About my boy child
I have got two kids, the elder one being a girl who will
turn six of age next month, and the other being a mere fifteen months old boy.
Typically, the girl is more attached to her father during
the first ten years of her life, and then with her mother after that. In my
case too, she has shown attachment to me in her first five years.
Whereas, the boy is always more attached to his mother than
to his father.
This “skewed” bondage also results in the mother developing
more
emotional bondage
with her kids.
My boy is already showing glimpses of having innate
curiosity to explore different locations, toys, people in our immediate
vicinity, and “things” to eat. He does not really mind if he is happily
munching a torn ragged piece of paper or wildly hogging on only two or three
pieces of pomegranate. He does not how to distinguish between the edible and
non-edible food yet.
Having grown up in the outskirts for Delhi, I quickly
developed a culture of food, something which is a hallmark of Delhi. I also
quickly latched on to the hustle-bustle and the outcome-based attitude of
Delhiites. I wish that my boy also gets blessed with assimilating these
benefits that Delhi has to offer.
Only yesterday, my family was watching a very nice movie
“Bala” featuring my favourite actor Ayushmann Khurranna. It was a stunning and
a highly captivating movie. However, for me, the most learning came from my
boy. I was enthralled to find that my
boy had enjoyed unabated in the vast open stretch of brightly lit shopping mall
with only a handful of people near him, after coming out of the dark film
theatre in a disconsolate mood. That he repeated this behaviour when we took
him back to the movie
Just like me, he likes freedom too. I always had my points
of views and wanted to spew those out either through the medium of news reports
or via publishing in blogs. I do not know if my boy would be equally marauding
and hungry in expressing his points of views, but it would be a good to have
trait.
Now coming to the bad habits. Some of my girl’s bad habits
have steadily and on occasion swiftly crept in to my boy, such as yelling and
yearning to always take him out of the house for a quick walk or a lazy recline
in our new car. He is so fond of changing the gears in my car! Whereas my girl
was always fond of taking the driver’s seat and bossing the wheel!
It is the other bad trait that I want to hinge this blog on.
That bad habit is that my girl, just like many other kids of her age across the
globe today have started being selective in their choice of food and their
choice of content to view on television, Youtube, or on mobile phone. The
perspective of the kids is reducing every day, and it is also making them hooked
on to the highly addictive world of video games, virtual world that is often
shown with bright colours, and with tremendous layers of aggression. I find
such content to be completely detached from the real world situation and how to
cope with the demands of living each moment in the real world. For instance, my
daughter needs a
lot of assistance in eating her meal. She cannot appreciate
my spending two hours sweating out under the hot Sun in playing lawn tennis. I
do not want to use this blog as sounding board, but I need my boy to come out
with me and train himself hard in jogging, playing tennis, football, and all
other games that require physical activity and training. The trouble today with
the gadgets is that one song (or any other content) will have dozens of similar
content (for instance, for a popular Bollywood song, there would be a tomboy who would be singing, a coterie of
seven kids attempting to dare a dance step on that song from the terrace of
their home, etc.), which has the effect of keeping the viewer in that virtual
yet vortex like world that does not let the viewer come out of that world. What
I would want him to understand is that the best friends have got a lot of
meaning movies in common, and that he should project his most favorite movies
along with lessons learnt from those movies in his first blog. That would be
special feeling too!
In the end, I want my boy to approach life with dignity, to
always be classy, to show off with black or grey goggles but not to overdo the
art of marketing oneself, by saluting heroes like Abhinandnan Varthaman but not
to overdo patriotism, to publish books and blogs, but not to project himself as
bookish, to express his points of views on multiple burning and pressing topics
– such as Delhi burning due to stubbles put on fire, how to improve the
happiness quotient of oneself, how to value small things like growing of
plants, cultures of various countries that I used to so dearly learn from the
splendid stamps that were around me during my childhood – all concurrently, yet
not in a boorish manner.
Next, I want to mention some quantifiable things. Some people say that it is the first time
that the child learns to walk is the most pivotal moment in its life. However,
I have now discovered that we need to timebox the moment when the child learns
how to avoid jumping into troubles when it attempts to reach the object that is
placed in front of it. This is because it does not know how to learn and apply
cognitive abilities to find alternate ways that are safer and easier to reach
to the object that is lying in front of it. Only yesterday, I was scared to
find that my boy attempted to jump off the sofa to reach to his blue bicycle.
Whereas a safer path would have been to step down from the sofa and then walk
towards that bicycle. It is yet another revelation that he has not yet learn to
climb down from a sofa! So, for me, it would be fascinating to know when he
learns to step down (say from sofa) and then safely walk towards that object of
interest. To diffuse the situation, I had pushed that bicycle out of his sight
and far from the sofa. His only tools and weapons to save him from such
situations at this age are his cute shouts.
I also want him to imbibe my good habits, which are walking
under the Sun, walking bare foot on wet morning grass, experiment with mixing
and matching of food (e.g., pomegranate with samosa!), how to connect with
neighbours, and how to develop an empathetic attitude towards others yet have a
sense of humour. He should work with full honesty throughout his life and
always value nature, simple living, and a benevolent attitude. He needs to
understand in due course of time that I have always valued fiction above
non-fiction, abstract ideas above those that can give you short-term gains and
living in the present than worrying about past or future.
He needs to learn from me how to value learning from
reading, from gaining perspectives of different people across the world, and
how to take things in perspective before jumping to any conclusion. He also
needs to learn from me how fast I can arrive at mathematical computations,
sometimes faster than a calculator. He also needs to learn from me how to stay
away from air conditioners and all the things that enslave you. Finally, he
needs to learn from me that I am learning from my within and from the Research
fraternity the time when he would stop making silly mistakes.
I wrote this blog while being seated at my rocking chair.
