<b>Kishore Singh:</b> Why aunts are a blessed lot

I'm fond of my family, don't let anyone tell you otherwise, but I have to wonder how my aunt managed without her daily tipple on a recent yatra to Mansarovar. "Dear, blessed soul," said my sister, peering at pictures of her pilgrimage group at Mt Kailash looking like they'd all stepped out of a detox centre. You can fault me on various counts but not when it comes to spotting a red herring. "She's holding a coffee mug in every picture," I pointed out, "when no one else in the group has any." "So," asked my sister. "Ergo," I smirked, "she's fortifying herself with a beverage that I can bet my tainted soul isn't tea, or coffee" - adding for good measure - "or soup."
 

I have so many aunts, the family legend goes, you can't step out for fear of tripping over one. And when they aren't going about their business, they're likely to be poking around yours. So it was with relief that we saw the first one, then another, and then the whole shibboleth morph into pilgrims. If one was in Bengaluru at Sri Sri's retreat, another was in Haridwar spending a suspicious amount of time at the spa instead of joining the aarti on the banks of the Ganga. They'd turn up for spiritual congregations but find themselves unable to attend because of a sudden twinge in the toe - though never the conscience for pulling wool over the family's eyes. They'd shop, and eat (and drink), and gossip with friends, and when their paths crossed, they exchanged notes - and I can bet anything it wasn't about pilgrimages.

While my aunts have been doing themselves well, I can't say the same for the rest of the clan who are a mob on social media groups. I'm occasionally roped in without permission, to find myself bombarded morning, noon and night with updates, jokes, forwards and annoying reunion reminders, a succession of pings announcing their lack of suitable employment during the course of the day. Every once in a while they target my calibrated silence, insisting on an urgent response. My wife, who recently deleted her family from her social groups, is now taking an inordinate interest in mine, weighing in with her view on every clan conversation. As for me, I'm appalled at everyone's slack approach to grammar, but my wife tells me it's rude to correct spellings on a social platform -even though no one thought to check before making me part of the group.

I don't know why people care so much about finding forgotten relatives, or friends, in cyberspace - you wouldn't have "lost" them in the first place if you'd cared sufficiently to have them around in real life. As a result, I find myself targeted by every bore and charlatan in the clan, some asking for a little something to tide them over till the Seventh Pay Commission reparations come in, others bombarding you with useless information about their children's "achievements", still others asking you to swear loyalty by Modi, your great-grandfather, the holy cow, while urging you to meet for a cousin's significant birthday where the full fury of having failed to respond to Sweety's record percentage in the board exams, Bittoo's engagement, Krispy's first foreign trip, or a curmudgeonly relative's welcome passing away will be visited upon in person with a fury that makes trolling on WhatsApp groups seem like child's play. I think I'll join the blessed among my aunts for a fortifying cup of, ahem, tea….