Diya's Artwork

The year of ‘The Princess & the Frog'

Sitting on the couch, on New Year ’s Eve, I can’t help but reminisce on the past months and want to capture some snippets before it is over. (Yes, our plans for new year celebration involve sitting in front of the couch and enjoying my brother’s cooking with Ken & Cathy who are our neighbors, friends & surrogate parents all in one.)

“This was the year of the princess and the frog” – Cathy’s words from her Christmas party rang in my foggy mind while I was attempting to wake up this morning. Why did those words get stuck in my head? Somehow they sounded appropriate for our lives this year.

Cathy, of course was referring to Diya & Aadi’s Halloween costumes this year. Diya had chosen the theme as she got to be the princess and Aadi really did not mind being a frog. The costumes suited them perfectly :)

As, I look back over the year, I can trace ‘the princess’ and ‘the frog’ over and over again. Here are some instances:

- Diya got into gardening this summer. She spent a lot of effort and focus on this and grew beautiful flowers. Aadi ate them.
- Diya is already reading fluently just 6 months into kindergarten while Aadi can croak only 3 words: 1) ribbit; 2) choo-choo and 3) car.
- Diya was a picture of perfection at Cathy’s Christmas party in her long flowing dress and impeccable table manners. Aadi ran around their house chasing cats – his tie askew and shirt untucked (yes he wore a suit !) and almost set fire to their house as he tried to hand me a burning candle.
- Diya is learning to control her temper and keep some patience. Aadi’s latest trick is to throw himself on the ground and bang his head on the floor at the first sign of being denied.
- Diya is now sleeping in a bunk bed being very careful to climb up and down from it. Aadi hopped on the bed so much that I had could not allow him on it even while I watched over him. I had to put him back in his crib right away. He tried to chew his way out of there.
- Diya shows her love for Aadi by kissing him. He reciprocates by pulling her hair.

It is amazing to see the change this year has brought in Diya as she matured as a big sister. As for Aadi, maybe our collective love and the thousands of kisses that we shower him with will turn him into a prince some day. I hope not too soon though, I wouldn’t mind if he remains a frog a little while longer. These years are too precious and they are going by too fast !

Happy New Year !!

Party Animal

Diya and I went to buy groceries. We ended up buying a lot. Noticing this, Diya launched the following conversation:

“Mamma, we bought lots and lots of stuff”

Yes, looks like it.

“Hey ! I have an idea !!”

What?

“We can have a party”

Okay

“Whose birthday is next?”

Hmm, no ones birthday is near. But Mamma-Baba’s wedding anniversary is coming up. And you know, it will be our 10th anniversary. That’s big ! So we can have a big party.

“Oh … are you going to get married again?”

That’s a neat idea – it has been 10 years, maybe we should get married again !

“Are you going to marry someone else this time?””

(Hmm …. tempting thought … but maybe I should not freak the little girl out )
No, I really like your Baba and he really likes me. So we will marry each other again.

“Good, then I get to see it this time. Last time you two got married, you did not invite me! “

Favors

We (as in Suvo and Golu) bought a 52 inch Sony Bravia HDTV with a home theater system to match, last Christmas. Today (12/12/10) was the first time Suvo and I sat down in front if it together – that’s almost a year later. I was already numb with exhaustion, the end of the year gets to you at work plus we are planning some home renovation before the holidays and that has us doubly taxed.

I jumped out of my quasi-coma as an obnoxious commercial flashed past my consciousness – “Instant Defense” serum for women between the age of 35 and 60, to reduce lines and wrinkles. ????? Women between age 35 and 60 – is that one age group??Q!W@E#@#%!!!!!

I am going to turn 35 in little over 3 months (at least my honest math tells me so). All the alarm bells started tolling simultaneously. I am not ready for this. What does this mean? Some hidden part of my brain issued a, not so subtle hint, - “Your shopping sprees are not going to focus on finding the perfect skinny jeans – instead they will revolve around finding some ointment to remove crow’s feet around your eyes”.

The sane (or insane –depends on the way you look at it) part of my mind rebelled against this and I frantically looked for a grip. My eyes rested on Suvo, who seemed to be carefully immersed in some private reverie, clearly not interested in engaging about this particular topic – hmm…. If I were a third party I would call this a wise move.

So I had no reprieve, until the next day – when I decided to engage the most perceptive audience of all - Diya. I posed a simple question to her – after she had had a prolonged bath, after a sleep over at Cathy’s, that ended with chocolate chip pancakes - the best possible circumstances. My question to her was –“ Diya – what will you do when I become an old woman”? While I waited with bated breath, her response was cool, automatic, premeditated and dismissive as always – “I will buy you stuff”. !@#@#$???????

I struggled to keep my anxiousness in check, and as I probed further – “What kind of stuff?” – may be that will give me some clue and bring peace to my wild heart. She shrugged her little shoulders and said – “You get what you get and you don’t throw a fit”. This is my standard line to her when I get her something. So, she is planning on returning all my favors – not sure what the right response to this is – “!!!!” or “?????” or "@#$#$%#$%”.

I really need to think this parenting thing through before it comes back to haunt me.

Bacteria

This happened just a minute back! I just had to get on the web and put it up on our blog.

Diya was feeling sick at her school daycare (called the "Adventure Club"). Stuffy nose, fever, tummy ache - typical symptoms of flu. Ankur and I decided that I will pick her up, go home and work from there (I have no meeting to attend today). That way we can get some medicine started and Diya can get also some rest.

When I reached her daycare, she looked very down. We drove back. She was unusually quiet all the way.

So, we reached home, Diya got tucked in and I got her some warm soup to her bed. After a couple of spoons, she got back her voice. And along with that her propensity of constant talking!

We started chatting as I was booting up the laptop. Here's the conversation which took place:

Diya: Baba, why do I need to eat the hot soup?
Suvo: So that you feel better. :)

Diya: But why?
Suvo: Well, the heat will kill the bacteria. Bacteria and virus can live through cold - they just freeze up - but when you put them in a hot place, they die. That's why people boil drinking water.

 Diya: Baba, then we should all go to India.
Suvo: ??!!

Diya saw the expression on my face and explained.

Diya:  In India there is no bacteria. Remember, you said that India is a hot place. There is no snow. So all the bacteria are already dead. ....

... after a brief pause ...

Diya: ... And please remember to go to the internet and read the report which says if a one year old can sit on the lap or need to have a his own seat.

Admittedly, she was already thinking of how to put Aadi on the plane!

Daily Update: 11/22/10

Today was a downright crazy Monday morning to say the least but nothing out of the ordinary I must add. I woke up at 5:33am, rather I jumped out of the bed screaming. I had had a nightmare, not sure about what; but the first thought that I registered was that Aadi had been screaming for a long long time and the volume on the monitor was too low for me to realize – or so I thought. (Yes – we/I have finally made it to the major milestone of moving Aadi to his own room after months of deliberation and finally running out of excuses.) My first reaction was to deliver a kick and an elbow to Suvo to let him know what an outrage had unfolded. Suvo nearly fell off the bed and gave me an uncomprehending look before he turned on his side, adjusted his pillow and went back to sleep. I wanted to punch his face but then I curbed my impulse and for good reason – I just noticed Aadi’s crying by its conspicuous absence. He had gone back to sleep!! This meant that he was not crying for long at all and what I logged on to was an isolated wail that ensues many times a night when he has a cold – like the one he has right now… (grr … I’m loosing my mind). After a cup of milk (aided by the melatonin I had at night) I went back to sleep.

The morning was no different than others, I woke up to the panic that I was too late for work (there was a 7am meeting !@#@$), except for the amount of black ice on the road. Suvo offered the statistics that there were 500 accidents over the weekend due to worsened driving conditions, while he nursed his morning coffee in his pajamas staring at his Macbook Pro and I rushed to get Diya to brush her teeth and Aadi to stop brushing his teeth (with his sister’s toothbrush). I had already gotten “ready-for-the-day” after spending about 9 minutes and 47 seconds to discard my night clothes, brush my teeth and stuff myself into whatever I could lay my hands on from the “work wardrobe” that did not have: a) baby food, b) spit up (I hate those) and c) excessive amount of dog hair (NOTICE – I did not mention “clothes that match”; I have simplified this by buying predominantly black and white so everything matches – a trick I have learnt from Diya, for her everything is pink!).

I found out that the 7am meeting was cancelled, actually it did not exist - my blackberry was not synchronized and was seeing ghosts. This annoyed me, I could have sneaked in another half hour of sleep. I am not exactly sure how the next hour passed – but between catching up with email piled up during the weekend, Aadi pooping twice and Diya wanting to pack 2 pairs of shoes for school (??!!) I hardly noticed the time and suddenly I was up against a 9am meeting that I needed to be in the office for (it’s a good 30 min drive to work on a good day and with this weather all bets were off). I walked Diya to the bus stop impatiently (across the street and one house over), scolding her all the way as she tried to skid on the ice, drag the front of her shoes and messed up the ‘patterns’ her friend had constructed riding his scooter on his driveway –only for his Dad to ruin. Suvo gauged my mental state as I got back home and he offered to drive Aadi to daycare. He also asked me if I would like to go with him (I think he just wanted to demonstrate how bad it was to drive today). I realized that the 9am meeting was not that important and I won’t make it in time to work anyway, I relented to do drop off Aadi with Suvo.

We skidded a few times on our way to Aadi’s day care and back despite Suvo’s pretentious Audi with all-wheel-drive and God knows what other features. Ammani, Aadi’s precious Daycare Grandma, related to us of their horrible Saturday night that they spent on the road as the highway stalled with a compounded 20 car accident. Suvo’s trick was working – by now it had started to sink in that I should probably stay off the road today, what with my VERY limited driving skills – it might be better for everyone involved including my fellow drivers on 494 (maybe we could work in a national security angle here if we stretched our imagination a bit). And so I stayed home – glued to the phone from 9:30am to about 6pm, of course swapping out the cordless phones as the batteries ran out.

The evening was another story all-together, Suvo had brought the kids home while I was still on the phone. I emerged from the basement (my home-office – as that’s where I get the best wireless reception, sitting right next to the modem @#$@) to find that the kids were going wild; there was a pile of dishes; no food at home and at 7pm two contractors were going to show up for giving us “free-estimates” for two completely different home-improvement projects that Suvo and I were thinking of (as if we did not have enough going on already) and with ZERO co-ordination between our efforts. At least, we managed to cancel one of the two before they showed up. Meanwhile, I had pasta cooking while Diya was trying to bake a cake ‘all-by-herself’ and Aadi was vacillating between watching Dora and wanting to come ‘help’ us in the kitchen since it was by far more interesting. Suvo managed to pull a vanishing act.

I was still in my pajamas, that have the motto ‘Peace on Earth’ with a picture of Eyore all over (remember I gave up on going to work, so I changed back thinking I will get into something better after I shower – surprise, surprise, I never really made it that far into my personal hygiene routine). I felt anything but “peaceful”; I got visible cues that Diya was ravenous. She started eating the cake batter RAW. There was chocolate batter on her hands, her face, her clothes, on the countertop, on the floor, on the carpet and on the music systems as she ran back and forth between mixing the cake and endlessly rewinding the “zooby dooby” song from the movie “Three Idioits”(her latest favorite) which was playing at a deafening volume. The pasta was still boiling – who needs whole grain @#$#$%!!

My brother called in to check if I was dead or alive and I shooed him away, promising him to call later in the night (he always understands!).

The contractors arrived 10 mins before 7pm, while I was still working on getting the pasta sauce ready and Diya was watching over the cake cooking in the oven. Suvo materialized out of thin air, to spend full 17 minutes with the contractors (who wanted to sell us new windows for a mere 40k so we could take advantage of the HUGE 1.5k of stimulus tax credits) before smoothly getting rid of them, all the while entertaining Aadi and reigning in Maple, who wanted to greet the visitors to death.

I proudly served the pasta to Diya, and even managed to sprinkle some cheese on it. She commented –“It does not look good”. That’s when the flood broke loose. I am not exactly sure what happened for the next 20 seconds or so, I only remember that I did not recognize my own voice as I poured in all my frustration and exhaustion of the day on our little princess. Anyway, the result was that (about 45 mins later) Diya finished all her food, ‘all-by-herself’ (even though she took a potty break in between). I used the 45 minutes to do a vanishing act myself, which involved finding a bottle of Pinot Noir, reading 30 odd pages of a book and taking the long postponed shower. I was much better composed at the end of it.

I came downstairs to find Diya, Aadi and Suvo collectively in a good mood. Diya was eager to point out that she finished her food and used that fact to blatantly earn her next phase in the evening i.e. frosting the cake. I could not deny her that, especially with the guilt of unloading at her earlier (she does know how to cash you in). So I gave her full access to the jar of frosting and a box of sprinkles. She completed the task diligently and then demanded that I let her light a candle and cut the cake immediately. I let her have her way. I even gave in to singing ‘Happy Birthday’ even though her birthday is 2 months out-of-date (maybe that’s within the margin of error).

Diya helped herself to about a quarter of the cake. I stopped myself from restraining her as I realized how I thought a bottle of Pinot Noir to be an acceptable helping (even a recommended serving) on a weeknight – its all about perspective!

The rest of the evening/night went in a blurr with “All iz Well” from ‘Three Idiots’ playing full blast in the basement. Diya and Aadi mounted on a chair together, trying to play Suvo’s double-decker keyboards as Suvo tried to express himself through saxophone. I think, I even managed to return my brother’s call in the midst of this chaos.

Somehow, Suvo managed to put the kids to bed as I stayed back to narrate the events of the day. Its 11.38 pm and my battery (I mean both mine and my laptop’s) has almost run out after 3 failed attempts of posting this on blogspot. Somehow, dinner fell off the table (not so literally) and I must so get some sleep – have an early meeting tomorrow and I really need to be able to make it to work.


NOTE: This was supposed to be a short account of my day – much in the spirit of keeping a ‘blog’ – I guess I just can’t help my self – or maybe it has something to do with how my life unfolds.

Growing up or growing old? … same difference !

As the plane pulled out of the gate, I felt like a brick fell on my stomach. At first I was confused; we had not started taking off yet so this could not be the usual air-sickness that hits me (grr… I will never get used to flying). It wasn’t until my eyes started welling up (which is not part of my usual responses to air sickness) that I got the first clue. I frantically sorted through my head to triangulate the signals and there it was – staring right back at me from the deep recesses of amygdale (the emotional part of our brain that we grown ups try so hard to keep suppressed so we always come across cool & collected) – an undiluted bout of sheer home-sickness.

I was on a flight to Mumbai, going to Pune for a week on a business trip with some colleagues. I did a quick scan around to make sure that my co-workers had not noticed me demonstrating, what I’m sure they will think as, juvenile behavior. Next, I did an inventory of my brain to make sure nothing else was lurking out there, ready to jump at me. Sure enough right around the corner, walking hand-in-hand, were shock & surprise grinning mischievously at having caught me off-guard. I frowned to make sense of this – home-sickness is such a normal reaction, why am I surprised? Then the realization hit me – I wasn’t surprised at being home-sick, I was shocked that I had never really experienced this emotion before. I travel a lot; I moved away from home to study; married and settled away from all family ties - but always the excitement of moving forward offset the pull to stay back.

So, there I was, 34 yrs old and smug in my assumptions that I have gone through a lot, I can deal with anything and stay ‘cool & collected’- sitting with my fists balled up in my lap so I do not involuntarily call the flight attendant and tell her that I need to get off this plane NOW. Slowly, I closed my eyes trying to understand what brought about this change. Am I still growing up and still in the process of discovering these fundamental building blocks of human psyche or am I just growing old and soft in the head? Does it matter?

The reason for the change was clear – Diya and Aadi’s faces lit up behind my closed eyes and the picture created a pull so strong that all my carefully constructed dams, that I built over many years to protect myself in the event of any ridiculous weepy-eyed emergencies, gave away and I surrendered to the single tear that rolled down my face. I pulled the eye-mask on and concentrated on thinking what all can I buy for the kids on this trip – the thought made the rest of the trip bearable. There is nothing like shopping to cheer you up!