For the black in the paintings I do not buy anything. Lamp soot collected on a piece of tin over the diya, then that soot mixed with a little gum from the neem tree, and it is ground on a flat black stone with a small round stone in the hand. That stone was my mother's. She used it for maybe forty years, and before that I think her mother's sister used it, I am not fully certain.

It is getting thin in the middle now. When I press, I can feel the dip where her hand went round and round. Some days I think I should keep it aside and buy a new one from the market in Darbhanga for the daily work, and save this one. But then what will I grind on? A stone sitting in a cloth on the shelf is not a stone any more, it is only a memory. My mother would have laughed at me for keeping it unused. She ground her kajal on it till the last year of her life and never once said this is precious, keep it safe.

My son says I should photograph it and put the photo online so people understand the work. I do not know. A photo of a stone does not tell you anything about how the arm gets tired.

The thing I am actually worried about is the dip. One day the stone will break through in the middle and then forty years of somebody's hand will just be two pieces on the floor.

Any of you who work with old family tools, kindly tell me. Do you retire them or do you keep using till the end?