Month of festivals

Every year, July and August are full of Hindu festivals and as a traditional housewife, I like to celebrate all of them with enthusiasm. But , somewhere , I feel I am caught between being traditional and orthodox and also having modern views about celebrating them. On the traditional side, I like to wear my "Madisar", prepare all the items, I like the smell of agarbathis and fresh flowers and like to admire huge rangolis.

But on the modern side, I don't like the "Madi and aacharam"associated with these festivals. In my opinion, "Madi"for a traditional Brahmin family, in the olden days, was to keep away the huge number of family members to maintian cleanliness while preparing large quantities of items during the festivals and this has lost its true purpose somewhere down the line. Now, with nuclear families and small flats , these "Madi"procedures have become more of a shouting and screaming custom to keep the children away from us, scolding them not to touch us or the items prepared before the naivedyam is done. All of this , I feel, finally end up in a scene where the charm of the festival is lost and everyone is fuming, brooding and want the pooja to get over before the rahukalam and grab whatever that is prepared and get away. To add to this , the children have to rush to school and my husband to the office. Gone are the days when we had holidays for these festivals and we helped out Amma with her preparations.
Despite all of that, inviting women over for Varalaksmi Vratham, Ganesh Chathurthi celebrations in Mumbai and "seedai" of Gokulashtami are things I would not like to miss at any cost nor do I want my children to miss them.