My Iron lady

“Women belong in the house... and the Senate” is true. Today is women’s day and whole world is celebrating it by honoring and glorifying it, which ought to be celebrated. It is the most suitable day to narrate story of my “iron lady”. She is none other than my mother. We all find our mothers to be the best. But I don’t find her best, as adjectives cannot suffice her importance in my life. After my granny I find her who helped me understand what womanhood, motherhood & feminism means.

She is a mother of two children & grandmother of her grandson. I presume raising my sister was not difficult for her when compared with raising a brat like me who has weird mood swings, possessive, extremely sensitive be it emotionally or physically. She is lady whom I find daring, confident and important pillar of my house as she has to deal with two extremely passionate & possessive men, i.e me & my father, and these two feel left alone when they don’t find her nearby them. She is her father’s most adorable daughter & brother’s adorable sister. Me & my sister used to call her “Dadu’s golden gift”, reason being she was born when my grand paa turned 50. She was a pampered sister, who would get five different dress (read it trendy clothes of 70s) on her birthday and festivals from her brothers and two pairs of footwears from her both parents. She would tie herself with her bed just to stay awake during her exams and study. Like majority of Indian girls, she got her prince charming, my dad and became mother of two children, daughter and son.

“Life is not always bed of roses”, so was her life not bed of roses. It was 4’o clock in the evening of 14^th October when her son, i.e me met with an accident on my fourth dusshera. People presumed me to be dead after having shown several children to her. But as we say a mother knows where her child is, so did she knew. She pointed towards the engine of the bus and told my dad “our son is there”.  I was taken out of the engine and was given in her lap. I still remember her yellow saree with blood stains. She looked at me and smiled and hid her grief. I opened my eyes after three days of series of major operation and saw her at my bedside. I don’t know what was going in her mind that time but I could see the confidence with which she saw me.   

“Life never stops, one must face whatever comes in life” is something that she believes in and this is what she has inculcated in me. Even today I remember how she would motivate me and used to leave me alone to face the world and its harsh realities. After accident I had become isolated child. I would neither like to meet anyone, nor would like to go to any kind of parties but she would force me to go. On an occasion she asked me the reason for not going to birthday parties. I said “ I have one hand. How would I clap when my friend would cut his birthday cake”, she looked at me and smiled. She said “ so what if you have one hand, you have got legs. You can clap” I found it to be a rubbish idea. She gave an another idea, which today I find very stylish. She asked me to put my hand gently on my chest and clap.

On an another incident I asked her how would I do batting in cricket. She called me and tied bat to my arm and said “lets play cricket. I’ll do bowling and you’ll do batting”. I wasn’t confident but I gave a try to it and was able to bat.  That was the moment when I realized nothing is impossible and that’s how I learnt playing cricket. Everytime I used to ask her “mummy will I get my hand back” she would give affirmative answer. It was morning of 1996, when I was reading telegraph and I came across an article on hand transplant of a French thief. Impromptu I ran upto her and made her read that article. She looked at me and said “I told you everything is possible. All you need is to believe in yourself”.

Today  whenever i get success I just think of her and say to myself “ its you mummy that I’m here”. De’scartes said “I think therefore I’m”, but I say “ mummy thinks, therefore I’m”.  I find solace when I see her smile when people come up to her and say that they find me cheerful, confident irrespective of my imperfection. 

Spiritual death

                                                                          

“The heavens will not be filled with those who never made mistakes but with those who recognized that they were off course and who corrected their ways to get back in the light of gospel truth” Dieter F Uchtdorf.

Death is separation. A physical death is the separation of the soul from the body. Spiritual death, which is of greater significance, is the separation of the soul from God. In Genesis 2:17, God tells Adam that in the day he eats of the forbidden fruit he will “surely die.” Adam does fall, but his physical death does not occur immediately; God must have had another type of death in mind—spiritual death. This separation from God is exactly what we see in Genesis 3:8. When Adam and Eve heard the voice of the Lord, they “hid themselves from the presence of the LORD God.” The fellowship had been broken. They were spiritually dead.

On this popularly termed virtual platform people come to see their other side and enjoy, but they very often forget that the ones sitting behind the screen are humans with all human attributes and their behavior can have grave impact on others life. This story is an example of such behavior which shows paradigm shift from real world to virtual world and its aftereffects on today’s generation.

A bed stricken, forlorn and spiritually dead boy Viraj’s physical pain became unbearable to an extent that he landed up in ICU of a hospital and ended up with complete spiritual death and physical death to a certain extent. The story goes back to the last days of his college, when he came across new people who made his life beautiful and lively. Irrespective of situation, he wore a smile on face and was inspiration for people. Whoever saw him used to say “he lives his day as if this day is never going to come”. But things are never same, a day came when people left him. He was desolated, felt left alone. In the process of living up to his dreams, an angel came in his life, for which he had long awaited. But his life was in complete chaos that he could celebrate angel's presence in his life, rather the angel’s birth was the only moment that he was waiting for to end his physical existence, which was known only to Rohan Verma.

Rohan Verma was an enthusiast young lad for whole world but in reality he was very emotional and introvert. Rohan and Viraj became friends on facebook at the time when all friends of Viraj had left him. In this process both of them became good friends to an extent that Rohan shared his identity with Viraj. They were in contact through regular phone calls and chat conversation. After sometime Rohan also left Viraj and he was again isolated and lost in the world, where nothing other than death existed. Now Viraj was not scared of death because he saw death as the sole thing that could give him solace and release him from all the pains. Everyday he went out with the hope of achieving his goal, i.e death but he was not fortunate enough.

T.S.Eliot’s  famous saying “sometimes things become possible if we want them bad enough” turned out to be true for Viraj. An evening of February Viraj met an accident, in which his spine was broken and he was bleeding badly. He was almost dead and was rushed to hospital.All alone in hospital surrounded with unknown face, Viraj was looking for that one "face" for which he craved but he couldn't see that face. Soon all the faces he was familiar with gathered but still those faces meant nothing to him.

Self-interpretation and communication gap had gone to an extent that the only thing that existed between Viraj and the face was misunderstanding, fear and anger. To an extent there was existence of annoyance on one side. Days passed by and his condition deteriorated. He held his antsy mother’s hand and wished to see a face which was meaningful for him (although Viraj didn’t exist for that face). An impromptu call narrated the whole accident to that face and brought it in the ICU ward. Happiness on Viraj’s face was inexplicable but this happiness was momentary. There was no bound to happiness on Viraj's face. After seeing the face his blood pressure got high and resulted into paralysed Viraj.

Today Viraj is alive with a body which doesn’t work and a soul which doesn’t have any emotions or feelings, resulting to his spiritual death. He smiles only when he sees the little angel because he wants to hide his tears from that angel. Angel is intelligent enough to read Viraj’s face & heart. Angel has cried whenever he has seen Viraj in grief, inspite of Viraj crying at his behind.

The face bears expression of remorse and regret for his deeds.

               

A musical love story

When someone talks of love affair & their encounter through internet, then rises the question “how can someone fall in love after several chatting & phone calls”. This love story will give answer to those questions. There was a boy & a girl. They had their own criteria for boy friend & girl friend but these criteria are mere adjectives, which a person ignores for that one someone special. In this love story it happened.  

There was a boy- cute, rugged with his own taste & attitude. His attitude had its own charm, which could make anyone either love him or hate him for he was straightforward. He has his own slangs & own acronym for his slangs. His way of scolding was like listening to sermons. His way of comforting was like cuddle. His way of asking about meals & health was like hypnotism; probably everyone would like to experience it. He would look into dictionary every time the girl uttered a heavy jargon. He fell in love with a girl. She was very sensitive, emotional, and adorable. She believed in celebrating every moment of her life. She had her own taste. She believed in class & sophistication. She had her own definition of elite. She measured elite on the parameters of education.  

They used to talk through music, songs & photography. They would talk about music for hours. Both of them were proud of their music choice. According to the boy, his choice was best & according to the girl, her choice was best, but every time they would agree that they had similar taste of music. They used to fight through shayari & panktiyaan. They had our own language. The boy would shout at the girl whenever he found her sitting under the sky in chilly winter. The girl used to always pull his legs by talking about Purple colour as one his date, whom he met, was dressed in purple. According to him it was his worst date. They would talk for hours on phone. They would talk for eight hours on facebook.

Then came the time which led to their fight & it was the girl’s acts that led to the fight. But both of them were sure that they will be together again. They stopped talking to each other. The girl used to call him & he would talk to her but never showed his anger because those were the days when she was going through her final semester exams & he was more concerned about her exams. After her exams got over he showed his anger through his shayari (which he used to do).  The girl knew that the boy loves her & cares because even after fight and the boy’s statement “you are nothing for me. I hate you like anything”, he would talk to her and their conversation was only about accusations but through songs. The girl was totally upset with the feeling that she lost him but then came a day when the girl gathered strength by having two bottles of Breezer, which was normal for the guy. After that she called him and talked to him. When she told him that she is drunk & had two bottles of Breezer then he laughed & said “you had juice”. That one sentence broke the ice & they were together again and talked the way they used to earlier. Both of them were relieved as they were together again.

Alcohol story (a note on paradigm shift from real world to digital world)

Very often it is said “happiness lies within us not in things” – true, but memories attached with things & incidents equally play pivotal role in making life happier. This story is all about memories & incidents.

There were two friends Kiaan & Ritvik. As the name suggest Kiaan was a person with sheer sense of class and sophistication from outside but from inside he was simple, delicate with no knowledge of class & sophistication. The only thing he knew was friend, for which he craved. He considered himself unlucky in terms of friend. Every person, who talked to him with love & affection, would be friend for him because he had a world, where love, affection & care meant friend and loved ones.  His world was a dreamland, which would get shattered every time and so would Kiaan.

 Ritvik was a bit rowdy, mature but immature in some of the things. Unlike Kiaan he was neither good at words nor good in expressing himself, but deep inside Ritvik had a caring & beautiful heart. Ritvik justified meaning of his name. The name meant “like a saint”, Ritvik was a saint. Yet Ritvik was mystery for world.

Friendship of Ritvik & Kiaan was very interesting. They would talk for a week & would go on month long sabbatical because Ritvik used to get angry on Kiaan due to Kiaan’s goofy & silly acts. Everytime the  sabbatical meant “ We are no more friends”. This would shatter Kiaan on one hand & on the other hand Ritvik would get infuriated. They had never met as they were internet friends. Yet they knew eachother very well. Kiaan would steal Ritvik’s status update & would post on his wall. Ritvik knew Kiaan very well. He could read Kiaan’s mind & soul. Kiaan used to share everything with Ritvik. Kiaan used to consider himself nothing without Ritvik. Ritvik was a tahitian pearl for Kiaan. Kiaan & Ritvik were opposite in few things. Kiaan was good at spying unlike Ritvik & that is why Ritvik would call him Jaasus (a spy). Whenever Kiaan asked anything to Ritvik, Ritvik would respond in his witty style “ jaasusi krwa le”.

Kiaan & Ritvik were again on sabbatical, but this time due to one of their mutual friend’s lie & innocent act. Kiaan was very depressed. He cried for several nights. He was in solitude.  Silly thoughts came to his mind. He would read their conversation & would recall those moments.  This would give him hope that things will be fine. One night Kiaan had been for party in a Lounge with his acquaintances. There was alcohol. The moment Kiaan saw alcohol he recalled Ritvik because once Kiaan was caught by Ritvik when Kiaan pretended to be drunk after having Mocktail. This time Kiaan planned to get drunk & lose control over himself.  Kiaan took shots of vodka & scotch. By the end of fourth shot his head was twirling, yet Ritvik was in his thoughts. Kiaan wrote an impromptu message to Ritvik expressing Ritvik’s importance in his life. Kiaan used to write messages to Ritvik but he used to save them as draft but this time he sent the message to Ritvik.  As usual Ritvik didn’t express anything. Weeks passed and things were on place again. The usual leg pulling started. Like always whenever things would get normal between them their friendship would become more stronger & beautiful.

Even today their’s is a story which is incomplete & mystery as Kiaan knows that he never met Ritvik but Ritvik & Kiaan have already met. Neither of them know what & where their friendship would take them. The only thing is that they are enjoying & making their friendship more beautiful & soulful. 

My 1st Poke friend

Facebbook introduced the concept of poke but we all have/had poke friends since the day we were born and she is our Grandmother. Like everyone my Granny (addressed as Thakurmaa by everyone) was cute, who would get annoyed when she found me eating Maggie instead of meals.  She was the one who used to give warning of calling mummy if I don’t listen to her but I would still poke her. She was my storyteller and the one who made me realized how possessive I was. She would teach me about family tradition and narrate stories of my father’s mischievous acts, great-grandfather and his horses. I would listen to her stories silently, which used to appear like the story of King and bad Britishers , where the King was always against Britishers and would file cases against them and end up losing the case everytime. This would make me hate the Britishers for being bad to my King. She was the one who familiarized me with the real meaning of feminism, liberal thought and modernity with values for family tradition.

She had a very good sense of humour. She was equally sarcastic and witty. I see her art of sarcasm with high regards. One night on the dinner table I asked her about the gift she would like to gift to her future Granddaughter-in-law, immediately she gave a witty reply saying “I will gift her thirteen leaves of hibiscus flower”. One day I was in her room and spontaneously asked her about the broken window bolt. She replied in her typical witty style “who else other than you can do this” I looked at her and smiled.

As time passed she grew old and so did her son & grandson, yet her son was a young lad and grandson a new born baby. Everytime when Papa would do any mistake, she would say “this boy will never change” and to it I used to try to explain her that her son is my father. With a sweet gesture on face, she would reply with a smile on her face saying you both will always be child for me.

I was her temple assistant. Everytime she went to her favourite Purandevi temple, she would meet the priest and ask to bless me. Her favourite dialogue in front of the priest was “what is my ek putra kaalidas[1] going to do”. The priest would first laugh and would say “Mrs. Sinha don’t worry. Yourkaalidas[2] is equal to ten lakhs. He will make you proud one day”. She was a voracious reader and when she got to know about my research on our ethnic language, she jumped into my help by making me familiar with typical jargons which even our parents didn’t knew.

 One day during childhood I was having an argument with my mother saying everything is mine. My mother said “Everything belongs to your Thakurmaa not you”. Out of curiosity I showed my school shoes to my mother and asked if it was mine or not and she said that my school shoes was also Thakurmaa’s. It made me furious and I looked for the moment to avenge my anger. During afternoon I saw a chance and went on to Thakurmaa and pulled her chair. She fell down. This incident got me good bane-stick lesson. While I was getting bane-stick lesson, my Poke friend (Thakurmaa) was trying to rescue me.

Time passed and she grew old, her way of spending time changed and so did mine. We would spent time talking and making her laugh by imitating and making mockery of her Daughter-in-laws, Sister-in-laws, her servants and some of the Neighbourhood people (some of her favourite characters). Of all her grandchildren my sister leaded the conversation as she is an expert in imitating people and making laugh everyone. She is Thakurmaa’s special and dearest child. Thakurmaa considered herself to be the luckiest & the one with the best fate and if asked the reason for this, she used to say “how many are lucky like me to get a granddaughter who calls at regular intervals, inspite of being miles away and busy in her hectic life.”  

Everyear Durga Pooja would come and she would recall the Durga Pooja when I made flower garlands for her Deities according to her desired designs. Time passed and on one bright sunny winter morning my poke friend said that now she want me to be with my other poke friends and left me by giving her blessings.

She was ideal definition of friend. She stood by me to help me in my illness, in my studies, made me smile & happy and saved me from scolding.