Spring break is here, and with just the right sense of timing and perception, the boys have decided that now is the time they will get along well together, without too many of their customary 5 minute interval clashes. A quiet afternoon, after work, and I am lying on the couch with this vague headache, which I cannot shake off over the past 2 days, which feels like its come on because of some toxic build-up. The boys who had been playing upstairs all this while are now playing around me. Not too loud, not too quiet, just the kind of noise level that doesn't rattle your nerves.
I have a shawl over my eyes to block out the uncomfortable light and am trying for a short nap, hoping it will kick off this nagging discomfort. But before my mind can release its hold and let me rest, a few thoughts come swimming up to the surface. And even as I am about to be caught up in them, I realise its happening, but feebly.
Sometimes, thoughts are so darn powerful, that while they happen, they have this truly dreamlike quality, making events, past and a forecasted future, seem so real, so tangible, and evoke emotions that are just as raw, that you know that you are bound to feel them at some point. Right then, I was having a sudden and intense perception of what it would feel like the day Winkie, as the first born, left the home nest, for his future. In a short 2 minutes, the scene played out, very very real, and the feeling of that goodbye, and the consequent emptiness in the house washed over me. I had always believed that I had a certain innate sense of detachment within me, which would only grow over time, to help me deal with that particular life situation, with a very stoic back. And perhaps, I still will. But I realised that I was also going to feel a lot more than I think I am capable of right now. The desolation of the children leaving the house, one by one, will surely find its way into my heart as well, and for that second, I even felt what that was like.
Disturbed out of my sleep mode, I threw off the shawl and looked around for the kids. They were still there some 10 metres away, playing some game conjured up from their imagination. But right then, even that distance was too much for me, and I called out to Winkie to come sit with me. He walked over, delighted by this sudden spotlight of my loving attention on him, and cuddled around my feet. I told him about my catnap dream, and he smiled some more. I told him that I wanted to enjoy all that I could of him for the time he was with me. He said ok, and cuddled some more. I turned my head, to see Thambi standing there, looking a bit left out and waiting to be called too. The instant I signalled, he bounded over and cuddled in the quickly narrowing space on the sofa. Before long, they were back in the thick of their game. In it, they had just escaped the chase of the shark in the water (the floor) and were now safely in the boat (the couch), and rowing hard to get to safety. Thambi tried to get Winkie to go upstairs with him, but for the moment that was out of the question as Winkie told him " I am staying here with Amma forever."
Slowly, the intensity of even that moment passed, and as my eyes closed under the pressure of my recent thoughts, the boys rowed themselves safely to shore, and made their way up the island, to their room. For the moment, all crisis had been successfully averted, theirs and mine, as I gave in to the luxury of sleep.
Yesterday morning, early enough by most standards, I was suddenly seized with the urge to do something that had been in the back of my mind for awhile. Which negates that it was a spontaneous action in the first place, but the early morning timing of it certainly was. I hurriedly punched in the numbers to deactivate the alarm system, got into my flip flops and thump-thumped my way down the stairs to where I knew I would most likely find it. There were a couple of boxes on top which I had to lift out of the way first. But underneath them all, there it was. Just as I thought it would be. Covered ever so carefully in plastic sheet on top, blocking out any source of dust or moth. I eagerly prized away the covering, and laid my hands on one single object on the top, lifted it out and measured it with my eye. Yup! It was about right. And when I looked inside at a tag, it said '3T'. This was it!
All of Winkie's 4-5 year clothes, carefully sorted some 3 years ago, the good pants, the good shirts, the still nice tees, and all laid neatly into this box, and covered up and put away so that in another 3 years, when the need for it was born, it could be opened again.
And as I found it again and opened it yesterday, I realised how intensely delightful this process has been for me. How I love buying clothes for their wardrobe, careful of price, mindful of colour and cognizant of my own tastes and preferences. How much of freedom I have in this enterprise and how it is my choice that they carry out on their backs, every single day. Its pretty amazing, when I get down and think about it. How much of delight they take when they have a new shirt to wear one fine day. To this day, I have never heard one negative remark, except for when only one kid has a new thing to wear, and the other doesn't, because the need doesn't call for it.
It is one of my simple pleasures every morning, to pick out something for them, and make sure the creases are out before they get it on. Winkie still hasn't reached that point of separateness where he wants to choose for himself. He is happiest when I do it for him. I love to see the end result of that everyday, as they walk in hair neatly combed, lip balm glistening on their lips, a dash of vibhuti faintly on their foreheads. Winkie almost always sneaks up on me quietly, to take me by surprise and contains his excitement at showing himself off with a very shy smile, which gets shyer when he notes the appreciation on my face. The little guy on the other hand comes tumbling down the stairs, every footstep marked and pronounced and even before I see him, I hear the ta-da!, in grand announcement! But quiet or all-out-there, they both wait for that same appreciative glance and exuberance from me in turn and I love to give it.
The novelty of a new shirt wears off sometime after the second use of it, and I think I say that more from my p.o.v, (for Winkie is still in raptures over his Mario PJ's bought 2 months back!), and it definitely doesn't last as long as that eventual day when the hem of the pantline is a good but sudden 2 inches short of the feet. When did this happen?, I wonder. I swear it fit him just last week! And after the next round of laundry, I put it away in a corner, the place where everything they have outgrown goes, happy that the rate at which this pile grows is still at a very manageable level for me. :) If its Thambi's, then 'Goodwill' is the usual recipient, after all the quality sorting and that goodbye isn't at all hard for me. And if its Winkie's.....ahhh! if it's Winkie's, then I linger just a little bit longer over those....knowing that there will come a day when I see it again. That when I see it again, it will be to clothe the form of yet another that is a piece of my heart.
And so, after that long winded and protracted attempt at sharing exactly what opening that box means to me...let me just say that yesterday was also the day we christened the first of those clothes. Thambi was pretty thrilled that he had a whole new box of clothes just for him. I was thrilled that I would be reliving some of those yester-memories, while anticipating the ones up ahead. And this feeling lasts all through the use of the box, until the very last garment is extracted and worn. And the faint aroma of it still hangs in the air, for many more wash cycles after. And so here he is, wearing the sweater Winkie wore to his 1st grade music concert, which shrunk in that very first wash and now fits the little imp nicely, with enough wiggle room too. Its amazing how much of personality he can insert into them and make those older memories truly a thing of the past!
Thambi is a whooping 4 years old. It happened some months back, of course, and owing to the pressure of time and then the distance of having crossed that threshold of time, I could not sit down and document that special day that was his, and the specialness that is him. But suffice it to say that he is now in full awareness of his age, and at times his age is big enough to license him to ask for some things, like going out to play on his own....with the words..
I am 4 years old Amma. I'm a big boy.
...with hands played out, a look of injustice writ all over his face. And then there are those times, when he will sufficiently play his age down and try to make me understand that being 4 is simply not enough. Like the time when I asked him to drive the car one morning!
Yes, I did ask him to do that. I told him, hey...I am tired today, YOU drive the car. And he looked at me, highly amused but seriously entertaining the question at the same time, demonstrating to me how he couldn't even reach the keys on the hook, so how would he drive Big Buddy car?
I am only 4 years old Amma. I am not a big boy, I am only small big.
So yes, age is just a number, which can be tweaked wherever needed to suit the situation. I think he's got it right. But recently, I discovered something he is apparently become old enough to do. And it amused me no end, when I saw the evidence of that action one day.
Another one of those busy mornings where I was working in the kitchen to pack lunches, and I grabbed hold of him that day, got down to eye level and asked him, very very nicely, to go upstairs, undress and get into the bath, by which time I would be upstairs. And his constant refrain these days is, a very eaggerated......... oooooooooookkkkkkayyyyyyyy! And he went upstairs, and busied himself and 10 minutes later I was there too and the rest of the process went on as usual. Once I got home after dropping him off to school, I went upstairs to make the beds and straighten up things and that's when I saw it. His near neatly folded pyjamas sitting daintily on the ironing table. It stopped me in my tracks. I remember telling him very clearly, to just take them off and leave them in the bed and I would get to them later, and I remember saying this with some exasperation, since he didn't know yet how to fold and put away his clothes, or so I assumed. But there it was, as near to being perfectly folded, as is possible from those little hands. The shirt laid on top of the pants and not on the bed like I had told him, but better still on the ironing table.
 I pumped up with full blown pleasure at the sight and at the very thought of him in the act of doing it, carefully, precisely, thoughtfully and perfectly. It made me see him in a way that I had not really seen him until that point.....as a little boy, whose capacity and ability was growing, and not just as my baby whom I could always lift with one hand and cuddle and kiss and crush. When he came home I excitedly told him how happy my discovery made me and that I didn't know he knew how to fold and would he please show me how he did it again. And then, he pumped up with the pleasure of all my compliments and proceeded to shake out all the folds and laid them again on the floor, turning them this way and that, and then promptly curling it all up into a mock fold, which was still precise and still neat and still perfect, because he believed that he was doing it right! It was priceless!
Now, he takes great pleasure in folding in his clothes everyday and I take great pleasure to look towards the ironing board where I am sure to see the result of his efforts every morning. And life is simply beautiful with this small big boy that is a 4 year old!
Have you all read ' The Power of Now'? If not, then you should. And I am not saying this lightly. I picked it up about a month ago, even though it was given to me by a friend even before that. You know how it is. Sometimes, the stars really have to come into that exact alignment, for a certain initiative to take place. And thus it came to be that I started reading the book.
What do I say? That it is the simplest possible truth of everything there is to be known in this life. That without the shades and nuances of religion, it lays the wisdom of all Eternity, in the simplest possible words. That the words just get you started, but somehow blend into the background, while the simplest possible understanding shines in the forefront. That it has changed my life. That it is yet another landmark in my growth as a person, trying to find her way. That it has broken down, into simple simple steps, the very cliche that is 'living in the moment'. I know now, how to Be. I can't do it all the time, but even when I regress, the awareness comes rushing up that I have slipped into the past or slided into the future, and that awareness in itself, is the present. I know now, the patterns of when I slip into my ego mode, such that if I feel anger, pain, frustration, sadness, emptiness, irritation...I know exactly where it is coming from, and the moment you know it, its hold on you is gone. I understand so much better, the patterns of pain I have created for myself. We all create patterns of pain for ourselves, such that everytime anything happens to create a ripple in our life, we identify with that pass accumulated pain and our reactions kind of snowball after that. Its called losing control of yourself. I know now how my body becomes stiff and rigid, when I identify with my mind and my thoughts, and its a very simple and elegant matter of just breathing a little deeply, squaring your shoulders to toss out that stiffness and become intensely conscious of what is happening at that point in time, to come into immediate bliss. It is now that simple. I realise now, that even if the person you are dealing with is struggling unconsciously with their ego, you can still help them, with your power of being acutely present.
And as a result, as a wonderful result, I know now what I was missing with my children. My two, sweet, precious boys, with their quirky little personalities, which is a cause for smiling, every single day. I have realised how much I was identified with my "role" of being a mother, that it took so much away from just being present with them and enjoying this thing called their childhood. I know how to be with them now. The struggle, that elusive struggle for that utopian place of motherhood is gone. When I am intensely focused on them, I stop being a mother, and am just me. And they are just them. And with that, we enjoy the simple delight of whatever we are doing at that moment, even if it is just struggling to get ready on time. Yes, even that becomes enchanting. All this new found peace is quite heady. And I want to share it with you. Please read this book by Eckhart Tolle. Let us not have an intellectual discussion on it, if you have, but just savour the experience of it, and spread the joy in your own life. True, many people have also discarded it as 'nothingness', and if that's how you feel about it, that is also fine. There is a time and place for everything.
I even had the opportunity to share the core essence of this book with Winkie. He was glancing at the cover of it, as it lay on the table one day, and put it down sheepishly as I walked in. I guess he must have wondered, what 'power' there could be in 'now'? :) But when I saw that smile on his face, something clicked for me inside, and I decided to tell him the 'story' of the book.
I told him, that right 'now', right 'here', there is a lot of power hanging around for us to take unto us and make our own. But we don't do it, because we, i.e., our mind is always thinking of something else that is not there. He might either be thinking of something that happened before or planning for something that may happen later (and here I gave him instances of his own thoughts from past and future, and he laughed at my accuracy!). So when our mind is elsewhere, it is not inside our body which is right now, here. So we lose out on gaining that power, that is there right 'now'. And the demons/ rakshasas (which he now relates to as the bad thoughts and vices in him) take control and gain domination. And the only way to overthrow them is to bring the mind rushing back to the body, to stay with it. Which means that if he is eating at the time that his mind wanders away for a lengthy, unconscious stroll, then he brings it back into his body, by first becoming aware that it has gone away in the first place. And then, lodging his attention very closely to his food, watching it clearly, putting a spoonful into his mouth, tasting every bit of it, and feeling the juice of it going down his throat, and then just repeating that over and over again, and discovering not the monotony of it, but the splendid uniqueness of every rote act. But it won't be always simple to become aware and then become focussed the very next instant. Sometimes, there will be a bridging facility that is needed, to make that 'effort' fluid. And he could always start with his breath. Watching his breath, in and out, in and out, and then slowly expanding that awareness outwards to everything else surrounding him.
He got that. He really got that. And I was pretty pleased with myself for having found a relatively simple way to share this great, mega truth with him. If he could become natural at this, this early on, when his mind processes are slowly getting complex, how much more delightful every life experience of his would be, and with how much more aliveness, he could witness it all. Sigh. They say the best way to teach your children something, is to be the lesson yourself. And I hope that I can practice this beautiful art of living so sincerely, that it IS me, and thus he will know of no other way to be.
It is a dream.
But that is in the future, isn't it? :)
It was the last few minutes before the bus was to arrive. We had lazy words going back and forth between us, the time stretching out just a bit. When all of a sudden, his manner changed. The flash of yellow from the corner of my eye, being the reason. An alertness came into his form, and he hurriedly opened the door. Bye Kanna, have a lovely day, I called out, and the appropriate response came, but they were mere words. His attention was already diverted. He spotted his friend being the first in line for the bus, and he banged the car door shut. Poor Buddy!...I thought. His legs carried him at a brisk pace, resisting the temptation to break into a run. Somehow, at that moment it was very important to me that he not run. That he walk. That grace be kept intact even at 7 and a 1/2 years. A couple of girls from behind overtook him as they ran to the door. His feet almost broke into a trot, but only just and he was quick, but he still walked. Tension, of a subtle kind, was writ all over his body. His mind urging him to run, to be the first, to get there before the others. But something else, some other ancient instinct restraining that outright action. Still the fear was there. Palpable. It was almost like it had a form, one that I could recognize, and see as an external object.
It made me smile, for having caught it quite unawares like that. How often do you catch Fear in its tracks, and call it out? Yes I saw it then. In him. And in me for all the times that I had let myself be crippled by it. And us for all the times, we will continue to let it be so, until that one beautiful moment, when we can all recognize it and call it out. Hey, you are Fear. And you are here. I saw you.
Fear in the form of not being a good enough person. Fear of feeling too happy. Fear that there is something lacking in your child. Fear of what someone else thinks. Fear of guilt. Fear to deal with difficult people. Fear of being sad. And depressed. Fear of not having enough Faith. Fear of death. Fear of that phone call in the early hours of the morning. Fear when the phone rings and your reverie is broken. Fear, fear, fear. Its all fear.
But the wonderful, most compassionate thing about it all is....we needn't launch on a whole new campaign to rid ourselves of Fear. The very action of knowing it, for what it is, that is a big part of saving ourself from its clutches. Instead of letting it be the constant hum-drum of our lives, dictating all our emotions and actions, if we saw it separately for what it is, and where it might be coming from, we have already become powerful over it.
And the even more wonderful thing is the opportunity to teach it to my son. Why does he have to face years of living in the shadows of it, his true personality masked by its darkness? I can tell him now, in very simple words, in a way that he can understand, teaching him to recognize it too. And if I was wrong in thinking of that moment as fear in him, then maybe he will see it for what it is at some other point.
The point is that Fear will not stand in chance in the light that is our awareness of it. Once we have recognized the thief, his identity is forever known. So all we have to do, is be there to see it.
I started off with typing out what the time is right now. But then I erased it. Does now have a time? Isn't now, that time? So...let me start again.
The TV is on, unusual for this time of the morning. Its the treat the little one gets for braving the highest fever of his life so far. My throat is warm and soaking in the delicious sweetness of my favorite coffee. The day outside is actually my perfect kind of weather. The sun seems to sleep in a little longer as the clouds take center stage and sing their rain song. Traffic.... whoosh...whoosh....whoosh. Everyone is going somewhere. The side table is stacked with some board games and a lot of tiny zoo animal figures and Thambi's cars, some upturned. Maybe they are still sleeping. :)
Half folded laundry is on the floor, a chore from last evening that I still need to finish up. I can hear the water pipes with their steady hum, as the sound of the tub faucet blares from the bathroom upstairs. R is getting ready for his day. He plans to work from home. Winkie still sleeps, and I greedily let him grab those last few minutes of blissful sleep before a hand comes to shake him awake. He slept late after watching American Idol with me. We are into it. I remember the look of smiling but tense anticipation on his face and feel like smiling too.
I rock gently on the armchair I am sitting on. I love this chair. Its right for my back and it has just the right tilt for a rock. I am here now. Happy to feel this familiar old urge to type into a place that feels like home.....words that come from a place that feels like home. Now is just wonderful!
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