New Delhi, Feb. 28 -- For years and years, I have heard the phrase "it takes a village". I knew former US secretary of state Hillary Clinton had popularised the line when she named her book after the proverb, in the context of raising children. For most of those years that I heard the proverb, I had no children and I lived in a metaphorical village where all my friends knew my business and I knew theirs. When I did have children, the earliest years were a combination of well-paid nannies, covid-induced isolation and a covid-induced move close to my family. During the pandemic, my immediate family and I saw each other more often than we had in my teens. A good indication of how things went in those years was my father remarking, "Your neig...