school friend once more

priti just called me out of the blue one of these past sundays and told me, "prateeksha, this is priti." it confused me for a second for everyone calls me preeti as well. She was in the vicinity and wanted to know if she could come...but of course, i was happy for the suddenness( though not ready to serve them lunch incase i had to, so quickly!!!) anyhow, she would come for lunch another time or possibly to stay over also. so she said. so when she came...these were the new leaves of her life- her family with husband, Mrinal who works in NABARD (posted in Bhopal) and two children- Manal and Sufi. In this picture, Manal is missing but another nephew is there-Sai. Meanwhile, we were trying that the children would put their heads between the bars like the dogs and have a joint picture like that. I was a little scared for the safety of the children of course, that their heads should not get struck, but I think the parents had a better estimate than me since I was at a lower level. We had a lot of fun that afternoon, with the children happy with the dogs and we adults happy to meet after such a long time and exchange so many words between us.

second picture is taken on the front lawn. The spring flowers were still fading behind them - the sunenaria and the petunias, in the flower beds behind.