What is your I'm-best-at thing?

I firmly believe that everyone has one little thing that they do better than almost anyone else. It might be playing the piano. Or folding towels. It can be anything, said She of Here In Franklin's Table

She's left handed, and at present, has my favourite flower, Hydrangea, as the header of her other, non food blog, Here in Franklin. Her thing: she makes the best guacamole.

This made me wonder about my thing. I couldn't come up with one immediately, so I tucked it away in my noodle brain, knowing it'll come back.

Earlier I had toyed with, best Benny The Ball voice over (the yeaaaa, TC) that uses to tickle my brother so much when we were little and addicted to TOP CAT.

Cute, sad, sulky Benny

But now that we're old, responsible adults, I need a smarter thing. I can't cook. I don't play the piano. I date someone who does. But asking to be the best dater of someone who plays the piano is a bit much.

Towels no. Gift wrapping, maybe.

I used to love ribbons (still do) and wrapping paper (still do) and jute strings (still do) and often snip a sprig of something growing in flower pots from my mother's garden when she had her back to me. All for the aesthetic cause. I'd feel important that in my house, among a full 4 people, I was best at wrapping presents.

I would make a ceremony out of it. When on a deadline, my mother would yell for me to hurry up and wrap this up nicely. So when my parents would be getting dressed for a party, I'd be handed some the this that they would then gift to someone for a housewarming party, or a cocktail or whatever the occasion.

I hated it when the this was bottles. Leaves nothing to the imagination, and wrapping it to look like a toffee is not fun after the first 8 times.

My gift wrapping phase lasted a long time, maybe 12 years. I am now lazy and there are gift bags, and I've become better at outsourcing that at the gift thing. But sometimes I like to lay it on, the scissors, the scotch tape, the nice little cards. It's an art. And maybe I want to get back at being best at it.

Special mention for, now that I think of it, my subconscious inspiration: When I was in class one or two, and living in a hill station with a home in a set of flats called Nilambar, with my brother in class three or four, and my parents in their late thirties, I had my 6th or 7th birthday party on September 01, say 1991.

Now as with what usually happens, the kiddies come at 5 pm, and then family friends with maybe older kiddies, troop in by 7 or later. One such family, with their older kids got me a last minute present -- Little Chick Chick -- the baby book in which the chick goes to Madrid. I was a little old to be reading twisty fair tales, but that present was the most innovatively wrapped book, I had seen. In newspaper, with jute string, and two big poinsettias attached on top. They said sorry we ran out of wrapping paper, but I didn't mind at all. Thus began to churn the wheels of ecologically savvy gift wrapping ideas in my head.

Glorious flowering Christmas poinsettia!

It's for little things like queen of ecological gift wrapping that I was an early starter. The typical stuff like boys and raised hem lines -- oh, muuuuch later.

But anyway, yesterday, while weaving through traffic, and chasing a colleague on the awful choked, potholed, undergoing metro construction roads of south Delhi, I found another thing, a less, little-girl-in-pink-frock-thing. I'm a trailer, a chaser, a non-shaker off. I'll follow you through bad roads and fat cops and 80 degree turns. I persist, like fungus. And so far, this is what I'm best at -- following you very very closely in traffic like a bird who has yet to learn how to fly so just sort of rides the trail of the guy in front. Makes no sense, yes, but that's my strength -- trailing you on the roads. Like a bird, like I said. Little chick chick is me.

For now I am going to ignore the voice in my head that's blowing raspberries at me and calling me things like pathetic loser, thank you very much. But if you have a better little-strength, I'd be happy to know of it. You can't say guacamole. You can't say towels. And I just took gift wrapping and leech-like behaviour on roads. Your turn.