If ever there was a prayer for these Covid times, it would be this,

“May all our sinks be ever filled with dirty dishes.”

For it meant a belly full of food. It means that we aren’t migrant workers, the poorest of the poor, walking hundreds of kilometres to our village, in the blazing sun, with our meagre possessions on our heads.

“May all our sinks be ever filled with dirty dishes” 

For it meant that our 12-year-old daughter was still alive and well, and sleeping through her online classes, in spite of the cold coffee you whipped up and now you have to wash the mixie, such a pain.

“May all our sinks be ever filled dirty dishes.” 

For it meant that we aren’t domestic workers, taxi drivers, rag pickers, craftspeople, weavers, potters, artisans. Proud people who never had much, but still managed to dream of a better future for their children, of sending them to English schools. Now they have to wait for the kind people to provide them with handouts, rations, khichdi, always khichdi.

“May all our sinks be ever filled with dirty dishes.”

For it meant that we weren’t doctors, nurses, support staff staring at death every day, scrounging for PPEs, not going home lest we infect our family, wondering if it would be us next in line. Knowing that this would not end when lockdown did.

“May all our sinks be ever filled with dirty dishes.”

For it meant that you who were a whistle-blower warning your community about a new and deadly virus, your voice was suppressed first by the powers that be, then by death.

*May all our sinks be ever filled with dirty dishes.”

May it teach us gratitude to the farmer, to the migrant worker, to our house help, to the teachers, doctors, frontline workers. To the Humans of Essential Services.

“May all our sinks be ever filled with dirty dishes.”

It means we are alive.