What's in a name?

Sehar keeps on coming with funny notions. Like the other day she asked us why we named her Sehar. Then she asked what was her name before she was born? Was she nobody?  And before we could say anything she wanted to change her name to "Sparkles". Funny, eh? 

For most of us, our children's names are stories stolen from moments spent discussing probabilities. Stories of those earnest aunt's suggestion, her stare at the bump, her own desi ultrasound. "Its going to be a boy/girl", hail the oracle. Or perhaps a distant well-meaning friend who called with her list of suggestion. Grandparents' musings on the dining table and the हमारे ज़माने में  (in our times)... And those endless hours surfing the internet, a book read or a song heard. Stories in motion.... 

So that day as we sat in the balcony, the radio station replayed our story for us. It was perhaps an evening in July 2006, MG road, Gurgaon. We were headed to Delhi in our little Alto. The song was "Pal pal pal har pal" and the moment, "Raat kate na kabhi ho Sehar". And on that hot day of July, 2011, Sehar's ears were glued to the i-pad waiting for her name to be sung, The story unfolding in slow rhythms. She smiled and hugged me tightly. 

And as if on a whim, I told her she kicked me in the tummy when we named her "Sehar". Sehar's joy knew no bounds. "Mumma, Sehar is my favorite name in the whole wide world", and the smile grew wider.

Yes, some stories are true; but the more important ones are the ones created to keep them alive, forever.........

Ugly and Beautiful

So here I was trying to understand from my child what Ugly and beautiful is. It all happened when we were reading this fairly famous story called The Ugly duckling. Honestly, that story should be banned and parents and teachers should remove it from their reading lists. 

So coming to our discussion. It was way past our bedtime, for it was our story marathon day.  I read the title of the book aloud, "The Ugly Duckling". My curious George "Sehar" asked me what "Ugly" was. Her riveting big eyes looking straight into mine. For the lack of a befitting response, a response that reflected my understanding, I answered, something that's not beautiful. Sehar was at her simplest self, her eyes unblinking and her mind racing - " Like sometimes you are not beautiful when you are angry and your face is like this". She seemed to mirror what perhaps must be my concocted face when I am mad at her. It indeed was ugly, for the emotion must have found a way out of my heart into my face. And that's when I understood, beauty as the society understands today is a part of a big social construct. People are not beautiful or ugly; emotions and intentions are. 

And what better way to understand it but from your own child.  To any child her mom is the most beautiful thing in the world. For mothers in their whole being carry an emotion called Love and its the emotion that your child feels and nothing beyond. Children have an amazing tendency to step into the unknown realm of your subconscious, for their whole being is not charred by experience. What matters to them is the heart and the heart is where they belong. 

So that beautiful night when Sehar told me, Mom you are very beautiful but sometimes you get ugly when you are angry, the point came home. I hope it stays like this for her, forever.

Kia

So here I was sitting cross-legged with the 4-10 years old, ready to test for promotion board. My embarassed 33 years notwithstanding, I put up a smile and waited patiently for my turn. For today was not about me, it was about us and about you. 

It all began about three months back when I took Sehar to the karate class. She loved it the very first day. And as if on a whim, I thought of joining the adult class as well. So here we were sharing a dojo and as I saw Sehar's little bows to the dojo every time she entered and left her class, I saw myself bowing to the spirit in her. Sehar almost always finished her classes with hugs and "Mom, did you see how I did that?, Mom, did you see my cute push-up?, Mom, did you see my kick?" Thresholds were broken and achievements were small but nevertheless, they were always celebrated with a hug or a kiss. The dojo brought the best in both of us and to me made a better person out of both of us. Here we were in that little space, ready to throw away all our prejudices and ready to take on "ourselves" and the "limits we put on us".

The dojo's transcendence lies in its amazing ability to cross over to any place you want it to be. Soon our little drawing room turned into a dojo where the sounds of 1 Sir and 2 sir resonated in the air. As we practiced together and did high fives in the air and cheered and taught each other, we were two friends unabated by the differences in our generation or our age.

And between 5'o and 9o' classes and drives to and from the martial arts school, quick dinners, bike rides and play dates we completed our 3 months and here we were testing for our yellow belts sitting together, she in the front and I, the last in the row (being the oldest in the class) .

A quote from Mac dojo Karateka resonated in my mind - "Kia is a meeting of the spirits. To me, this implies a focusing of energy or simultaneously focusing the mind and body for one purpose". And as we ended our session with the board breaking  and a loud "Kia", we were officially one in spirit, body and mind in that moment and our distance was only a perception of space and time.

The magic called Day and Night....

The day drew to a close and the sun bid adieu to make way for its sparkly half. The sounds changed as the night dwellers claimed their space around the camp. Sehar was obviously upset. The open surroundings of the camp was her abode, a place where she belonged.

We had dinner by the camp fire and for the lack of nothing worse to do (like watching TV :) ), we decided to gaze at the stars..The night is a beautiful thing in the hills. The clear sky has million of stars sparkling with joy and that's where our magical story began. 

There in the sky is a magical pink fairy bringing the stars to her twirling black sequin sparkly dress. She loves sparkly dresses much like Sehar and is pink. I bet in that moment Sehar imagined herself to be the pink fairy.  As she dances, the dress twirls around to surround us. A smiley face appears in the crescent moon and brings smiles to every kid in the "whole wide world". The pink fairy dances the whole night, till its time for the blue fairy to take the moon and the red fairy to bring the sun. Division of labor, so we thought :) The sunny girl pokes everyone with its pointies (the sun rays :) ) and wakes everyone up. 


We twirled our way to the tent dancing to the tacit music of night. Hearts in motion and the mind dancing, our bodies slept through the night.

The first ray of light poured through the tent's sun roof. It was as if someone nudged us and brought us outside to witness the splendor of day break. If magic had filled the dark sequin dress with sparkles, the day was a beautiful wonder filled with colors. The resplendent red filled the sky as if the artist's palette had no more color left. As the red gave way to the orange and the yellows the day brought its sounds with it. Birds tweeting, cows mooing, the world seemed to have changed as life claimed its space. Sehar jumped and chased a bird and we sipped the tea and just marveled at the magic called day and night.

Seeds can really make you tall

A resplendent spring along with a chirpy background is a potent combination for self-discovery. Leaves were breaking through branches, adding life and character to the emerging spring... Life broke through the tiny mounds on the branches and continued to express itself in the blossoming flowers, in the ducks splattering in water, in the cardinals adding music, in sparrows doing their air-shows - it was a wondeful day to enjoy life as is.. After months of spending life indoors, Sehar was loving her new found freedom. It was as if everything around her was talking to her and expressing itself through her when she asked THE QUESTION - "Mumma, why are trees so tall and we are so small?"

 

"They are tall because nature made them that way", I smiled. So much for being at the realm of self-discovery.

 

"No Mumma, trees are tall because they are made of seeds. Seeds can really really really make you tall. We are not made of seeds, so we are not tall." Sehar refuted my claims as she answered.

 

Yes, I was at a realm of self discovery for, for once I agreed partly with what she said. We are also made of seeds, albeit a different kind. We are made of seeds of love, of hate, of joy and seeds of sorrow. Some seeds grow taller to make us wonderful beings while others consume us to define our self. Much like nature, we feed them and while some grow up to make tall beautiful trees, some become large as egos crushing our entities. Some are happy trees and some become plagued with sorrow and wilt with time. 

The day was drawing to a close and I felt as if a shadow touched me. I looked up and there it was standing tall, a strong character. I hugged Sehar and told her how much I loved her. She kissed back, the shadow moved as if in approval. The seeds of love blooming and growing.

 

Now every time I plant a seed, I choose it with care for seeds can really really really make you tall............

To Delhi, with love

Delhi's scarlets (Day 2 in the city)

The resplendent scarlet caught my attention as I drove through Delhi. The flamboyant color stood apart amidst the ruinous quarters in the city. There is something about those scarlets that stir the deepest in you...

And not long after, I was scrounging the ground for fallen buds as if picking memories from the past. Remember those good times - A distant scarlet covered road, beauties on the ground... Sometimes picked for silly meaningless games and sometimes squashed by a wanton spirit. They were there as the school year began as if celebrating with us in our new beginnings. The scarlets challenging the ruthless sun of summers taught us to dream big dreams. The slow twirling dance to the ground taught us about the joy in letting go... Days went by under those Gulmohar trees where life led us in gay abandon.

As the flash drive moved in slow motion, the wind stirred us up.. The scarlets started falling to the ground as I gazed at the random motion.. I heard a distant voice from the present running after the falling petals. Sehar was trying to catch a falling flower for her friend, Melody.. I smiled and not long after we were running and jumping on the street around the Gulmohar tree... Tired, we decided to sit on a bench. We gazed at the tall leaves touching the sky and there they were again - the scarlets challenging the ruthless summers of Delhi and the falling flowers twirling the sweet tango. And this time they had a story to tell............

Day 15 (Delhi - Sattal)

My tryst with the scarlets didn't end in Delhi. The hills beaconed us but not without telling us what we would miss back home. The scarlets bumped their heads at odd corners as we drove on NH 24 and NH 87.  At Moradabad they stood in contrast to the green city. Their presence unchallenged and they looked beautiful and at peace. At Rampur and Bilaspur the Mangoes seemed to have borrowed a little of their orange from the Gulmohars. They made an odd pair. The Mango trees poised and dense with their rich green leaves and the Gulmohars confident and brash with their scarlets. At Haldwani, the scarlets grew darker as if the fertile soil of the Himalayan foothills fed their color.. I saw my last scarlet at Kathgodham and from there we headed into the hills where there were newer trees, their identity lost in the larger than life Himalayas. The brashness of my scarlets seemed to be missing here. It lived in the city where it belonged.... It lived in the eyes of the millions teaching them to dream big dreams and it lived on the streets in a child chasing a kite..

The Himalayas envelope you everytime you go there. The sense of eternity lives there in every moment. Its difficult to leave a place where your mere existence leaves you and yet is so reaffirmed every time you gaze at the snow-capped hills. With a heavy heart I started back from Saattal - our adobe for a few days. The seven lakes were unpreturbed by my departure. They stood still in their timelessness. I was sad and the hills had nothing of that emotion shaking them.

It was a familiar tree at Kathgodham that welcomed me.. Its branches swinging with joy and the scarlets doing their twirling dance.. As I spread my hand outside the window to still that sweet tango in my palms, I knew I was about to reach home...
P.S : This is dedicated to my school and all my school friends with whom I spent endless days under the Gulmohar trees from 1982-1995....

The Truth called Love:

It was a beautiful day on my birthday and we had some awesome Thai dinner with friends. We were chatting, singing and enjoying the pleasures of life that comes with togethernss...Radha had brought a book with her about Benjamin Franklin and was reading it to all of us. She read "Benjamin Franklin lived a long time ago" It was then that THE DISCUSSION began......


Now, dying is a very difficult subject to talk about. Even as mature individuals we are in a constant endeavor to evade the topic, leave alone talk about it with our kids. Isn't this amazing - dying is the ultimate experience of life and yet how unwilling we are to even talk about it. Or is it?

Back to the story. So where was I? Yes, Radha began reading-"Benjamin Franklin lived 200 years ago" However, thats not how Sehar heard it. "Mumma, has he died", she asked. Engrossed in the moment called life I answered - "Yes Sehar he has died". I didn't know Benjamin Franklin and didn't really care about him dying. Ofcourse, my lack of compassion for Ben Franklin wasn't my real failure in that moment. My failure was my inability to comprehend my child's mind, her fears and her doubts. Sehar, who was in deep thought asked me - "Why did he die?".."Because he was old", I answered...

As if, this was exactly what she feared I would say, Sehar started crying. I heard these words amidst her incessant sobbing"Mumma, I don't want you to ever get old and I don't want you to die."

The moment had slipped quietly out of our hands into our child's teary eyes, where it popped the last question for the day.. Enough to break any parent's heart she asked "Mumma, am I going to die too? and if I do will you get a new Sehar"..

We quietly kissed her and held her tight as we slipped into the zone where our parents stood years back. We asked her to touch our heart and we touched hers. And as we did that we told her, "We all are never going to die as Mumma and Daddy will live here in your heart and you in ours.  And that's a magic spell which will keep as young, forever"..

With her fears allayed, Sehar smiled and after sometime dozed off. She held my finger tight through that night...

And thats when another truth about parenthood dawned on me - " Parenthood is not about  telling "THE TRUTH". Its about concocting stories to see a different truth"...

And as if on cue I called my parents..................

Mountains can be made of anything:

On our way to school as we turned into Main St., Sehar saw a little mountain knocking at her outside the car window. Its then that she asked me THE QUESTION. "Mumma, how are mountains made?"
Now, I love the mountains and marvel at their eternity and their ability to make you look small  but nothing in those emotions ever prepared me to answer this question. So, I decided to stump Sehar this time with a question as an answer - "So Sehar, what do you think mountains are made of?"
Sehar obviously had her take on the issue, like she always has on everything - "Mumma, mountains can be made of anything.. Like sometimes, mountains are made of snow, sometimes of sand.. Sometimes we can make them with leaves and jump on them and sometimes of flowers and smell them.. Sometimes you can put stones together and sometimes draw it on the paper like a triangle"..
Simple yet profound.. And all I could hear was the crunching of the leaves and the many drawings on the board I made as a kid... We made mountains everyday, climbed them, broke them and then made them again. Mountains never tired us, they were neither eternal nor did they ever make us look small... They were there to be made and scaled and remade........
As I heard her I decided to climb my little mountain that day. And my mountain that day was made of words. As the words popped in my head and I typed on the screen, I realised I had so many more mountains to create everyday... For mountains can be made of anything...
So which mountain did you make today?
P.S: Please answer with your mountain's details :) Should be fun!

THE SUN HAS WINGS

It was a lazy afternoon and the sun was finally blessing us with its beauty after a really long winter. I drove Sehar back from school and thinking was the last thing of my mind. Sehar however, had a very different idea of her afternoon. She was carefully watching the sun. She was quiet and thoughtful. And as we reached  the signal near the home - out she popped THE QUESTION- Mumma, the sun is following us? Can it walk? Does it have feet?
This time I wasn't going to get fooled by Science and so I decided to create a little journey out of our wondorous life. I decided to chase the sun and let Sehar guide me. Some places the sun was behind us, some places ahead of us and some places next to us. Sehar was glued to the window, nose pressed and eyes wide. She was carefully watching the sun and wondered if the sun had a wand that helped it reach places so fast. It was absolute magic. Hey, I heard you saying direction. No, no, no - don't let the educated mind fool you, it doesn't know everything. For a moment, let go and let the magic talk to you.
It was not long, before Sehar fell asleep and I took her back home. Happy with our mini adventure, I looked at the Sun and found it smiling back. It was in the game with us. I felt the warmth on the cheek and for a moment wondered if it was there, right next to me.
As expected, Sehar's mini adventure continued in her dreams and when she woke up she came running to me - "You know what Mumma, the sun doesn't have feet. Actually, it has wings, those shiny things around it, thats why it can go everywhere in the sky".
I smiled and wondered if the sun flew to me on that wild sunny afternoon...

Stumped.....

Yesterday night as we playfully hit the bed, Sehar, my 4 year old asked me THE Question - Mumma, did God create us? A question sages have pondered for ages, philosophers have written books about and scientists have spent lifetime answering. Stumped.... I really didn't know how to answer that one. My simpler self prevailed and I told her - Yes, God created us.
Being a biochemist by education, my scientific self felt guilty and I felt I need to provide a legitimate answer to this curious mind. Now isn't that what the kids book tell us?
Charles Darwin and Robert Hooke prevailed on my brain and I started talking about evolution and cells.. I told her about how life began with a single cell which evolved to make animals, plants and monkeys/apes and eventually, human beings.. Monkeys, that's funny, she laughed... Mr. Huxley, take a walk.......
I don't know what brain cell triggered the next question - Mumma, but how do they remember.. Finally, years of genetic experiments didn't go waste as I proudly spoke about Mr. Crick's DNA.. I was so proud of myself, I am educating my child in a legitimate way. DNA? Mumma, Whats that? Deoxy ribose nucleic acid... Hun.. thats a funny name.. Ha ha ha. So does it remember like I remember English and maths. I obviously didn't want to delve further into the DNA's manufacturing and supply chain and wanted to end it there.
God was a simpler answer, this is getting complex, I thought to myself.. I need to wriggle out of this one.. Sleep was taking over and my memory and age were failing me...... God, need help...Forget it Sehar, God created all of us.
Sehar thought and pondered - Mumma, so did he put the bones together, put in blood and painted the face? Well.... yes, that's what he did..
Sometimes, simplicity is so much simpler :) And we both slept...