Happily Ever After …..

DISCLAIMER: “All characters appearing in this work are fictitious. Any resemblance to real persons is purely coincidental. The names selected for the characters are arbitrary and have no bearing to their personalities.”

Once upon a time there was a Princess. Her name was Princess Dynamite. Everyone called her Princess D with love. She was strong-willed and short tempered but she was also very kind and generous. The Princess loved her family dearly, specially her baby brother Prince Adorable.

Prince Adorable was a happy baby, cute and very squishy, but he was also very naughty. Everyone called him Prince Ado. He loved his family too – but most of all he loved his big sister Princess D. Princess D and Prince Ado lived with their parents, the King and Queen of the ‘Land of Impossible’.

Princess D and Prince Ado played everyday. Prince Ado followed his big sister every where she went. He wanted to do everything like her. He wanted to sleep in her bed, play with her toys and even try out her clothes. Princess D shared everything with her baby brother and made sure he did not get into any trouble or do anything dangerous – like swallow her golden pendant or dunk her mermaid toy in the ‘Royal Potty’.

One afternoon Princess D was quietly lying down and reading her book when Prince Ado came and sat on her face. He was really trying to sit on her lap but misjudged and ended up on her face – messing up her hair and … Oops … tearing her favorite book. Princess D was of course very angry but she controlled her temper and told Prince Ado –“No Thank You brother – please play with something else. This book is not for you” – and she went off to find some sticky tape to fix her book. Prince Ado then started playing with his sister’s little puppy toy which looks like a real dog and barks and wags tail if you press a switch. He found this toy royally entertaining – but he hugged the toy so hard that it broke a leg and gutted out the batteries. Princess D returned from having fixed her book to find her puppy toy in shambles. She was now very very angry and she screamed at her baby brother in her native language: “BHISHON BOKE DEBO!!!” which means ‘I will scold you royally’. Prince Ado, not knowing what went wrong, got very upset to see his big sister in such distress. He snuggled up to her and hugged her. Princess D thought he was upset because she scolded him and felt very bad. She gave him lots of hugs and kisses. They both calmed down but the Princess needed to take a break so she went up to her room to cheer herself up by trying out some new dresses.

The Princess was busy admiring herself in the mirror in a new gown which flowed up to the floor and swished from side to side as she twirled around or walked. Just then the Queen Mother entered into Princess D’s room unannounced and admonished the Princess for putting on the new gown when she was supposed to get ready for a nap instead. The Queen insisted that the Princess change the gown immediately. This was TOO MUCH for the Princess – first her book was torn, then her little puppy toy met an ugly toy death and now Queen Mother was not happy with her and she could not take it any more and burst out –“NOOOOO ….. I DON’T WANT TO SLEEP …. I DON’T WANT TO CHANGE MY CLOTHES … I DON’T WANT TO TALK TO YOU …...”

Queen Mother was very sad to hear this. She told the Princess in a very firm and serious tone –“Honey, please don’t speak to me like that. I just wanted you to change your new dress so it does not get ruined and you can wear it for your birthday party. But you don’t want to listen to me and you misbehaved with me. I will not speak with you if you talk to me like that. You are a big girl now and can take care of yourself, so do whatever you like, stay by yourself and don’t speak to me and I will not speak to you” and so the Queen Mother stomped off.

The Princess was stunned. She was feeling very sorry now. So she threw herself on her bed and deeply contemplated for 3 minutes. Then she walked over to her Mother in the other room, who seemed to be immersed in some deep contemplation of her own. Princess D climbed into the Queen Mother’s lap and made the following statement: “Mother – I never want to get married” … Queen Mother was startled out of her reverie and wondered what string of thoughts brought the Princess to this conclusion? Did she, the Queen, in her angry discourse said something that made the Princess think that she was stubborn and difficult and worried if she would be capable of adjusting with other people in her life (and hence should not get married) … or were these guilty reflections of her own self-doubting thoughts ….?

The Queen decided to tread this course extremely carefully as she did not want to make any scars on the delicate mind of the Princess. The Queen said very gently to the Princess, “Darling, you can do whatever you like, if you do not want to get married, then you do not have to get married” and also added the more desirable option “… but if you want to get married, then you can get married and we will be very happy”. The Princess considered this for a moment, recognized the thinly veiled recommendation and explained her position by saying, “Queen Mother, I do not want to get married ever because I do not want to go away and stay by myself. People who get married have to go away” “… so this (the fear of separation) is what bothered the Princess!!” (she had taken the “stay by yourself and take care of yourself” to heart) … the Queen Mother almost cried out in relief … but suppressed her smile as she did not want the Princess to think that her Mother was making fun of her concerns. Meanwhile a new revelation hit the Princess and she exclaimed – “Mother, how about I get married to my baby brother Prince Ado – then no one ever has to leave?” The Queen was not really surprised at this turn of events, for she knew that her daughter was very creative and unique in her thinking … but she knew she had to find a way to educate the little Princess. And so she explained to the Princess – “My dear little daughter, we do not marry people within our family … because, if we do that, then we will never ever meet new people. We marry outsiders so we can make new families.” She further clarified to the frowning Princess D, who was trying hard to figure out this strange new concept –“See, if people married their own brothers and sisters, then I would never meet your Father, ‘King Impossible’ and you and your brother would never be born.” The Princess mulled this fact over and being born with indefatigable logic came up with the final solution to the family predicament – “Mother O Mother – I know what to do!!! When I grow up I will marry a Prince and we will make a very big castle. And the Prince Ado will grow up and marry someone and he can come live with us and you and Father should come live with us too. And we will all live together for ever and ever …. !!!”

Amen.

P.S. Everything is possible.

How To Laugh Your Stress Away

They say "stress relief with humor" is quite effective. We do think it's true to some extent.

Sara - Our New Cleaning Lady

It was a work-day. I was working from home as Diya was at home that day. She already "graduated" from her pre-school, and was waiting to join Kindergarten the following week.

After working hard for an hour as Sara, our new cleaning lady, she decided to take a long break. :)

The Car Ride

Coming Up ...

Let there be light !

This happened a few weeks ago. We were planning to have a backyard concert – an annual event where we invite all our friends to gather in our backyard for some music and food; improvising our deck as a stage and asking every invitee to perform something.

It is always challenging to schedule this event in advance as Minnesota summers are known for the thunderstorms that materialize out of nowhere and ruin any outdoor evening plans. Yet, all participants needed much advance notice so they could prepare & practice their performances. There is also quite a bit of organization and arrangement that goes along to convert the deck into the stage, getting all the music instruments & PA system out, decorating, planning the food etc. In short, it was not possible to do this party impromptu. So we set a date tentatively and started tracking the weather for many days leading up to it. We did not realize but Diya got a hang of the concept.

The weekend before the party some of our friends had gathered for a practice session and the conversation inevitably turned to the weather and whether the weather would cooperate. The more optimistic people (like me, proclaimed confidently that everything will be fine) and the more pessimistic folks (like Suvo, prophesized doom and gloom as ever). Trying to avoid domestic meltdown some of our friends intervened and suggested we take shelter in science – lets looks at the forecast! So we pulled up the ‘wunderground’ report for the next several days. It did not help us much as the forecast showed rain and shine alternately for the next several days – really meaning that it was going to be a flip of a coin, not really helping the somber mood that was threatening to descend on all of us. But Diya suddenly noticed the screen, and never wasting a chance to participate, said something that left us all laughing (except her ofcourse!). I will type it verbatim, as I can never quite wordsmith as well as she can –

Diya - “Mamma is this showing the weather”
Me – Yes, shona.

Diya – “It is going to be rainy tonight!”
Me – hmmm …

Diya – “Is this next picture for tomorrow?”
Me- yes tomorrow morning, (and anticipating the next 5 questions, I continued to say) and the one after is for tomorrow night, and the one after is for day after tomorrow morning ...

Diya – “Oh … tomorrow is going to be cloudy” … she paused for effect and not getting any response from us she continued …. “and then in the night it is going to be “moony!!”)
Me – I opened my mouth to correct her but could only laugh at her irrefutable logic – if it can be sunny, rainy and cloudy then why can’t it be moony??

The real kicker came the next day when I was driving her back from the daycare. She had inevitably picked up our anxiety around weather and somehow wanted to help. She was uncharacteristically quite and soon said very thoughtfully – “Mamma, I want to be a weather girl when I grow up”. I was suddenly alert – where did this come from, we spent a lot of time drilling in her head that she should be a doctor or an engineer. So I gently asked, why do you want to be a weather girl? She said without hesitation – “So I can make it sunny everyday !!” :)

Diya With Mom's Camera

Diya decided it is high time that she starts taking things (like mummy's camera) into her own hand :-)