Momma thinks...

I know, I know, I shouldn't be here right now, blogging in the middle of a work day. But, I promise this is gonna take just 15 minutes and then, over and out!

Today is an official 'Day of Cribbing', a day--which, incidentally, comes by way too often for my liking--when I'm allowed to rant and rave, and generally put on a don't-even-think-of-striking-up-a-conversation kind-of face and be moody all day long. No, it isn't PMS; just one of those days when the maid has gone AWOL.

But I am not taking precious minutes off work to write an anti-maid rant. In my new, 'improved' avatar, I have already learnt to take such inevitabilities in my stride.

Pic courtesy: indyeahforever.wordpress.com

This is on another tangent altogether: I was running late to pick my daughter (her school bus drop-off point is about a half-km away from my apartment) and on the way, the usual thoughts popped into my head: 'Why is it that women always have to take the brunt of domestic emergencies? Shouldn't both parents have equal responsibilities?' and blah, blah, blah... a rather needy voice in my head kept going on and on. Mind you, I don't even have serious reason to complain; Abhi is more often than not ready to pitch in with Ditu-related details.

But my mind--unruly as usual--was off on its own sweet (sweet? nah!) track! And then it struck me: don't brace yourselves or anything-- nothing earth-shattering here...

Just realised that if God (or Nature, if you prefer) chose the woman to carry babies within her, there is definitely something special about her, right? Something more than special, I think, something that is both a wonderful blessing and an overwhelming responsibility. I don't need centuries-old conditioning or unwritten rules of society to tell me to always be there for my daughter, to nurture her, protect her, help her grow into a sensible and caring human being.

And by that same count, I believe God has put something extra, something mysterious by nature, in every woman: an impulse to love that bit more; that instinct to keep your child safe no matter what the circumstances; to keep giving a little bit of yourself even when you feel like you just can't, any more; the strength to love selflessly and then let the light of your life choose a path of her own, a path which in all probability leads away from you; and a kind of patience that beats definition.

And by that count, what does a little bit of extra duty matter? 

Back to childhood

My parents are back from a month-long vacation in Pune, visiting my sister. They got here at four in the morning. I was up and had made tea for them, and was generally being woman of the house but the moment they stepped in, something changed. Perhaps it's my perspective: once my parents are here, somehow, sometimes the child in me inevitably peeps through. It starts by my automatically assuming that my Ma will take on my burdens: in this case, feeding Ditu (a laborious three-hour task divided into three acts during the day). Never mind that my parents had just got in after a 36-hour journey.

Usually, I would even hand over the kitchen as well, including preparing the menu. That, I skipped 'cos I have a maid-in-residence who had been briefed extensively the night before. (The maid is a whole other story that I will put down in another post.) 

The contractor doing my new apartment's interior work is presenting the plans today, and guess who's coming with me: my dad!! Of course , I can do it without him... And we'll probably never agree on the design anyway (I'm all for contemporary lines while he half-lives in the past). Yet, it somehow seems important that he sees it.

My mobile phone company's innovations mean that we can talk endlessly on our cell phones (closed group or some such thing) for a nominal 99 bucks a month. So we end up chatting on every little dustball spotted, Ditu's little spills and thrills, maid woes and a whole lot of 'relative' banter, which adds up to more than seven phone calls a day. And some of those calls can go on up to 20 minutes or so! Just thinking of it gives me earache... but this whole month (when their phones were on roaming), it was pure torture not calling them up the moment my maid upped and quit without a notice, when Ditu said something particularly funny and when I had 'in-law' trouble. On second thoughts, maybe I wouldn't have told them about the last even if they were here; it might be just easier for me to forget the whole thing than to erase 'how bad my daughter must have felt' ideas from their minds.

And now, though I'm running tight on an impossible deadline, I feel calm and collected. Mom hai na!

P.S. Thank you, Anna, for pushing me to post. Love u