The Things We Make for a Day
Like every year, our festival of Vishu arrives on April 14th. When we were kids, Vishu meant two or three things: early morning firecrackers, Vishu kaineettam, and the sumptuous sadya that followed.
Late on the previous night, long after most of the family members have gone to sleep, the women of the family would still be awake assembling the Vishu kani. The brass uruli would be brought out and polished until it caught the lamplight. A kolam would be drawn, and rice, fruits, vegetables from the harvest, flowers, a mirror, a lamp, jewellery, Puranas, currencies, new cloth, and the image of Krishna would be placed with care—as if abundance itself were being composed into a still life. Before sunrise, everyone in the household would see this arrangement as their first sight of the day, a moment of bounty and beauty. By evening, however, everything would disappear.
If one thinks about it, we Indians seem remarkably comfortable pouring care into things that are meant to vanish quickly.
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Every morning across India, in lakhs of homes, someone—usually the lady of the house—bends down at the doorstep and begins an act of beauty that is transient in nature. White powder trickles through her fingers, connecting dots. Soon a geometric or floral pattern emerges, and with a touch of colour a rangoli appears—only to dissolve into smudges and footprints before the day ends. And yet, the next morning, it will be made again.
Once you begin to notice it, this instinct appears everywhere. Marigold garlands brighten our doors knowing they will wilt by night. Diyas burn briefly before surrendering to smoke. Firecrackers rise in bursts of sound and vanish within seconds. Jasmine flowers adorning the hair fade within hours. Mehendi darkens into intricate elegance precisely when its fading has already begun. Glass bangles bought at village fairs are worn with delight even though many will not last the fortnight.
Even our grandest celebrations are comfortable with impermanence. A wedding mandap rises like a palace only to vanish within days. Idols of Ganesha and Durga arrive as divine guests and leave through immersion. The idol is not destroyed; it is returned.
In a world increasingly obsessed with preservation, this instinct can seem puzzling. Modern life values permanence. We archive photographs, store documents, back up memories in clouds, and measure success by what lasts. The highest compliment we pay an object is that it will endure. Yet Indian life often appears guided by a different intuition: not permanence, but renewal. A rangoli does not need to survive because its meaning lies not in endurance but in return. Its disappearance is simply the prelude to its next appearance.
Perhaps this instinct is not merely aesthetic but philosophical. A culture shaped by the idea of cycles—of seasons returning, of karma unfolding across births, and of existence moving through rhythms of creation and dissolution—may naturally find comfort in beauty that does not insist on permanence. The rangoli, erased each evening and reborn each morning, quietly mirrors a worldview in which endings are rarely final.
Curiously, however, this comfort with impermanence exists alongside an apparently opposite instinct. The same homes that allow a rangoli to vanish without regret are filled with objects expected to last decades. Dining tables remain companions through generations. Steel utensils refuse to retire. Old sarees are reincarnated as quilts or cleaning cloths. Plastic containers migrate across purposes with remarkable resilience. Indian households, in fact, are masters at making things last.
At first glance, the two instincts seem contradictory. Why create beauty that disappears while expecting furniture to survive forty years? The answer may lie in how we treat objects and rituals differently. Objects belong to utility; rituals belong to meaning. Utility demands durability; meaning thrives on renewal. A dining table must endure because it serves daily life, while a rangoli must disappear because its beauty lies in the act of making it again.
Modern consumer culture, interestingly, often reverses this logic. Today we increasingly live with temporary objects—fast fashion, disposable furniture, gadgets designed for obsolescence—while simultaneously trying to preserve every memory forever through digital archives. Traditional Indian life did the opposite. Objects were built to endure; beauty was made to return.
Perhaps that is why our everyday culture feels less like accumulation and more like rehearsal. Festivals return each year with familiar lights, smells, sweets, and songs—not because we lack novelty, but because repetition itself offers reassurance.
In that sense, the rangoli at the doorstep may be one of the most modest expressions of a larger cultural intuition: not everything meaningful needs to last. Some things derive their value precisely from the fact that they must be made again. By tomorrow morning, the doorstep will be empty once more, and somewhere, before the day gathers speed, someone will bend down again and begin another small act of faith in return. Perhaps, for us, the act matters more than the artifact.
Wish you, a Happy Vishu.
Even our grandest celebrations are comfortable with impermanence. A wedding mandap rises like a palace only to vanish within days. Idols of Ganesha and Durga arrive as divine guests and leave through immersion. The idol is not destroyed; it is returned.
In a world increasingly obsessed with preservation, this instinct can seem puzzling. Modern life values permanence. We archive photographs, store documents, back up memories in clouds, and measure success by what lasts. The highest compliment we pay an object is that it will endure. Yet Indian life often appears guided by a different intuition: not permanence, but renewal. A rangoli does not need to survive because its meaning lies not in endurance but in return. Its disappearance is simply the prelude to its next appearance.
Perhaps this instinct is not merely aesthetic but philosophical. A culture shaped by the idea of cycles—of seasons returning, of karma unfolding across births, and of existence moving through rhythms of creation and dissolution—may naturally find comfort in beauty that does not insist on permanence. The rangoli, erased each evening and reborn each morning, quietly mirrors a worldview in which endings are rarely final.
Curiously, however, this comfort with impermanence exists alongside an apparently opposite instinct. The same homes that allow a rangoli to vanish without regret are filled with objects expected to last decades. Dining tables remain companions through generations. Steel utensils refuse to retire. Old sarees are reincarnated as quilts or cleaning cloths. Plastic containers migrate across purposes with remarkable resilience. Indian households, in fact, are masters at making things last.
At first glance, the two instincts seem contradictory. Why create beauty that disappears while expecting furniture to survive forty years? The answer may lie in how we treat objects and rituals differently. Objects belong to utility; rituals belong to meaning. Utility demands durability; meaning thrives on renewal. A dining table must endure because it serves daily life, while a rangoli must disappear because its beauty lies in the act of making it again.
Modern consumer culture, interestingly, often reverses this logic. Today we increasingly live with temporary objects—fast fashion, disposable furniture, gadgets designed for obsolescence—while simultaneously trying to preserve every memory forever through digital archives. Traditional Indian life did the opposite. Objects were built to endure; beauty was made to return.
Perhaps that is why our everyday culture feels less like accumulation and more like rehearsal. Festivals return each year with familiar lights, smells, sweets, and songs—not because we lack novelty, but because repetition itself offers reassurance.
In that sense, the rangoli at the doorstep may be one of the most modest expressions of a larger cultural intuition: not everything meaningful needs to last. Some things derive their value precisely from the fact that they must be made again. By tomorrow morning, the doorstep will be empty once more, and somewhere, before the day gathers speed, someone will bend down again and begin another small act of faith in return. Perhaps, for us, the act matters more than the artifact.
Wish you, a Happy Vishu.
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