Infants cast mysterious magic spells...

Living with the central characters of my life's script, delight and awareness have become synonymous to my days and nights. None other time pass appeals more than spending time with kids - be it friends or movies or shopping - and office actually seems enemy-like. In fact, I have been taking many offs from work recently, and quite helplessly too. As if the prospect of doing the jobs of two children with my own hands and watching them grow for a longer time was not enough, the force recently TRIPLED. Yes tripled! Vasu, Darsh and now "Vaibhav". Vaibhav, born on 3rd of December'2006 at 11:46 AM - is the youngest and the most charming kiddo at home - my cute little nephew. The urge is but naturally overpowering. Yet to turn two months old, the angellic looks invariably makes amazingly steady eye contact for minutes together. He listens (discerningly as if) and almost consistently quips ideal responses through his heart-robbing facial expressions and coo-coo voices. When his delicate thin rosy lips curl to form a smile, his sugar sweet coo-coo voice adding tasteful music to the ambiance, he seems as if actually rejoicing your joys and jokes [:-D]. He recognizes his mom rather distinctly and becomes more vivacious at her sight and touch. Truly turning out to be an expert at stealing hearts, he brings wider smiles and louder chirps wherever he is present. [:-)] Loads of best wishes and long life for him! God bless him! AMEN!

General but very subjective...

Talking with a fellow parent invariably renews my own zest and commitment as a parent. The utter enthusiasm and the distinct twinkle in their eyes is infectious. I gather the feelings in parenthood are pervasive and quite general. Let me recount some cute accounts I heard recently... One of the colleagues of my younger sister at Navisite has a one year old son - same as Darsh's age. He fondly talks about him and tells that wherever his son accompanies, he renders the standards higher. Wondering what it implies??? Well..well... wherever his son goes, people have to put everything higher so as to keep them out of his reach! [:-D] I absolutely identify. Infact, any parent of a toddler will identify with his experience. [:-)] One of my colleagues, Mita, has an adorable three year old daughter - four months younger to Vasu. The locus of her mom's energy, Laasya is a consistent and frequent topic of our gossiping sessions. And aren't they absolutely enjoyable. The girl almost habitually leaves Mita at the end of her lucid wits. [:-D] Like, one evening Mita reiterated to her that she sees everything Laasya does and does not, even when she is not around her... Laasya instantaneously quipped, "Are you Durga Thakur???" [:-D] Another day, Laasya was being very naughty at the nearby temple... running about in the premises, giggling and chirping non-stop. So her mom had to ask Laasya to make use of some peace, sit down and pray. Guess what, not only did she oblige, but started praying thus with her hands folded and eyes tight shut - General, yet not quite... " Bhagwaan ji, mujhe thodi shanti de do, aur thodi toffees de do. Mummy ko bolo ki woh mujhe thodi icecream bhi dila dein aur mujhe ghumaane le jaayein. Mujhe bade school mein daal do..." ... her wish list was going on and on as her mom watched her with astonishment and eventually prompted her to say thank you as well to Bhagwan ji. [:-D] Speaking about prayers, let me also share here the first time when Vasu pleased me in a similar fashion. It was early January or late December. One night I requested Vasu to chant prayer loudly on my behest. Not only he obliged, but also chanted Namokar mantra thrice and carried on with the names of Tirthankar Chaubisi, just like I had been praying before him loudly, whenever I got chances. Man! Wasn't it delightful? I felt so gratified. He exemplified, he not only listened to me carefully but also was sensitive to my preference to the count of three. The day I also realised for the first time that he was memorising the names of the 24 Tirthankaras, I rhythmically chanted before him a counted few times. [:)] Now, with time, he has become more fluent with the names and Namokar Mantra. His pronunciation is much better and fluency more consistent. Yet none of it can overlap the joy of the first time, but obviously.

SHHShh...!!!Someone is sleeping...

Here are some adorable photographs that I took of you while you were enjoying a baby sleep... These are my lucky moments as a photographer... [:-D] Babies look like angels while they sleep, don't they? [:)] Any parent will agree and identify with my feelings... the strong urge to shower kisses and hugs to ones offspring, while he/ she sleeps - so lost and content - warm and secure - looking lovely, as if a fairy sleeping alongside, a smile invariably envelops the face expression, when one watches a baby sleeping. One day was especially my lucky day, for I caught both of you sleeping side by side... ...facing each other, making a connection as if in your slumber...[:-D] I quitely captured those moments to cherish...[:-)] to keep with me forever - to share with both of you later on - hoping that you would enjoy these moments as much as I did then. Here, this image belongs to you Darsh - when you were a couple of months old... or may be lesser... I do not really remember. Excuse my short memory dear. And this model picture in green suit, I precisely remember, was taken by me the day you turned two months old. I will confess something here... I did not find you cute at all when you were barely days old... you had hair all over your body including your face... You had a dark complexion and a bigger upper lip. I had no idea that you had the potential to look a cutie pie later on... [:-D] All the solo pictures above belong to you and none other. Who can believe that you looked really unattractive when you were born? You started looking cute to me when you started sitting by yourself (around four and a half months old I guess). And now over to you Vasu...Here I captured you yawning!!! I know you must be wondering about your baby pictures while sleeping. Well...I don't have them. [:-(] But you know what... you looked absolutlely gorgeous as an infant and a toddler. Unlike Darsh, you had balanced features, fair complexion and really attractive and spell-binding eyes and lips.(:-D)

TWO SIDES OF A COIN...

Have you ever felt like you cannot take it anymore... your patience runs out ...words in your mouth are no more warm and logically schemed... all you are left with is a sense of incompetence and frustration... Well thats precisely what I feel at times when I am around my two sons, who are old enough to run around but not old enough to be prudent and careful in their choices. Master of their independent moods and mind, they share an amazing chemistry and coordination. When one of them decides to be picked up by me, a sense of fiery competition prevails and I turn out to be the victim. They surround me from both sides, vying for my exclusive attention and putting me at loggerheads thus. It is both overwhelming and irritating to find them wailing at the loudest decibels their tender lungs can manage and outdoing each other to prevail in the war for occupation of my lap! It is particularly enchanting to watch the victorious looking down upon the lesser in his eyes and finding a peculiar joy in wondering what the other is doing now...[:D] Eventually, I end the tug of war by holding them both side by side (torturing myself thus to an extent) and give them a taste of equality and sense of togetherness. [:D] I must say I cherish these moments of agony, as they bring home a very important point... that we are a FAMILY.[:)]

One Christmas afternoon of your life...

Hi Vasu, This Christmas Bhanu planned an animated children's movie exclusively for you. Your second trip to the big screen again sponsored by your dear mausi.. the movie was "Happy Feet" - an animated movie having a lots of penguins depicting an emotional saga of love, heartbreak and daring. You seemingly did not like the movie much. You told us to drop you back home right after the intermission. You said,

"aap mujhe yahin chod do. Mujhe ghar jana hai. Aap movie dekh lo." [:P]

Now a tickling moment from the day... As we had to wait for the cinema hall doors to open at PVR Anupama-saket -3rd Floor (hall no. 4 I guess), we bought you fanta upon your clear-cut demand and ourselves started enjoying nachos. We got so busy with ourselves - chatting, observing the crowd and crunching the corn-made nachos relishingly - that we missed the moment when you moved away from us. As soon as we realised your absence from our side, we looked over and guess what we found you doing??? You were having a critical closer look at a revealing full-size poster of Bipasa Basu - esteemed very hot bollywood actress. [:D] After a content look, you turned about and realised that we were watching... Bashful and naughty you looked while you came back to us sipping your fanta. [:D]

SANITY AT ITS WORST

Irrespective of age and era, bringing up a child demands extensive emotional bonding, physical labor and financial support. From rearing a life for nine long and trying months in one's womb to hellish experience while delivering the infant and the sleepless nights that invariably follow - from a restrained life routine revolving around your child(ren) to prioritizing all expenses related to the offspring(s) at the top to appear last yourself in the budget list - from sharing each of your child(ren)'s joy and sorrow to forgetting about your own in the whole process - it indeed takes a soulful lifetime of parental commitment to bring up a happy child... and dismally enough neither the children who commit suicide nor the countless killers at large pay any heed or respect to the efforts and feelings of the parents in question. Depressingly, all love, austerity and restraint of parents/ guardians is side cornered to the extent of neglect in the face of few self-centered and selfish motives/ desires.

PROLOGUE

I hope one day you have the patience to go through this blog to read it throughout. I guess this blog will make meaning to you only once your will realize how life is passing fast and steady, like sand passes through ones fingers.

It seems as if it was just yesterday that my mom used to take care of me like I take care of you now… her touch used to render me fearless, secure, protected, fast asleep… just like presently my touch relieves and relaxes you to baby sleep.

THE BLOG STARTS HERE...

It has sort of become a habit with me … to wake up in the pin drop silence of the mid night and wondering about life, death, the real and the surreal. It all seems so distinguished and distinct in the darkness just before dawn. The moment is just idyllic for introspection and retrospection.

The lethal silence brings me face to face with life and its pace… how it is drawing dangerously closer to the moment when a pang will become inseparable only to depart in death. And who knows how would the luxury of being alive choose to show its back. It’s a secret, but I always used to count my age one year ahead so as to feel younger for a longer period of time. Thus I remained twenty-two for two absolute years and yet I cannot distinctly recall any one of them! From twenty-two once upon a time to twenty nine today, I am painfully aware that it will soon become twenty nine once upon a time and sixty five today, just like the life that lays faded in my meandering memory lanes at present!

I often look back in time and find myself as the same person who was once only six-year-old. Then the years that outlined the transcendence from childhood to adolescence came and went unnoticed, past so fast that I fail to remember that they ever existed.

Who knows whether I am entitled to the next round of breath? It makes me realize how luxurious it is to be able to breath… so pleasant it is to inhale and exhale fluently. An earthquake struck in Gujrat without a warning, didn’t it? Even the Tusnami in South India did not ring a doorbell. Accidents on roads, heart- attack at home, brain hemorrhage on the office chair… death is fearless and unrestrained. There is a plethora of means to die and only one way to stay alive – by sheer good luck! If the whole account leaves you with an impression that I am dreading death, you are NOT entirely wrong. I do dread death for myself and others, but what I fear more is the fate that waits beyond death for each one of us… I feel the cycle of death and birth is too frustrating and distressing. How can we let it happen to us over and over again and do nothing about it? To be absolutely honest, each time I had my babies, I was unable to take the experience in an absolute worldly manner. Each time, it was painfully realized that a soul had taken re-birth; each time the baby seemed miserable during the initial days - as if feeling physically feeble - detained and emotionally frigid - fearful. While I played an eager parent, I was aware that the same fate awaits me upon dissolution of this life. Imagining myself in their shoes ran a chill down my spine... picturing myself as helpless and as weak in the infant body! And then I also hoped to be born as fortunate, to be handled with similar care and sincerity... Does my imagination know any limits?

When I was not visualising my infant sons as a re-incarnation of a soul, I felt the nip of the ordeal that every infant faces - so oblivious of his enviornment, a very tiny fragile being that one day opens his eyes to a bright, colorful and magnanimous canvas of mother nature... all the time coming across a never-ending train of good and bad surprises - the magnitude of the world, which is now learnt to us by heart, must seem so confusing, large and extensive! And then one day unsparingly, every innocent baby has to grow up to realize the devastating truth about life - that is the eventual absence of life! And no one can avert that.

I still feel restless because I am helpless - I cannot avoid the day when my innocent and lively children will also realise and even observe the play of life and death before their eyes equally helplessly. Right now they believe life goes on without hurdles and endlessly. They neither know religion, its need and its role, nor they have any interest. But one day they will be robbed off their sweet ignorance and serene innocence, as per the strict and undelible rule of nature.

They will need to face life one on one... with nobody around to comfort them… probably with a flawed attitude entailing lust and unreasonable expectations out of others.

And when all these thoughts strike, I realize that the path shown by Jinendra Bhagwaan can only relieve us and put an end to all kinds of restlessnesses and anxieties.

Hey kids I hope I make sense to you…If you are reading it before reaching your mid twenties, you may find it rubbish – my depressed mom! She is a professional at killing/ supressing fun element of life... Blah blah blah … if that is so… I request you to read it when you feel you have aged… and then you will understand what I wish to say. It is in no way to depress or discourage life… it is only to spend it most prudently for the best of results in both the worlds. Jai Jinendra!

My Little Cracker...

This post is dedicated to the little "patakha" (cracker) in my life. All of one, he is making me adore him more day by day - my little one - my second born!

Consistently practicing out newer stunts that I find too adventurous for his little human body to handle, he has been outdoing my expectations out of him in terms of achieving his physical and mental milestones for the first year.

He made his first steady eye contact with me lasting at least ten seconds when he was just 10 days old. He handled his head when he was barely two months. He started sitting without support when he was approximately four months old. He started crawling when he was seven months old. He started walking when he was nine months plus.

Nowadays, he is my one year old bundle of joy!

When he is annoyed, he frustatingly repeats "tetetettettetee...".

When in a loving mood, he affectionately obliges my demand for a sweet sound of "mama".

Oh!!! the deliberate "mama" sounds so much sweeter than sugar to ears!!! His cuckoo sound is so gentle, caring and absolutely lovable.

His eyes have a definite sparkle and his face glows as soon as he finds the open door of the small mandir ji at our home. He immediately rushes to the entrance in sheer hurry with a smile on his face reflecting excitement and naughtiness. He throws himself inside by all means and only initially folds his hand as if to pray... but it is a pure show off - a clever manifestation to get an affirmative nod from his guardian during the moment for an entry in the mandir ji - but as soon as things settle down and he is not prohibited inside, he comes in his real form - his destructive ways - a tornado at large. [:-D]

He prefers targeting the main door of the house more than playing windstorm in mandir ji. But he chooses between what is feasible and readily available. He does not believe in cribbing over a lost cause. [:-)]

A very handsome little human being of the ideal height to render him most cute and absolutely adorable - I want to freeze my moments with my SECOND BORN as he is right now. Specially when he stands besides Vasu that sharply pinpoints his cute stature, he oozes oodles of grace, style and individuality from hair tips to toe nails. The sight of his simply mesmerises me to hypnotism.

I wish I could capture these moments forever to relive them whenever I felt like it. [:-)]. I hope God blesses him in the most special of His ways! Amen! OM! Shanti! Shanti! Shanti! Regards.