Rainy recalls from Goa, Kurla

An intense green-ness has overrun everything here, while a sap-green lushness crowns the tops of vineyards or serves like an aura around apple trees. Pic/Rosalyn D’mello

Since I returned to Tramin after tying up loose ends in Venice, I have been longing for a sunny day. And yet, given that it is now the beginning of August, my wish has yet to be sufficiently granted. You could probably count on one hand how many blue-skied days we've had. I'd been fantasising about spending hours lying on the grass and intermittently taking a dip in the beautiful swimming pool in Tramin. There's a reasonable entrance fee of seven euros and one can spend the entire day lounging on the grassy terraces, reading, listening to music, knitting. The pool is quite massive (spread over 1300 square meters) and the water is always cool and crisp. You feel nestled in the valley with the mountains always bordering your field of vision. I remember having spent many days by the poolside last year. When we were working and didn't have the luxury to go swimming in the day, we would go to the Kalterersee, the Kaltern lake, around 7.30 pm, when entry would be free, and there was still light and we'd either swim or sit by the lake and chat with friends. It's simply been too cold and rainy to do that.

On the other hand, despite knowing the moody weather shifts are integrally connected to climate change, I have also been savouring this feeling of monsoonal weather. The last few days have felt like and even smelt like Goa in the rains and there is this intense green-ness that has overrun everything, a sap-green lushness that crowns the tops of vineyards or serves like an aura around apple trees, and generally stands out when you gaze upon the mountains. In the fountain in the main square I can smell the mossy growth at the bottom of the water. It feels so familiar and it somehow places me back home. It's an unexpected delight. When the rain gushes down, especially at night, I remember that childhood desire, that wishing that it would continue such that we wouldn't have school the next day. I loved those days when you returned home because all the teachers who came from Vasai to Kurla as well as students from more faraway parts couldn't attend. I loved that blessing of free time, leisure time, it always felt like a gift.

I have been thinking a lot about earthworms these days. I haven't actually sighted them here. When it rains what becomes most visible are slugs and vineyard snails, which are utterly fascinating to watch. I remember seeing so many earthworms in our colony in Kurla during the monsoons, and I remember being so fascinated by how unstable they were as beings, how they pushed their body forward, wriggling in order to move. I have this vivid memory of being asked to collaborate with a classmate named Wayne Gracious during one edition of the science fair. Wayne's vermicultural project proposal had been selected to represent our school at the district level science fair and the teachers thought I would make a good companion as you generally needed two people to explain the project to visitors. Wayne and I went to the graveyard during the monsoons to find worms. We needed to build a compact soil enclosure with the worms to show how they fertilised the earth through their castings, their excrement. It must have been my first close interaction with the politics of caring for soil, and nurturing the earth, and I don't think I have ever communicated to Wayne how grateful I have been that he welcomed me to be part of his project. Science was never really my strength, as a subject, but I happened to participate in so many science fairs because I had a flair for talking to people. The first time was with my then best friend, Imran, who had proposed a display on laser technology. It was his project, but he invited me to participate as his partner.

I recently came upon a brilliant text by the composer, Pauline Oliveros called, The Earthworm also sings. It's a meditation on the art and act of deep listening, and at some point forays into an exploration of how sound registers itself in the ear. In another text Oliveros has an instruction called Native in which she says, "Take a walk at night. Walk so silently that the bottom of your feet become ears." I tried to do this a few days ago with my partner, at a walking path on the outskirts of the actual Kaltern lake. We were walking on wooden boards and we tried to still our bodies such that our footsteps barely registered. Our experience of the environment suddenly changed. The insects could no longer anticipate our movement and they continued to exist unmindful of our presence. Our feet, indeed, felt like ears, like receptacles. I am still learning how to invert this trick so that my feet can signal what my body is feeling. I am still striving to be embodied, to bridge the gap between body and mind, to be a more whole, sentient being.

Deliberating on the life and times of Everywoman, Rosalyn D'Mello is a reputable art critic and the author of A Handbook For My Lover. She tweets @RosaParx

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