Seeing your child unfold in front of your eyes is the strangest sight. It is like witnessing a face being carved out from a lump of clay. An individual emerges with her own set of thought and quirks, her own way of interpreting the surroundings. You are awed by the way nature works and wonder if all this is just a dream. You keep reminding yourself that this is the same puny girl with crumpled skin whom you met for the first time outside an operation theater.
I have read enough on the internet to be scared of the terrible two. When I look back at the last one year, I can say that it wasn’t the easiest of times but the thought leaves me with a smile. There was time when I wanted to bang my head on the wall, when I wanted to run away and hide in the hills, when I wanted to sleep peacefully for a night but then there were also millions of moments when my heart melted at the mere sight of her. It was last year when she pointed a finger at me and said Papa. It was last year when I started telling her stories and although she does not understand a word, she listened to them with rapt attention. It was last year when she turned into this non-stop talking machine. I still tell myself that I am not made for being responsible for an individual, that I am still not ready for this but the fact remains that unless you jump into it, you are not ready.
She has started dancing without any qualms in marriages, she started eating Maggi and chocolates, she started admiring herself in the mirror, she started getting scared of doctors and needles, she started copying the maid and broomed the whole house, she started loving those videos on YouTube where someone opens chocolate eggs to reveal gifts hidden inside, she started playing Temple Run, she started liking nail paints and sunglasses, she started loving car rides. Her Bollywood fixation ended, which was a mercy. She is now more into animated songs for children. She is an entirely different person from who she was in the first year. Back then she only slept, pooped and cried. Yes, that was pretty much it.
Having her in my life has made me wonder about a lot of things. There are some things for which you become more perceptive and tolerant after you become a parent. For example, I do not make a face when I see a couple jostling with their crying baby, I don’t say – they can’t even control their child – when I see parents wondering what to do when their child throws a tantrum. I don’t have anything but sympathy and understanding for them. I can even go and help. I also do not understand how people abandon their girl child in dustbins. The mere thought of Anika out there alone send shivers down my spine. I also do not understand how parents allow their daughter to be mistreated by her in-laws. Believe me, I would end up breaking open their heads. I am now filled with more and more anger at how the girls in our country are treated as second-class citizens. I was always a feminist but now I am a feminist with a daughter which makes me doubly dangerous and doubly furious.
This may sound crazy but sometimes I keep thinking of the time when she will leave the house. She might leave to study or work in another city or get married. I know its years away but the mere thought chokes me up. See, its happening as I am writing this. I might cry right now. But, I guess its bound to happen some day. There is a whole world out there for her to see and experience. She will have to fall and fly because that is the only way to live your life. As a father, it is my job to be worried and overprotective for her but I will never take away her wings.
Oh well, I must come back to the present. So she turns two today and I am hoping that the next year will be as exciting and scary as the previous one. She will finally get potty trained which is such a relief because my life savings are depleting buying diapers. She has started joining words so I suppose there will be more non-stop banter all day. She has started understanding the world bit by bit but sometimes it breaks my heart thinking that she won’t remember any of it. She will start making memories only after three and that too will turn vague as time will pass.
Maybe, all this is just for us, her parents, to remember.
She is two and she is sleeping with her mouth open, showing her two front teeth. I must stop writing and look at her. This is an important moment to remember.
Category Daddy Diaries
Daddy Diaries : And she turns one
Dear diary,
Anika turns one today. In the last few weeks, she gave us one jolt after another. First, teeth started sprouting all over inside her mouth. I know that is normal but it was strange to see her with teeth. She looks like a bunny when she laughs which she does a lot nowadays. She farts and laughs. A lot.
She has started walking too. She did a drunk dance for a few days and then one day, got up and crossed a room. Everyone fell silent and looked at each other, as if we have realized that there was a green alien from Mars sitting in the room with us. Then everyone fell upon each other to grab their mobiles. She clapped and laughed and walked. She is still getting the hang of it. Her gait is funny.
She has started eating all kind of food – eggs, yogurt, butter, panner, khichdi – you name it, she eats it. We usually have to put up a song when she eats. Thank God her relationship is over with Justin Beiber’s Baby. The affinity was driving me crazy. Nowadays, it is plain, old Lakdi ki kathi. Bless the Lord.
Diary,
A few days back she made the first connection between a word and what that word means. It was a bit surreal. I don’t know how to explain it. It is like that moment when you understand the first word in a French movie because you have started learning the language. That happiness. That first click. I felt that for her.
And that was the first time I felt how far away she has come from being an unknown face floating in liquids that she was a year back.
Last year, we were worried about everything going right, worried about her grand entry in the world. And when the doctors brought her out – a pink mass of flesh, completely dissatisfied with the change in her quiet existence, hungry, crying – I felt a surge of blood to my face. Something changed inside me. I went to the nursery, saw the nurses put some identification on her as she tried to open her eyes and look at me. I stood there a long time trying to comprehend what had just happened. I became a father. Holy crap!
Dear Diary,
It had been a crazy one year journey. Geet and I went through myriad collection of emotions. Our limits were tested. Sometimes, there were cloudbursts of happiness. Sometimes we went through volcanic eruption of frustrations. But we clung to each other. We watched her face change every day. We saw her pick up new habits and discard the old ones within weeks. We saw her smile one fine day and smiled with her. I won’t lie if I say that there weren’t times when we wanted to break free, when we wanted our own personal space, when all this got too overwhelming for both of us. And that is when our families came to our support. I don’t know what we would have done without them.
But you know what, Diary? We always felt guilty about leaving her behind whenever we went for a movie or a dinner date. We kept talking about her. I remember both of us getting restless when we went to watch a movie leaving Anika with her grandparents for the first time. We could not sit through the second half. And that is when we realized how much our lives have changed. How much this girl has crept up in our thought process. How much she means to us.
In January ’14, Geet and I went on a holiday with Anika to Kasauli. She was seven months old and everyone scared us to bits about taking such a small child to the hills. We still went ahead and immensely enjoyed the trip except for that one time when we had to go to a temple on the top of a hill and taking her there in the pram was not an option. I picked her in my arms and climbed the hill and then scared a monkey away who tried to kidnap her. I was Superman in Geet’s eyes that day. Her jaw scraped the ground and she had no idea how I did that. Neither did I.
Diary,
I wonder what is in store for us in the future. I am scared that she might not pick up my habit of reading or watching movies. I want to discuss books with her. I want to discuss old Hollywood classics with her. I know, I should not be imposing any sort of career choices on her but I want her to an artist – a singer or a painter or a writer or a dancer. I want her to love her profession. I want her to choose a career that fulfils her, not something that just pays the EMI of her apartment. But, well, I think I am thinking far ahead. We will cross the bridge when we come to it. All that makes her happy right now is her plastic fruit basket that she loads and unloads relentlessly with plastic mango, papaya and bananas.
So, one year has gone by Dear Diary. Who knows what the future holds. But I do pray that the fun continues.
Happy Birthday Anika.
Daddy Diaries : Music, Sounds and Radars
Dear Diary,
Sometimes I feel that children are born sadists. How else do you explain their waking and wailing at exactly the time when you are praying to God for a minute’s respite? I can give a million examples –
- Geet and I put Anika to bed and even though we are tired to the bone, we think of indulging ourselves with a bit of ding-dong. We are on the cusp of happiness when Anika raises her head from the cot and start wailing.
- I desperately want to work on the book and miracle of miracle happens and Anika goes to sleep. I haven’t even greased my mind properly to write a few words and there she is, sitting and grinning at me.
- We are getting really late and as soon we glide towards our car, Anika dumps a royal poop in her diaper.
- I have an implementation the next day and I have to get up at 4 am and all I am praying for is a good 3 hours sleep. Anika somehow hears my prayers and wakes up so many times in the night that I wonder why I didn’t stay in the office.
I think children have this radar that catches adult happiness pretty quickly. Then, very clandestinely, they start making elaborate plans for ruining that happiness. I wonder how they do it. Is it some form of a seventh sense? I am glad that some children lose the ability as they grow because the world will be inhabitable otherwise.
Dear diary,
Two teeth have mysteriously appeared in Anika’s mouth and she looks quite cute when she laughs. But before those teeth appeared, we had a harrowing time grappling with the indicators. So almost a month before the twin towers appeared side by side, Anika had an upset tummy that lasted for almost three weeks. Geet and I nearly died of exhaustion during that time. We were changing her diapers for 10-15 times a day. We felt as if there is no other purpose for us to exist other than to be a diaper-changing-machines who were dragging on all four after those horrendous three weeks and were praying to God to have some mercy on them. Anika, of course, had no idea as to what her poor parents were going through. She was busy being a poop Niagara. Finally there was some sunshine and the teeth appeared as our saviour.
Anika has started to crawl with the dexterity of a crocodile master crawler. She can be from one end of the bed to another during the time it takes us to say – Oh Shit! She can now sit in her walker and pose immense threat to all the show-pieces and flower vases appearing in her range. She needs her favourite songs playing in the background when she eats her food. Her favourite songs include – Justin Bieber’s Baby (Sigh!), O Gujaria (Queen), Tum Hi Ho (Ashiqui 2) and Baby Doll main Sone di (Ragini MMS 2), Aaj Blue hai (Paani)x8 (Yaarian) and Gandi Baat (R…Rajkumar). In fact she is so smitten by Tum Hi Ho that she starts staring at the wall the moment the song plays and loses the sense of all her surrounding. It is the correct window to put dollops of Cerelac in her mouth. Bless the Music Director!
Dear Diary,
Anika has started filling the house with her sounds. The first sound she made was Pa-Pa. Of course she has no idea what she is saying and neither does she associate the sound with me. He even calls a flower-pot Pa-Pa. Then the second sound she made was Ma-Ma. Then came Ba-Ba, Ka-Ka, Tat-tat and Bye-Bye. It was a bit surreal after all those cries and throaty laughters.
Sometimes her growth scares me. I mean, she was like a toy earlier to play with but now she has started turning into more human with all those sounds and the way she now recognizes family members and her reactions. It is as if the human that was hidden somewhere inside her is coming out. It makes me more and more aware of the immense responsibilities that Geet and I have as parents. I hope we do well. She is a happy child. She laughs a lot and cries very little (only when she has to oil her happiness radar). We hope we will demolish the radar as she grows up.
Daddy Diaries : The terrorist and the fountain of milk
Dear Diary,
Anika is not well. She has spluttered and splattered throughout the last two weeks. The clan typically went for home remedies which as usual did not help. Finally when the bouts of cough started bringing a crimson tinge to her face, the alarm bells went off and she was taken to a doctor. The poor girl is recovering now and always ends a cough marathon with a ‘Hai’, just like old people. The tribal dances are back with a vengeance.
A few days back Anika was drinking milk from a bottle while Geet and I were bitching about our neighbours. Suddenly, I sensed a cough taking shape from Anika’s throat and removed the bottle immediately. Well, the milk was still in her mouth when the cough finally made an appearance. There was this brilliant fountain of milk that sprouted from her mouth and drenched me and Geet. You could have seen the shock on our faces. We were talking a second ago and suddenly there was this spray of milk on our faces and the bed. It was like one of those days when it is raining heavily and you are trying to cross a road and then a car swoosh by, transferring the muddy water on you.
Now look what have I written! How can I compare a mixture of my child’s cud, saliva and sputum with muddy waters? Let me make amendments by saying that Geet and I enjoyed the spray. It was splendid.
Dear Diary,
During Ashtami, we dresses up Anika all in red and mom bought a red chunni and a lot of colourful bangles for her. Then all of us washed her feet and took blessings from her while she chewed the bangles to we-were-once-bangles shapes. It was hilarious. She was so perplexed and had no clue what was happening. Mom gave her a bit of halwa and she made a disgruntled face and threw it out of her mouth. While washing her feet, I asked her to give me a lot of money so that I could buy her tickets to Switzerland. I think she was excited by the wish.
Image from here
Dear Diary,
Anika is getting very very active. Her hands and feet are constantly moving. Tell me this is normal? There is a four month old girl in our building and she is so quiet and never moves her limbs. And look at our child! I am disturbed because of Anika’s behaviour because she cannot understand that her pulling, biting and pounding might hurt someone. She tries to pull out my eyeballs, my lower lip, Geet’s hair, her teddy’s butt. This little terrorist is terrifying at times.
You won’t believe how many times she has kicked me in the balls. I have been telling her again and again that she is the only heir to the Sharma Empire and Geet and I will never ever have another baby but she does not believe me. She keeps up her efforts to crack my walnuts to make sure that there is no rival. I have never seen someone attacking her own source of existence with such vehemence.
Diary ji,
Diwali is almost here. It has been a year since I wrote the Sita and Draupadi Costa chatter series which everyone liked so much. Anika was a tiny, few centimeters thingy wobbling inside Geet’s tummy back then and we were preparing ourselves for the biggest change in our lives. Now she is here and sometimes this all feels like a dream. She is five months old now and can turn on her tummy. We have started giving her dal and soups. The moment she sees a spoon hovering over her, she opens her mouth eagerly.
A very Happy Diwali to you Dear Diary. I hope you grow fat and healthy.
And a very Happy Diwali to the readers of this blog. I and my family wish success and happiness for all of you.
Anika in her red dress and bangles and a tikka way off the mark
Daddy Diaries : About working hard and Kissing feet
Dear Diary,
I am delighted to announce that the days of the tribal dance are over. As soon as Anika completed her third month, she started adjusting to the fact that a dark room means that she is supposed to go to sleep. Then, my sister-in-law sent her this miraculous gift all the way from America and everything fell into place like a jigsaw puzzle.
Image from here
Now when she has to sleep, she starts rubbing her eyes as if she is hell-bent to claw them out which is a signal to put her in the cot. Then we switch off the lights and switch on the hallucinator (that is what we have named the device) and she goes to sleep within five minutes.
Anika completed four months on Earth on 21st September which means she has completed one-third of a revolution around the Sun. She has started turning sideways. She laughs now and for some spiritual reasons, loves to put her whole hand in her mouth. A few days back, Geet and I took her to her nani’s house. She stayed there for four days. When we returned, my family pounced on her like hungry vultures as they have never lived without her for so long. We were hardly inside the doors when my mom and dad swooshed her out of our arms and started cuddling her. We were scared that she might get crushed between them. Now Anika was confused as they had been erased from her memory in the last four days. Dear Diary, you cannot imagine the ruckus she created. She screamed like the bathroom lady in Psycho for half an hour and leaked a bucket-full of her tears. We were perplexed and kept checking her for any injuries. It took her a day to re-adjust and understand that no one was trying to cook her for dinner.
Dear Diary,
My daily schedule is so tiring that I am hardly able to spend much time with Anika. I leave home at 7 and come back by 8:30 at night. By that time, I am donkey tired but I do try my best to hover over her and remind her of my face. I can see the difference now. She laughs much easily with people who are with her for the whole day. She has difficulty placing me at times. This really scares me. I don’t want to be like those filmy fathers who earn money for the family and are distant from their children. Twenty years down the line, I don’t want Anika to turn around and tell me that I was never there for her when she wanted me, that I was always busy with my work. God knows that will kill me. I have to find a way to be around her and my family, to give them more of my time. I know she will need me more and more as she grows up.
I do not understand the men who say that they are working hard to provide a better future to their children. What is that supposed to mean? Isn’t this what our parents thought too? But we are still working hard, aren’t we? What about the present? What about spending this moment with your child? Diary ji, people might call me unambitious but I will prefer that to my daughter calling me distant.
Dear Diary,
Anika has developed a strange habit. She can’t stay still. At any given point of time, only her head and torso is visible because she is flailing her arms and legs like one of those mutants in X-Men. Now this poses a great difficulty when she is to be fed. Geet and I magically fell upon the solution one day. You have to kiss her feet for her to stop. Keep kissing both her feet and she turns into this obedient entity. I hope this practice does not continue till adulthood.
Time is flying. A few days back we kept aside a few of her clothes that are too short for her now. It was such a surreal moment. She was such a small tiny girl weighing 2.6 Kg when she was born. Now she is 6.5 Kg and 14 cm taller. Isn’t that amazing Dear Diary? She is such a calm kid, laughs all the day and is a perfect recipe to raise your spirits. After my hectic day, all it takes is her smile to drain out all my tiredness.
Life is beautiful. It really is.
Daddy Diaries : Tribal dances and progressive words
Dear Diary,
Anika is three months old now. She has turned into a Bonsai Sumo wrestler. The doctor says its baby fat and we should not worry much. Silly man! He should try picking her up for half an hour. I even suggested enrolling her in a gym and reducing her diet to half but everyone thinks I am crazy. No one pays any heed to her ever growing double chin and her as-thick-as-Qutab-Minar thighs. Her cheeks are like double scoops of butter-scotch ice-cream.
I do not understand why we Indians cannot bear the sight of our crying child and rush to pick her up. Geet and I wanted Anika to have a habit of sleeping in her own cot without any assistance. Of course she cried a bit but that was natural and we had to give her some time to get used to it. Instead of allowing her to adjust to this format, the whole family (including Geet and I) rush to her aid the moment she releases a high decibel sound. Everyone is falling on top of each other to grab her, just like a bunch of zombies who have spotted a living human after months of starvation. Dear Diary, things stand at such a point at the moment that she is now unable to sleep on her own. Geet and I have devised new strategies because the put-her-in-cot-and-be-done-with-it strategy has failed miserably.
Now there are two plans available to put her to sleep –
Plan A. Geet does a very complex tribal dance with Anika lying in her arms. The dance has a lot of squats, jumps and swaying steps. It also includes a weird song that sounds different every time she sings it. While dancing, she looks like Neo dodging the bullets. I am thinking of gifting her with a spear on her next birthday. It will give an authenticity to the whole act.
Plan B. I am a tyro as far as the tribal dance goes but I have devised plan B in case plan A doesn’t work. I take Anika in my arms and move her rapidly in random directions. So a typical manoeuvre will be up-left-down-right-up-up-down-30 Degrees-120 degrees-side… and so on. The immediate effect is that she feels dizzy and faints, which basically solves the purpose. Everyone in the house is amazed that I can put her to sleep in 10 minutes but they have no idea that she succumbs to a rapid change of frames. It is our little father-daughter secret.
Dear Diary,
Another splendid development in the last one month has been that Anika has started saying a very progressive word. Now I call it progressive because even adults shy away from saying something like this so frequently. The word she speaks is – Akuu. Initially I was not very sure what that meant but then one fine sunny day the bulb switched on in my head.
What she really means is – Fu*k You.
And to say that every time with a smile on her face is no small achievement.
“Anika, would you like to have some milk?”
“Akuu.”
“Anika, why are you so cranky? Go to sleep immediately!”
“Akuu.”
“Anika, why do you have to always wake up when I am eating food?”
“Akuu.”
“Anika, why do you drink so much milk and vomit it out?”
“Akuu.”
“Anika, take your hand out of your mouth immediately! Now! Now! Out!”
“Akuu! Akuu! Akuu!”
She even tell the ceiling fan to fu*k off when it fails to entertain her. She loves to watch the fan and the family rotate above her. I think she will go a long way as she has already learnt the one word that is essential for your survival in the world.
Dear Diary,
I think Anika will become a singer. Her wails are raga based. She always cries in a “Ga” moving to “Pa”, “Ma” and “Ni” rapidly. Her hands and the little fingers attached to them move like those of a seasoned classical singer as she gives her performance after staining her diaper and warn us that we better change it. It is a delightful sight. I can right away imagine her performing in an amazing concert and ending it with an Akuu to the audience. Imagine their faces! They will be shocked out of their skins.
Anyways,
I have to go now. The performance has started and it is a full house. I will have to execute Plan B very soon.
Anika with her 2 friends. One of them works for the Queen of England.
Daddy Diaries : Timings, Fire and Nosy Aunties
Dear Diary,
Anika turns two months old tomorrow. She is taller by a few centimeters and weighs almost double of what she weighed at the time of her birth. She now has layers and layers of baby fat on her arms and legs and has a double chin that can shame Adnan Sami (older one). She also has started smiling although she does that more while staring at the walls than the family which scares the shit out of us. We believe that there is a ghost in the house.
Sharma Clan is famous for its sense of timing. We have a 100% track record of understanding the importance of a perfect sense of disruption and I am proud to announce that Anika has picked the trait in just two months of her existence. So, the moment I put her to sleep and tiptoe towards my laptop, she suddenly opens her eyes and start wailing. The feat is repeated when we are eating food or trying to take a nap or basically doing anything that does not involve her. She pretends to be asleep and the moment you happily turn your face emancipating a sigh of relief, she opens her eyes and give an evil grin.
I am so proud of her.
Dear Diary,
We had Anika’s naming ceremony a few days back. It was just a formality as she already has a birth certificate with her name on it. She slept throughout the ceremony, flailing her arms in alarm as if the world was about to end when the priest dropped a utensil on the floor. When the fires were lit in the hawan kund, we deported her inside. The priest had too much time on his hands as he had no other appointments and he took his own sweet time to finish off the ceremony.
Now I really like the fire part of such rituals. I was adding ghee to the fires, just like those vamps in our daily soaps. It is an art. You have to drop the ghee at precise locations so that the wood catches fire properly and you don’t end up suffocating to death. It’s basic survival skills. So the whole Sharma clan was more interested in strategically burning the wood rather than what the priest had to say. He was anyways into too much of Sanskrit. In the end, I had to lower a mini coconut in the fire and I loved to see it burn with the rest of the wood that the family had successfully reduced to ashes.
Then the eunuchs arrived. Their leader was a towering personality (imagine The Great Khali in a saree) who made us shudder by her dance. We had to part with 7500 Rs because the gang repeatedly threatened us that they will be taking off their clothes in front of us. I was amused and actually wanted to see if they are capable of doing that but I got glares from my family and we finally gave in to the blackmail.
I can’t describe how much I abhor all those nosy ladies from Mom’s kitty who came for the ceremony. One of them has a granddaughter of her own who is a month younger to Anika. There is some problem with her eyes as they water very frequently. The doctors say that they might have to do a minor surgery. Now this lady finds solace in scrutinizing all the babies in the colony to find watery or uneven eyes. The first comment that fell off her mouth after seeing Anika was – Don’t you think one of her eyes is smaller than the other?
“Really? Just like your boobs?” I wanted to ask. Of course I held my tongue back. Then she did what we were avoiding to do throughout the ceremony. She smeared Anika’s forehead with the red tilak and then plonked a few rice grains on top of it as if she was a ceremonial goat tied in a temple.
Another lady had a huge issue with what Anika was wearing. She behaved as if we have draped the baby in woolens in peak summers. Then she had a problem with her name too.
“Why Anika? It is a very old fashioned name,” she remarked.
Another one had a problem with Anika’s upper lip. Sigh! Dear Diary, I must tell you that my middle finger was twitching to be raised throughout their stay in my house. I am contemplating putting a sign board outside the house specifying that dogs and nosy aunties are not allowed inside.
Dear Diary,
Anika got two injections in her thigh as well. The moment the needle went in, there was an expression of utter shock on her face and then the scream came 5 seconds later shattering all the glass windows of the hospital. I think she was quite brave, given the fact that her mother still holds my hand while facing an injection and makes a face as if she has swallowed a frog.
Time is flying by. I can feel it. A few days back Geet and I were discussing about how Anika will grow up and leave us one day to find her world. Silly, I know. It all started when I took a policy in Anika’s name that will mature in 21 years. Now I have two policies to take care of in addition to a home loan. The dent in my pocket is so enormous that I can fall through it and out of my pants.
Anyways,
I need to stop. She is awake and quivering her lips like Sharmila Tagore.
So long.
Daddy Diaries : Mind Un-pooped
Dear Diary,
There are some things more scarier than L.K. Advani becoming the Prime Minister of India and him dozing off in his swearing-in ceremony. More scarier than him suddenly waking up and saying – Now I can die peacefully – and then doing exactly that. I wonder how our President will react to that. Wait! Who is our President nowadays?
Sorry Dear Diary, I went a bit off track. I was talking about scary things. Right.
Ever since I have seen parents handling their kids, the one thing that has scared me the most is the act of cleansing the child off undesirable and discarded belongings. I have always found the act repulsive and the mere mention of a diaper would give me cold sweat. I really could not understand eager parents who would open the diapers at the drop of a hat to examine the insides, the same way they would examine their child’s report card years later. There are some who do not take the pain and simply sniff the diaper as if they are strolling in the annual flower show in the Mughal Gardens. Then there are some who put their hand underneath the diaper and weigh it to guesstimate its approximate weight and act accordingly. There are times when I have seen parents indulge in incredibly horrifying and nauseating multitasking like eating Rajma Rice with one hand and handling the diaper with another.
I must admit Dear Diary that I have turned my face away with aversion whenever I have seen the act. But as they say – You can run, you can hide but you can’t escape God’s sadism.
When I discussed it with Geet, we hugged and cried with relief because she felt exactly the same but was always afraid to discuss it with me. She told me of one lone incident when she tried to change her nephew’s diaper and then could not eat anything for the rest of the day. There was a soothing calmness in knowing the fact that we were equally hopeless. Dear Diary, you cannot believe the burden it took away from our shoulders.
The fear returned when Anika was born. Geet was too weak to do anything for the first few days and it fell upon me to do the inevitable act that I have dreaded all my life. The moment of truth had arrived. I waited with bated breath for the sound of release. I had no idea how it would sound like or whether there would be a sound at all. And then I heard it. It sounded like a dormant volcano that has come alive. My heart was in my mouth as I opened the diaper with trembling hands. Beads of perspiration were glistening on my forehead. Geet looked at me with an expression that smelled of pity, helplessness and amusement.
Dear Diary, what happened next was so unexpected that I still find it hard to believe. My mind was un-pooped. There was no feeling of revulsion or disgust. I did not choke. In fact I smiled as if I have discovered diamonds in the diaper. I cleaned her, changed her diaper and then closed Geet’s hanging jaw.
I don’t know how it works. How does your mind behave in an entirely different way when it is your own child. I have been fighting this phobia for such a long time but when the time came and things actually happened, my mind behaved as if it was the most natural things to clean butts smeared with refuse with a straight face. I guess, there are a few switches that are turned on after you become a parent.
This, Dear Diary, has been the most fortunate turn of events. And it wasn’t just me. Geet too did not feel a thing. In fact, there are times when we examine everything closely and discuss various factors like colour, graininess and flow before using the wipes. There have been times when Anika has done a ‘Balam Pichkari’ on my clothes and I have laughed at that too.
I have done it 230 times till now. Yes, I have been counting. It is an achievement dammit. I have also realized the fact that diapers are so expensive. I keep telling Anika to use them judiciously and she has been a nice girl.
Dear Diary,
Time is flying. She is a month old now. Geet and I are already discussing investments for her. Oh wait! There she goes again. Oh! That sound is so amazing. Etna has erupted.
Time to go.
[image from here]
Now that you are here my daughter…
My eyes are adjusting to your presence. The moment when I held you in my hands for the first time seems like a dream. Your being is so surreal that I have to see you again and again to make sure that you are not a figment of my imagination. Your crying sounds like a creaking door and the chap – chap sound you make while drinking milk lands me in convulsions of laughter.
Yes, you have arrived and now that you are here my daughter, I have a few promises to make.
I promise that you will never learn to accept your gender as weak. The idea will never be taught to you.
I promise that you will learn to make your own decisions. I will be there to give my opinion, suggestions and guidance but I will not make decisions for you.
I promise that you will learn to value a human for his thoughts and not for his religion or cast.
I promise that I will be there to help you get up after you fall but I will never stop you from committing what I think are mistakes. I will never strangulate your convictions.
I promise that you will learn to defend yourself and your rights.
I promise that you will know the true significance of this gift of life, that you will value it in all humans above anything else.
I promise that you will understand the significance of hard work, you will understand that success achieved through shortcuts does not mean anything.
I promise you will grow without any cultural shackles. You will never be a part of a family that demands dowry or pray for a baby boy.
I promise you will be taught to respect Mother Earth. You will learn that there is nothing like cultural superiority.
I promise that you will understand that there are only two kinds of humans – the ones who make mistakes and hide them and the ones who accept their mistakes, learn from them and rectify them.
I promise that I will encourage you to fall in love. My opinion about your choice will not matter if you are convinced and happy with your partner. And no, the gender of your partner will not matter.
I promise that I will neither show you off as a trophy nor treat you as a racing horse to further my unfulfilled ambitions.
I promise that I will try my best to incline your interests towards various art forms. I will try my best to make you fall in love with books.
I promise that I will be your best friend. I will listen to you with amusement when you will tell me that your boyfriend got his ears pierced seven times. I will listen to you with pride when you will tell me that you broke a man’s arm with a karate chop when he tried to harass a lady in the bus.
I promise you my precious Anika that I will love you unconditionally. My love will not change with your successes or failures, your decisions or opinions. My love will not change even if I have to change a hundred diapers a day. It will not change even if I end up being sleep deprived and dream of diapers falling from the sky during my random power naps.
I am looking forward to spending the rest of my life with you. I am looking forward to see you take your first step, call me dad, laugh out loud, fall in love and live your life.
p.s. I might be blogging erratically for a while because of my busy schedule of changing diapers and burping the baby. Please don’t mind.
p.p.s This blog might turn into a daddy blog for a while.
Mashed Musings 