Happy Mother's Day...

I wanted to write this today… here in public. Many of you might wonder why! Maybe, because, I am not the type of person who could put these in words and express it in nature. Maybe bcoz the person whom I want to tell this to will not be able to take it 😊  For sure, she would cut me off saying, “Ohh ilakkam venda, Dialogue mathi. Over aakkanda.” Yes, that’s how she would respond. My Amma can never take these emotional honesty.

Amma and my relation has always been the katta-meeta type. She could express her anger more than her love, maybe that was why it was so. We never knew or could express the actual love we have for each other. Atleast, that’s what I think. We spoke like friends, at the same time, kept secrets from each other – Maybe for the fear that it might hurt the other. I always complained, she didn’t love me as much as she loved my brother or for that matter her sister’s kids or anybody else. On contrary, I think, she also always felt, I loved my aunts more than her. Strange, isn’t it.

All my life, I have tried my best to never do anything that would hurt her. Unknowingly, I might have hurt her many times. But, what I would always regret is that, Knowingly, I had to give her one big pain. I hope, someday, she would understand that this was best for her daughter; for I know, nothing is bigger than her daughter’s happiness for her… and that it killed me more to hurt her and would never have dared to do so, if I had another choice.

Today, Amma, on this Mother’s Day… I want you to know something.

“You might not be the perfect Mother in the world. But you are the best mother for me and I will never want to part from you, in this life or any other lives… I am so proud of you, that you have always tried to not hurt any other mother’s child and still do. Yes, it might have hurt me at times, but as a mother, I understand that even I would have done the same, if in your place.

Thanks for the days you stood by me, though you never agreed to me…

Thanks for the words you said aloud, when I felt completely lost…

Thanks for the moments you shared, when I stood totally alone… 

Thanks for my favorite delicacies, when I yearned for it every single day…

Thanks for the smiles you showed, when I knew well that you were crying within…

Above all, thank you for being my Amma. My best amma, love you more than my life. I would always want to see you happy and never want to hurt you. I am sorry for hurting you. I will always want you to be right beside me and never leave me. I might never be able to say this to you on face, but please never leave me alone. Whatever rights or wrongs, I may do, stay by me for I can’t bear being away from you. I love you and will always love you…

Happy Mother’s Day…”

I am not OK...

Since the last 'gone-wrong conversation'; mind has been restless. I knew, it was already late…too late to have that open talk with mom. Knowing clearly, how she would react, always kept me from making her a confidante in my life. Her views were always based on “TRADITION, CULTURE, SOCIETY” and it never matched my outlook on life. She would go hysteric on hearing anything that was against what the usual “EXPECTED” society made norms. This made me apprehensive to be open to her on my most personal feelings – be it joy or sorrow.

Today, I purposefully, took one day annual leave; to talk to her. Rather, open up to her and try to make her realise what was I going through and why this idea of “Lone Trip” was in my agenda. The past nights were restless as I was repeatedly, planning, scripting, rehearsing the moment when I would TRY opening up to her.

As luck could have it, brother too was at home. Completely wrong day… I was so hoping to be alone when I start this conversation. Thus I waited until afternoon, to finally find my mom alone in her room. I went inside, “Amma, I need to talk to you…”. As expected, her face changed to one with ‘worry’. She was already getting into a hyper mode, I knew it.

As I continued, “Amma, please don’t take this conversation on a Society perspective and try to see it as your daughter’s feelings. I really want to talk to you. I AM NOT HAPPY.

SILENCE… as stupid can I be, tears started overflowing my eyes and I was choking with pressure within…

"Amma, all that discussion on the trip. You should try to understand, why am I being so….”

Stopped short, not due tears, but mom had already started off. She was outpouring all her anger on the last conversation and HOW SHE CANT LET A GIRL GO ALONE ON A TRIP and HOW IT IS NOT ACCEPTED IN SOCIETY etc etc etc…She was so outrageous as she was shouting on my audacity to expect to do such a trip and I could clearly see that she saw nothing else over that conversation…She didn’t see my tears, she didn’t see that I was trying to break open a barrier that was always between us… She saw nothing…

Her loud voice had invited brother’s attention and he too entered the scene. Now, this was something I never wanted as he started asking worriedly on what was happening. I rose from my seat and as I dashed out, “Amma, THIS IS WHY… I could never be open to you. You always complained that I wasn’t being open to you. Now, you saw? You want a daughter who always smiles and be happy in front of u. All my life, I had done that. I have accepted everything for the sake of you and dad, be it was against my own happiness or wishes. You are fine, as you feel that wud keep me happy. But NO. For once, today, I tried to finally tell you, how unhappy I am in my life and how serious is my personal life… I begged to u to look at it as a mother to a daughter and not thru the society’s eyes. BUT… Sorry, I made this mistake of trying to talk to you. U will be happy with the charade I have been putting on all these years. I will…hence forth too. As long as I can, I will. But remember, ONE DAY, I will reach my limits and, that day, don’t be sad or blame me for what happens…”

For me, it was as if WHERE DID I GO WRONG…Through my room’s closed door, I could hear, brother talking to mom on why she reacted so when I had to share something…etc etc. Maybe he felt, I was serious. I didn’t wanted to hear anything. But… soon I found amma sitting by my side with her head bowed down… I could see that she was hurt and feeling sorry...She wanted to know what was the issue and am I ok...

I had nothing to say…Afterall, what could I say…how could I explain…All the courage, the rehearsals and days long planning was not helping me anymore. I was blank… With tears, I could just say…

I am not OK…

I need to talk...

I was good at smiling even when I was burnt down by the harsh realities of life… my smile always helped me to camouflage the real me. For I felt, the real me would be a pain to my loved ones. I was immature, that I grew up in that way. Hiding my true feelings and trying to keep everybody happy. Time taught me that was wrong, but did that bring any change in me? No…Unfortunately No. I still continue to do the same mistake…

In the quest for giving happiness to everybody, what did I attain… Frustration, just sheer frustration… to oneself and to others. But when, I didn’t take care of my own happiness, why expect it from others. Not everybody would be fools to live taking care of the other’s happiness. Atleast, I know not many who would do that…

That’s how, I ended up hurting myself…. hurting my love…hurting my self-esteem… For the past one year, I have been thinking of doing this solitary travel to the mountains and undergo a detox program. I wanted to be alone and face the challenge of that adventure of being alone. It excited me. But, to do that, I would need to hurt some loved ones…or rather One…

My mom… being the orthodox woman, she can never accept any female travelling alone in this cruel world… And when it is her own daughter, she is scared that all the disasters of the world is all set to fall over her child…All mothers think so…I agree… But where I disagreed was the reasons she pointed out…What the society will say…and I hated it… By now, I realise that if there was anything that had hindered my happiness; it always had an indirect connection to “WHAT SOCIETY WOULD THINK”…

Decisions I made was always for my happiness… and their decisions were based on the so called “SOCIETY”… but now what… So for past one year, I was indirectly brining this topic of my travelling, every now and then, into any general talks at home. I was trying to prepare my mom for the shock and expected she wouldn’t be as surprised as she could be otherwise…Though, every time I mentioned about it, she kept repeating…”Go wherever u want, but take your son with you.” It was her displeasure that resonated in those words.

But today…Today, my cousin had visited us. She is very close to mom than us, talking regularly on phone and keeping in touch etc etc (I should confess, I am bad at keeping in touch with relatives.) So in between the talks, this talk about travelling came up. A very general talk…

Me: Oh Didi, I am going in January to XXXX... (Awaiting for a reaction...) 

Mom: With WHOM? (Brows up)

Me: Alone… (Ofcourse…)

Mom: You will NOT… (Irritated…)

Me: I will. I have been telling this for long. (Stern...I am not moving...)

Mom: You WILL, after I die… (Angry…)

Me: Amma, LETS NOT ARGUE ON THIS. IF I AM DECIDING TO GO, I WILL. PLEASE DON’T MAKE AN ISSUE OUT OF THIS. (PERIOD, fed up)

Mom: ……… (SILENCE which is dangerous than any other statement….)

The conversation continued with a lecture by my cousin on WHY SHOULD I GO ALONE and WHY DON’T I GO WITH HUSBAND…etc etc etc… But nothing was getting through my senses… I knew for sure, that both me and mom is now going through the same emotions…

Frustration…and Silence….and I knew it…

I need to talk…

The Ultimate Fool of the Day...

Morning started with heavy headache…Tomorrow is week end and I was hating it to even think that my week end might be spoiled by this headache…I have been pressing my forehead with my cold hands from the moment I reached office…and as I heard one of my colleague discussing with the other about an idea to fool her husband, I realized “Hey, Its April 1st today and it’s the April Fool Day…”

Somehow, a cunning thought came into me…Uhmm…maybe I can have a little laugh by doing some prank….but then what…I am not sure, if I could get any such innovative idea to fool my family…I hate playing pranks by saying some bad things about somebody…a bit of superstitious here…but then what…

And then I got my Masterplan…Some of my cousins are visiting us from India this month end…and its still on the planning mode…uhmm…I devised my plan…I called my mom, “Mom, Aunt called from India…They all got the visa..they are flying in on 19th night….”…My mom was still half asleep, I suppose…was naturally excited…She was like .. “Wow, so quick…only 19 more days….great…I will call her now…” hehe!!! I counted one down…I repeated the same lines with my dad and husband who were already in their office…I evoked the excitement in all of them of this good news of our relatives arrival date…lol!!!

After 5 mts, I got a call from my mom…and she was trying hard not to laugh and then blasting me saying… “Youuuu….you waste my money on an ISD call…I am not going to pay for that…u will pay…” etc etc….haha!!! Then I called my dad…and got some what same response…lol!!! My husband acted a bit better saying, he didn’t get time to call India…I laughed and said… “It’s ok dear…I understood that u too celebrated ur birthday just now…Happy April Fools Day…”

That has made my day…I was expecting after effects from one of them soon…and was extremely cautious in picking up every single calls…and then I got a call from the Pizza Hut…it was a true call..it seems somebody ordered for a Pizza on my name and mobile number…I said No, I didn’t order anything..maybe it’s a prank… They said fine and the call was off….Little did I know that, that was just the beginning….

Soon my office reception had a visitor…A KFC delivery boy with a bucket of family meal…I didn’t even care to go out and told the receptionist that its not my order…and soon I started getting calls from almost all the receptionist and almost 10-12 calls from the KFC office…every time I said NO ITS NOT MY ORDER….

Finally almost after 45 mts, I blasted them off and then threatened them, that IF I GET ONE MORE CALL FROM U PEOPLE, I WILL COMPLAIN TO THE POLICE….IF SOMEBODY ORDERED UNDER MY NAME, U TRACK THE CALL AND CATCH THE CULPRIT INSTEAD OF CALLING ME AND WASTING MY TIME AND UR TIME….

Soon after this, I got a call from my mom…and I could hear her laughing…

Mom: (with giggles and surpressed laughs) Haha, heard you are eating KFC….
Me : Oh, ok..so it was u…then don’t worry..police is on the way…I have lodged a complaint and they r tracking the number…
Mom: What...Oh no…it was not me..it is ur friend…he just called me and told that he played such a prank…Your husband is also in it…
Me: Ok, then no probs…u can let them know that soon they will get call from the police…
Mom: (shocked) Hey, no…let me call them and do smthing…

After this, I got a sudden gush of calls from my friend and husband pleading to me to collect the KFC and they promised they will pay me in the evening after work…But I was helpless, I had already send the delivery boy back a million times…

But guess what, the delivery boy came back..and I went and met him..He was all miserable by facial expression…He called his manager and gave the phone to me…(the same person to whom I have threatened to call the police…)…hahah!!! He apologized for the trouble and was miserably telling me how difficult it has become for them… just bcoz of this prank, they r getting delayed for other orders…I felt bad too…I finally decided to buy the delivery in…and even gave a tip to the driver…Poor Man…he would surely get complaints from other Customers for delaying their orders…

And for me, I was angry for this silly prank, where not me but the KFC people was harassed…Just then I am getting my next call and I heard my husband pleading… “The Pizza Hut will also come…pls take that also…I will pay u in the evening…”… He knew, if he had held on to the phone for long, I would have given him a good set of lecture…

Anyways, soon the Pizza also was delivered…and guess what…the whole floor of my office got a share of the Unexpected KFC and Pizza treat…they were all thanking my husband and my friend for the treat…lol!!!

Just now my mom called me and said that it seems she has warned my husband and friend to wear a bullet proof dress if they are going to come in front of me…hahaah!!!

Now you guys tell me…at the end of the whole story…out of the KFC Delivery boy, KFC Manager, My Mom, My Friend, My Husband and Me…

“Who was the Ultimate Fool of the Day???”

Cruel as the Grave...

I was reading a mail from my Dost today…and in there he said… “I am a bit jealous too!!!”…now before you all start assuming what he might have been jealous for…let me tell you..with a bit of a Halo around my head…He was jealous of me…lols….Yeah..as per him…he likes my blogs and my writing style..and he felt jealous on that…

So, while I was reading his mail…one face came to my eyes…a face that I haven't seen for more than 10-12 years...Its been years, that I haven’t thought of her…She was a good friend of mine from the age of 10 and we were in same school till Age 15…the meaning of her name was Light; so lets call her so….but somehow, from the first day I met her…I always thought that was the only thing she missed in her life…Light…Light of Love…Light of Affection…Light of Intelligence...and so on…She was a beautiful singer…apart from that she was inactive in anything and everything…

Now the irony of her life was her Mom…Just opposite to her character, Aunty was like a Super Hero in the field of Art, Literature and Popularity …. to be frank…’Light’ always reminded me of Cinderella and Aunty to be the step mother…bcoz the horrifying abusive stories that Light used to share with me, really made me believe that indeed Aunty was a Monster…(till date, I don’t know if what she said was right…still….) Light used to come to school daily with new marks on her body…Red marks of Trouser Belts…or Burnt skin…wounds etc etc…and she sadly claimed all of them to be gifted by her mom…

When asked for a reason…there was none…sometimes for walking slowly…sometimes for not sitting straight…sometimes for talking…sometimes for not talking…and so on…daily I would sit and listen to these stories and feel sad for her…Many a times I wished I could take her home and let her live with me… which was impossible…This was a preface to my main story…

[About me…I really need to tell you about me to understand the cause of the whole story…I was an extreme extrovert and tomboyish from school days…As my mom would rightfully say… “I had skin of a rhino or hippo…”…as I had no fear to get into any thing and everything… The truth was… “With the motto of bunking the maximum number of classes, daily I thought of excuses to not attend lectures…Instead I started participating in any contest or competition held anywhere in or around my school…”…Thus, I became a singer, dancer, guitarist, painter, poet, athlete and what not…I just started looking for new ways to bunk school or classes… and to some extend, I was excelled in the items and managed to bring atleast one of the first three prizes in the contests…
For fear of low marks in school, I had to even study well for exams…else I could have experienced some marks on my body too…hehe!!! My mom would have seen to it…lol!!! So, even after all these extra curricular activities…I used to get above average marks too… All this attributed for myself being a pet of the teachers and nuns of my school….]

Now, the above was not boasting…but I had to tell you that…bcoz in one way or other…directly or indirectly…I play the “Villain” of this story…lol!!! Poor Me…

Anyways, that was a longggggggg preface…

Now, Let me get into my story…So it so happened, Light’s mom started comparing her daughter with me… and she was really irritated on the fact that her daughter was quiet and not so active…to add it up, Light never managed to even score decent marks in exams…and the worst part of all this was 'they were a distant relative of my cousin’s family'…At times Aunty used to tell me that Light is so irresponsible…and I used to support Light and at times tried helping her in her studies…

But as days passed, I started seeing extra marks on her body whenever I accomplished something…If I scored high marks, Light got another slap or burnt mark…If I won a prize in a dance competition, Light came to school with wounds all around her hands or ears…When we have parties and when Aunty sees me dancing; I could witness aunty pinching Light’s hand as long as blood oozed out…I could see her pushing Light towards the dancing floor…and Light used to just come and stand there at the centre of the floor as if SHE WAS LOST…

I knew, there was some problem…but Light never said anything…with me, Aunty used to soooo much like Darling talks…she never behaved indifferent with me…but still marks on Light’s body hurt me and to tell the truth…many a times I prayed to god wishing Aunty would change some day...

Years passed…when it was time for our public exam results…using her political influence Aunty got me my results…(which I had never asked for…and God knows, how she had my ID number…)…She happily announced that I got a 90% for the exam…I wondered, why she had to take the extra step to find my results through the back door…uhmm…anyways…it did ease of some tension of waiting for the results…lol!!!

After that…almost 3 years passed before I saw Light again…She had changed…enormously…She wore highly fashionable clothes…with heavy makeup…and extremely talkative…I was hurrying as I was on my way for some urgent issue…Still I asked her…How was she and Aunty…and even asked her how was her daughter…(ok, now the story is…soon after our 10th public exam…she joined a school…and then she eloped with their college peon… but soon found her way back home with a baby on hand…I had heard this story through some friends….) I didn’t wanted to ask her WHAT and WHY about her marital life…but still for courtesy I enquired about her daughter…

I still remember, the way Light spoke to me…She spoke with an aura of pride and self confidence in her…she told me what she was doing…and her daughter was fine and was at home with a servant…As I was observing the vast change in my “Light”… she continued…

“Dear, do you know something…I have never told you this...My life was hell always because of mom’s extreme expectation about me…and to worsen the situation you came by…and my life became Devilishly Hell with your presence in my Mom’s Head…She was always comparing me with you and always hated you…She was angry evry time you won a prize or got good marks…she was suffocated at the fact that you scored 90% while I score less than 50%... It was hell for me… ”

I was shocked…I wondered…Me…???

She continued… “Yeah, I know, you were always sweet to me…and that’s why I never wanted to tell you all this then…I never wanted to hurt you as you were my only relief those days…Do you know…My mom even always used to Wish that U WERE DEAD…and she even prayed hard for that…Whenever she was talking sweetly to you, at heart she was cursing you...”

I was dead-struck…I couldn’t belive my ears…as Light continued…

“Don’t Worry Dear….I never wished for that and always prayed that mom’s wish shouldn’t be granted…and all my life, I will pray for your good…Mom was just envying your parents…She was JEALOUS…jealous from the core of her heart…I just wanted to tell this to you some day...”

Once she said that, a tear rolled down her eyes and she walked off…I stood there…I was Lost…I didn't stop her to ask for any clarification...neither I needed any...I knew, maybe, she wanted to clear off some sort of guilty feeling from her heart…and I am sure she succeeded in that…and I am happy she did it…

But then…a question that I still ask is…Can Jealousy grow to that extent where you would pray for the death of some other parents’ child…Can it grow to this extent where one could hurt her own child…Can it be called Jealousy towards another or Over-Love towards your own…No answers…As it says in the Bible… “Jealousy is Cruel as the Grave: the coals thereof are coals of fire”

But, now I understand and realize the essence of Lawrence Durrell’s words.

“It is not Love that is blind, but Jealousy…”

Mom, I Love You...

I was 6 or 7 years old then…The venue is my uncle’s house and it’s the 14th day after the death of my uncle’s mother. As part of traditional belief or custom, there is a ritual to be followed by the son of the deceased at their residence. Accordingly, the morning of the D-day was very busy with visitors still pouring in with condolence and relatives being part of the rituals…By afternoon, the house was filled with just very close relatives and even that added up to atleast 30-40 people in there…

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A Detailing of the Situation:
If my memory hasn’t failed, that day there was some huge strikes going on all around the city protesting the attacking of a popular politician…the mob was angry that their leader was attacked and people were really into the roads to protest and show their support to their leader….As part of the protest, that day, there was to be a rally taking place with thousands of people participating. So from afternoon, the police blocked almost all roads and the roads were filled with the protestors walking in lines and moving thru every single street in the city…I still remember, the line took more than 2 or 3 hours to cross our house once started…so u can imagine how big the rally was…and the mood was ANGER..ofcourse…
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OK...let me come back to my story…so by afternoon, all these relatives that was left back at home naturally couldn’t go back to their respective houses due road blocks…so all the adults took seats at the balcony on the second floor of the building…and all the kids (including me) went to the terrace and continued playing…So now the scene is… “The adults in the floor below is sitting and watching the passing procession and we kids above playing…”

Now, what happened was…two of my cousins had a fight and they started up an argument…I got bored and started scribbling on the floor with a red brick in my hand…I was drawing pictures on the floor and the sides of the boundary wall of the terrace…and between was gazing out into the procession seeing the thousands of people passing by…

But, then…that happened before even I could realize…as I was standing at the edge of the terrace…one of cousin pushed the other one and she fell on me…in my panic to not to fall, the stone flew off my hand and fell down…just inches off from the passing public…[Now, remember, it was an angry mob…and if the stone had fallen into the group…it could have been mistook as some enemy group peltering them with stone and that could have resulted in a riot where these people could have just stormed into our house and thrashed all of the people in there…that day, I didn't know any of of the seriousness of the matter...Lucky for me, that the stone didn’t give me up on me that much…]

But, how lucky was I…bcoz, as soon as this stone fell on the floor…I saw my dad’s bro almost flying up to the terrace…His face was red…he was angry…and he was holding a stem of a banana tree…(actually I don’t know the exact word to be used for that DAMN thing…if u remember…u cut off the bananas from their plant as a one whole bunch…the whole set of bananas grow in a thick hard stem…usually, we pluck out bananas from this part and by the end, only the thick stem remains…Now, my uncle came up with this stem with no bananas, but with lots of protruding from where the bananas where once plucked…if you see the picture to the right...and imagine this long rough thing without the bananas on them...this remained after the traditional lunch which was always accompanied with bananas.)…Anyways, my uncle reached us and he just shouted out… "WHO THREW THAT STONE…?”…

I was really a kid…and STUPID too…not even realizing why he was so angry at such a small thing…I smiled and enthusiastically started answering… “Uncle…”

He didn’t let me complete…THUDDDDD….the rough end of the stem had already made it mark on my right thigh…Great, I was wearing a short frock, so the damn thing really could help itself on my thigh…I felt as if my vision was going off…I could feel stars flying all around me…I just couldn’t understand what happened a second back…I WAS LOST...all I could see is that my uncle dashing down the stairs the same way as he came up…

I was scared to dead…no voice came out of me even to weep..but my eyes were overflowing…my thighs were bleeding and giving a red colour to my white frock...and soon I saw the same uncle’s daughter coming running to me and pulled me to go down…she said, I was being called…I couldn’t move…I felt, that I was being called for more beatings…She dragged me down…as soon as we reached the second floor..it was my dad’s turn…not even asking me WHAT, he just dragged me all the way down the stairs to the ground floor…by holding my right hand…I literally hit each steps with the sides of my body as I was being pulled down…and shamefully let me admit…I was peeing all the way down due horror …

I was dragged into the house…and here my mom was sitting with many other ladies..none of them knew nothing of what happened outside…My mom suddenly saw my father fuming with anger dashing into the house dragging me on the floor all the way…She was terrified…her first reflex action made her carry me and push me into the bathroom and locked the door and guarded the door…I could hear her screaming and shouting… “WHAT HAPPENED…WHAT DID SHE DO…”…

I don’t remember anything after this…maybe I fell unconscious…maybe I forgot everything due fear…what ever…I remember, I hated my dad’s bro after that…and I hated his daughter more for taking me down…lol!!! Only days later, everybody knew the truth…that actually I NEVER THREW ANY STONE….IT JUST FELL OFF ACCIDENTLY… and the worst part was…when this stone fell..one of the old lady in the house lied that it fell on her head…when it really didn’t fall anywhere near her…that is what increased the intensity of the after effects…grrr..how I hated her, when I knew about this lie she said…Anyways, once my uncle knew that he mistook me…he pampered me with all sort of gifts to say SORRY…and in that age…those gifts were more than enough…I was ready for one more thrash…lol!!!

Only after years, I realized how bad that day turned out to be…Only then I could understand the real terror that might have happened if the stone had fallen into that rally…(afterall I was a kid..I knew nothing of politics or protests…uhmm…)…

And with this one thrash my uncle made on me…a big family issue broke out…my mom was absolutely not approving of my uncle thrashing me…FOR WHAT SO EVER REASON…I came to know that my mom fought every single person who supported my uncle, including my dad…saying… “I don’t like anybody hitting my daughter…I haven’t given that authority to anybody…and HOW could u thrash her so mercilessly with that stem which is usually used to thrash cattles…I can never pardon you for that…”…. This outpour made everybody angry against my mom…they raised their brows for my mom talking back to them like that… They tried KEEP QUIET and don’t talk like that…but my mom still protested…

Years later, when I knew this…I was overwhelmed…I doesn’t remember anything like that about that day…but knowing that my mom stood there protecting me did make me sooo emotional…and even today...as I type this in…my eyes r wet imagining my mom protecting me against all the relatives…

Mom, Thanks for standing up for me…thanks for supporting me…thanks for trusting and believing me...thanks for going against all your loved ones just to protect me… Mom, I love you…

I will always love you, Mom….

My Partner in the Crime...

Happy New Year....

May God bless you with all happiness and success he can shower upon you...On this day, I have decided to share with you some good thoughts... Something that added into my life's "Book of Do's and Dont's"... something that added onto my virtues to grow into a better human being...

Do you steal??? Have you ever stolen anything from your own home??? Have you stolen MONEY from under your parents’ eyes??? I have…but couldn’t pursue my higher studies in mastering the art of stealing…lol!!! It is a story…and here it is…

I was some 5 or 6 years old…and my brother two years younger to me… that year, we both got enrolled into the same convent school… myself being the big sister was cool at the new school…but my brother who was going to a school for the first time, soon started hating it…more than any reason, he didn’t want to go anywhere, where his mom was not present…He was (and still is…grrrr…) a Mamma’s boy….Daily morning, it was a heartbreaking scene to see him screaming and crying when being dropped at his classroom…(afterall, he was just between 3-4 years)… seeing him crying used to make me also upset…

Soon, I had an idea to stop him from crying...Give him sweets…he loved sweets…if you give him sweets, he would stop crying (every afternoon, they used to sell sweets at my school… and my all time favorite was the orange toffee) but then, to buy sweets, you need money… and during those days there was no such phrase called “POCKET MONEY” in my house…we, children, got anything and everything that we wished for from our parents…but we were not allowed to keep money or buy things on our own… to eat sweets on a daily basis was considered NOT GOOD FOR HEALTH by MOM (how weird…) Without money, how could I buy sweets for my brother…I started using my brains…how can I get some money… uhhmm…???

During those days, my mom had this practice of maintaining a Piggy Bank…this piggy bank was kept in her room to build in some “Money Saving” nature in her children… If ever we got any money from anywhere, we were supposed to put the coins into that piggy bank…to increase the spirit, she herself used to gift both of us children with 50paise or 1 Rupee coins to remit into the so called Piggy Bank…(here, it was a powder tin with a narrow opening, which mom had cut out with knife, at the bottom of it…)..She used to motivate us to follow this practice and had promised that once the tin is full, she will open it and divide and gift the money equally to me and my brother, so that we can buy what ever we wish for….

Thinking of the Piggy Bank, I finalized on a fool proof idea to get the money required for the sweets…STEAL… steal the money you want…from the piggy bank…moreover, you doesn’t have to worry that mom would know about it… My partner in crime was my own brother… Very innocently I told him my plan and soon I started pulling out the coins from the small opening on the Talcum Powder tins…the denomination of coins that came out depended on our luck and on that luck depended the number of sweets we could buy that day… I started going to school with this money and buy sweets daily in the afternoon…give some to my brother and eat some myself...days when I got more money, I started sharing sweets with my friends too… I started acting like a big girl, to be on my own and having money to buy sweets and offering it to my brother and friends…my friends used to adore me for giving them sweets daily…uhmmmm….I WAS GREATTTTTTT…

But…all that happiness didn’t stay long…One fine day, I and my brother had a fight on some silly matter…my brother was on fault…and so naturally, mom scolded him…I was happy…He got punishment for his mistake…but then…the most terrible thing happened….Something that I never imagined…something that I never thought would happen…My brother…my little brother…my three year old brother…blurted out… “Mommmmmmmm, why u scolding only me…u should scold sis also… she takes money from the piggy bank daily and buy sweets…You scold her also…”…

I was shocked…yet I could see my mom was Dead Struck…She stood as if she couldn’t believe what she just heard…She asked, “What???”….and within no time, my dear brother presented the detailed story board of how the crime took place and how I walked around in the school with sweets in my hands and offering it to kids who begged for sweets… I felt as if the earth was moving off from below my feet…I just remember mom asking me if what she heard was true and myself trying to mutter some reply…

What followed was a small action movie… literally and physically, she was blasting me out…I screamed and cried…I pleaded for forgiveness…After the initial explosion, maybe she realized, she was over reacting (only I know, she wasn’t..uhmmm)…She took me to her side…calmly she explained how bad stealing was…and why one shouldn’t do it…and if not anybody, but still god was watching all that I was doing…and so on…I cried…I felt bad for what I did…I repented…I apologized and promised never to repeat my mistake…She kissed me and said she has forgiven me…

Be it the hard way, still I learnt the biggest lesson of my life… * Stealing is NO good…Work hard for your needs…Trying to steal it from somebody is equivalent to stealing your own self esteem * … and always remember … "The only thing worth stealing is a kiss from a sleeping child..."

Between, wouldn’t you like to know what happened to my dearrrrrrr brother…uhmmm…when I heard him blurting out the truth, I had felt like killing him… but, soon I was smiling…BECAUSE…he too got a share of the initial explosion that I got from mom…afterall…He was

“My Partner in the Crime…”