Master Stroke!

A drawing by my elder one on the occasion of "Love Birds" organised by South Central cultural  Zone in Nagpur.

(Thought I'll do a writeup, but I guess some pictures say it all!)

The blue butterfly

Story telling sessions with my children are one of my favorite ways of spending quality time together. It often gives me an insight into not only how creative and imaginative kids can be but also can convey subtle messages without being preachy. During one such session, it was my elder one’s turn to narrate a story.  My younger one and I listened with rapt attention to his tale. I must confess, it was so captivating, that it transported me to my own childhood! I will narrate it as he did without making any changes to his original story. I hope I do justice to his tale.

In a beautiful jungle there was a school. A lion was the teacher in the school and he had three students, a giraffe, an elephant, and a peacock. One day the lion decided that he would hold a fancy dress competition and the winner would get a prize and lots of gifts. As the students were walking back home, the giraffe and the peacock started arguing.

“I am the best, look at all the beautiful brown mosaic on my yellow body. I do not even have to make an effort to dress up”, said the giraffe.

“Have you seen how beautiful are my feathers? It has to only rain, and they fan out into the most amazing colours you would have ever seen. I am the best”, argued the peacock.

The elephant who was listening felt very sad. He had a grey body which was very wrinkly, nothing to be very proud of. He was wondering if he should go to school the next day or stay at home. The elephant reached home and sat under his big banyan tree with tears in his eyes.

“Oh god, why didn’t you make me beautiful like my friends?” he cried.

Just then his friend, a little blue butterfly came and sat on his trunk.

“Why are you sad, my friend?” she asked.

The elephant told her the whole story.

“But I think you are the best. Nobody can work as hard as you or lift heavy loads. Nobody has a memory like you. Don’t be sad.” She tried to cheer him up.

“I don’t want to go to school tomorrow. My friends will make fun of me”, he said.

“I think participating is more important than winning. So you should go to school”, she told him.

The next day the elephant walked to school with a heavy heart. As he reached school, he saw lots of other animals from different schools who had come to participate in the competition. He felt even more upset. There were so many beautifully dressed animals.

“They must be laughing at me,” he thought as he saw everybody stare at him as he walked up on the stage. He wanted to run home before the results were announced.

As the competition ended, the lion announced the results.

“And the first prize goes to Master. Elephant.”

There was a huge round of clapping and the elephant was overjoyed.

“We have never seen such an innovative dress, elephant,” the lion said, “here’s your trophy.”

As the elephant collected his trophy, his eyes fell on a mirror near the stage. He looked blue! How did his colour change from grey to blue? He looked really beautiful. Did someone apply paint on him? Suddenly he realized his body was completely covered by thousands of blue butterflies that made him look so pretty. His friend, the little blue butterfly had gotten all her friends to sit on the elephant and cover him completely. Such a sweet gesture it was! He was glad she was his friend.

                                                          *************

image coutesy: google

Lease of life...?

“Hello there, blue kurta!”

Shivering with fear, Rashmi wondered who was calling out to her. She took a deep breath and turned around. ‘Here comes the moment I have been dreading ever since I joined college’, she thought.

“First year?” he asked.

‘Don’t show him you are scared. Be brave Rashmi,’ she told herself, ‘anyway ragging is banned on the campus, if he acts too smart, just complain to the principal.’ Mustering courage she let out a meek “Yes, first year.”

“Great! I am in first year too! The name’s Agrawal, Rohit Agrawal,” he smiled, making a James Bond like pose. “And yours?”

“Patala Bhairavi!” she made a face and walked away.

“Hello Bhairavi, which branch? I am in electronics.”

She walked away without answering.

He was pleasantly surprised to see her in his class, and sat down beside her. She looked away. She wanted to stay away from any of these Romeo type of guys.

“Bhairavi, which school did you pass out from?”

“Why don’t you find someone else for your banter? I am not interested.”

“Whoa, that’s rude, I didn’t ask to date you, I was just trying to make friends” he said taken aback.

“Well, find someone else, in that case.”

He got up and walked away. Throughout the day she found him staring at her and looking away when she stared back. She made a couple of girl friends and was walking towards the canteen with them after college, when he approached her again.

“Bhairavi, could I have a minute.”

‘Oh no, not again’, she muttered under her breath.

“I wanted to tell you that you look like a replica of my mom, you have her green eyes, her brown silky hair, her fair skin, and I can’t help wondering how alike you both look.”

“And I wanted to tell you Mr. James Bond, that this is the cheekiest line I’ve ever heard. Why can’t you keep out of my bounds?”

‘What is with this girl? She thinks she is some Cleopatra or what?’

He watched as she stormed out of the canteen and walked into a swanky car waiting for her at the college gate.

‘Spoilt brat’, he said aloud, sure that she couldn’t hear him.

He still couldn’t stop wondering how she looked so much like his mom. He took a bus home and rushed to tell his mom about her.

“So mom, tell me what do you think.”

“I have heard there can be seven look-alikes for each person, so why not? For all you know, she might be one of them.”

 “I hope we didn’t lose any child when she was young…or..” he trailed off. He wanted to ask her if she ever had a daughter that she had given up at birth, but kept mum.

As if she had read his mind, she reacted, “Neither that nor did we ever give up any child for adoption. Now run off and let me work in peace.”

But he couldn’t take his mind off that girl.

                                            
                                                                        ******

Rashmi couldn’t stop thinking about the strange boy either. She herself had been thinking that he looked a lot like her dad. The curly black hair, the moustache, the deep black eyes, yes he did resemble her dad. She had always thought herself to be a misfit in her house. She didn’t look like her parents and didn’t like the rich lifestyle, the non-vegetarian food or the over-the-top way of showing emotions. They were social butterflies and had a lot of friends.

On the other hand she had been shy, conservative and liked to be with herself. She had preferred vegetarian food and had kept a low profile. Nevertheless she loved her parents and they loved her more than anything else in the world.

                                                            *******

It was midnight and everyone was asleep. Rohit’s mom sneaked off to the store room and climbed the dusty attic with the help of a wobbly wooden ladder. She used her torch to find an old rusty trunk case secured with a lock. She opened it with a key that she had kept hidden all these years. She searched till she found what she had been looking for.  

A faded picture of a bonny baby girl, with beautiful green eyes just like her. She wiped the dust off the picture and kissed it softly.

Her baby.

The baby she had secretly swapped with an innocent baby boy on the next bed. His mother had just delivered and was still unconscious. None of her relatives were around. Her husband had thrust a wad of 100 rupee notes into the hands of a nurse and swapped the babies. If he had not done that, her baby would not have been alive today. She had already had two daughters and a third girl in the family would not have been welcome. Her in-laws had already made that clear to her. She had been lucky enough to get a baby boy without raising any suspicions. No one knew of the swap except the both of them and they intended to keep it that way. Forever.  She had given her daughter a new lease of life or had she? Life had a strange way of coming a full circle.

                                                              ******

(Image: courtesy google)

Letting go!

It is that time of my life when I am learning yet another lesson in letting go. I wonder how my little one has grown up so soon! It feels just like yesterday when he had taken his first baby steps. He had faltered and fallen and stood up with determination again. I had beamed with pride and fussed over him at his effort! He had treated me to umpteen such moments, and had given me ample opportunity to marvel at his little efforts; smiling, rolling over, crawling, walking, teething, blabbering, incoherent baby talk and many more. All the while he had been hinting how he was quietly growing up, but none of these prepared me for his next major step. Going To School!

From the day we completed his admission formalities (which was 6 months in ago, yes, 6 months! Haven’t admission procedures become ridiculous? ) I have been fretting and complaining that his age is not quite right, he is too young to go to school and maybe we should have waited one year more. But the school authorities and hubby dearest had managed to convince me how the kid’s age was ideal and how he would be too old for Pre-KG next year.

Since then I have been religiously coaching my son about every aspect of school, the fun he will have there, the friends he will make, the things he will learn, the new things we will buy for him and so on and so forth! My little one has never left me for a minute and I was very worried whether he would leave me and go to school. Hubby dearest has looked on with amusement at my non- stop chatter about his schooling and has more than once remarked that he wondered if I was preparing the child or myself for the separation! Maybe he was partly or even wholly right! I was perhaps preparing myself for the separation. Because as much as it was true that he had never left me for a minute, it was true the other way round too.

As we went through every step of the preparation, buying of new uniforms, shoes, bag, books, etc, my heart grew restless with worrying continually over him. And as for the man of the hour, my little hero, he would nod his head and say “No!” when anyone asked him if he would go to school. Fears multiplied manifold, I could not sleep the whole week before school opened for pre-KG!

My dad recounted how defiant I had been going to school initially, actually for 5 whole months and had kicked the life out of the ayah with my shiny black shoes, when my dad passed me on to her at the school gates! Brace yourself, he warned me.

The D-day finally arrived and I thought my little one looked rather cute in his new school uniform and shoes. He was all smiles posing for the camera and we tried to capture his first steps in school. But the minute we handed him over to his teacher he was screaming his lungs out trying to break free. My heart went out to the little child, who was stretching his little arms out and calling out to me. I could have cried myself, had hubby dearest not taken me away from the place. We were told to collect him back in an hour’s time and to me that hour seemed like eternity!

I had been continually worrying how he would be faring and hubby dearest got sick of my incessant chatter.

‘For God’s sake, calm down, your child is not the first one to go to school and we have not left him in the jungle with a bunch of lions, so stop worrying, he will be fine’, he said, his voice soaked in sarcasm.

But a mother’s heart does not understand that, does it? And it continues to worry, about the well-being of her child, knowing at all times, that she cannot hold her child with herself forever. Neither in her womb nor at home. He will eventually break free from her. And she will have to let go.


Image: courtesy google

My master's voice...

“Tea?” I croaked.

Hubby dearest looked at me like I had just landed from Mars and he was hearing an alien speak.

“See, that’s what happens when you don’t know when to stop.”

He was obviously taking a pot shot at last night’s ‘mehfil-e-khas’ at a friend’s house. We had gathered at Anil’s house for a weekend night out and Anil brought out his brand new karaoke system and plugged it all together. After we had all oooh’d , and aaah’d at the piece, we got together for the mike testing and singing. Friends took turns singing and the mike finally landed in my hands. I flipped through the list of songs as if I was a pro.

 It will be imperative here, to tell you that singing is my passion, but unfortunately my vocal cords went on strike when I was born and never returned. All they left behind was their poor cousin who at best makes me sound like I’ve swallowed a frog! Nevertheless, I saw a long listing of Kishore Kumar’s songs and they brought an instant rapture, a feeling I cannot describe! I picked up the mike and cleared my voice, all set to give the Indian idols a run for their money. The lyrics ran amok on the TV screen and I broke into a full throttled performance as if it was my last day on earth! The song ended and I was so mighty pleased with myself that I couldn’t bring myself to part with the mike.

‘Can I sing just one more song’, I pleaded.

‘Of course go ahead’, they chorused.

They must have probably kicked themselves right after they said those four beautiful words! Because, right away I got to demonstrating my non- existent singing skills, belting out one number after another!

I must confess I am a self-proclaimed, obsessive fan of Kishore da. I have listened to his songs umpteen times .I listen to him every waking hour, irrespective of whether I am cooking, cleaning, eating, reading, blah blah. I sing along, not just the lyrics but the music too! From the first note to the last...so much that with the first note of music I know which song it is! When I hear the master sing, my mind just wafts to him like the smoke from an incense stick. And stays there. His voice makes me go weak in my knees. That is the effect his music holds over me. Mesmerizing and enchanting! He transports me to different world where there is just me and his voice (and in the background swaying trees and gentle breeze, fragrant flowers and gurgling streams, chirping birds and dancing butterflies!) Yes, magical is the word!

So how could I just let go of the opportunuity to sing his songs here? 

As for the others, they had given up all hopes of karaoke-ing and had resigned themselves to hear me croak.

I went on and on till I could go on no more. It was almost three in the morning and I was sounding like I had swallowed a hundred frogs! But I must confess, I had thoroughly enjoyed myself! My poor friends looked like the pale, flat green leaves which serve as landing pads for frogs and hubby dearest looked plain embarrassed!

“Let’s go home and get a power nap”, said hubby dearest with a hint of sarcasm in his voice.

 “Sooo..ee….Di’ I  o’ ova’bod’?”  

“Well you did go overboard, but this wasn’t the first time,eh? Remember the last time at the office party?”

 I smiled sheepishly. Of course I did remember. I had sung ‘Pal pal dil ke paas’ and the team broke into a thunderous applause after I finished the first stanza. Motivated, I sang the entire song! There were claps at the end of each stanza and I wondered why the claps died down by the time I finished. Hubby dearest told me later that the first applause itself was meant for me to stop.....! stop singing!

“ ‘e mays ‘e ‘o ow o’ co’to’ ”  I tried reasoning, meaning ‘he makes me go out of control’, the “he”  referring to Kishore da.

“Poor guy must be turning in his grave!” he smirked, “May he rest in peace.”