to stay positive, I also learnt to be patient and to stay calm.

We are so used to having our families around us in times of any crisis especially in India that to be sequestered and completely alone could be terribly daunting. But once I was alone in my room, I decided to fill my days with music and positive energy. Most of all, to be deeply thankful for all the things I had surrounding me in my Isolation Room. For instance, the books I had yet to read, the beautiful art on my walls and beyond the room, the garden the verandah overlooked with its trees and flowering shrubs. To keep my mind preoccupied, I set myself a schedule, which was to appreciate and look at the paintings one by one, to recollect how they came to belong in my collection. This soon became a fascinating memory game, revisiting for instance, the veteran artist K G Subramanyan in Santiniketan, when I acquired the glass painting from him in 1997 or later my interaction with Victor Banerjee when I got the little Jamini Roy seascape, or even later, the visit to Jaipur, to Himmat Shah’s studio and my purchase of the exquisite terracotta sculpture that remains my most favourite work till date. Each of the art works clamored to tell me their stories and I finally had all the time to listen. My study desk yielded its own treasures that included a hand-written script by Satyajit Ray amidst other old letters and photo albums I had never had the time to look at earlier. Suddenly, there was so much to do. Since long conversations on the phone was not possible as they left me a bit winded, I started writing about my days in The Isolation Room in brief posts where I shared my many little discoveries with friends, giving them a sense of how I was passing my days isolating, to reassure them that I was doing alright.

Maybe, it was this positive spirit that actually hastened the recovery period, the fact that I awoke feeling I had a schedule to work on no matter how exhausted I felt at times. There were, of course, many difficult moments coping with the infection, the most debilitating being the bouts of breathlessness, headaches to name a few. But I’m glad that I didn’t allow the darkness to seep in. Since I was trying to keep my spirits up, my family too kept their faith that we would fight this scourge together and so we did. I deeply missed being with everyone but there was no other way to deal with the situation, I was not about to jeopardize anyone else’s health because I craved company and so we took each day as it dawned till my quarantine period was finally over.

When I was a little girl and very ill, I remember my mother, busy with housework, would appear once in a way and place her cool palm on my forehead. Inexplicably, then, I would suddenly begin to feel better! She kept a table by my bedside piled with books, a coin purse, a bottle of Eau de Cologne and it was reassuring to reach out for some little object, when I felt a little bored or sad at my predicament. So many decades later, I realized that quite by chance I had arranged my bedside table with books and little knick-knacks as if unconsciously recreating a comfort zone for myself that my mother had once created for me.

That evening, as I stood on my little verandah, lost in thought, perhaps even missing Ma a bit, the unmistakable scent of my favourite flowers wafted up to me. Was it my imagination? Looking down, I saw the bushes below were radiant with fragrant gardenia blossoms. Realization struck then, that I was able to smell again. My days in the Isolation Room were over, I was healed.