One day at the movies

Few days back, my son and I had decided to watch "The Guardians of The Galaxy". He got his mandatory bowl of popcorn, after confirming with me that I was not hungry and that I would not eat multiples of five popcorns at a time and eventually finish half his tub. He exaggerates, I have no clue where he gets that trait from!

We entered the audi, took our 3 D glasses and settled ourselves, cleaned the glasses with wipes, and got ready to watch Chris Pratt in action. and Baby Groot. (love that little creature,  rooted teeny soul that he is)

Few minutes into the movie, I was pretty disappointed by the quality of the print. The images were blurry and the print quite dark. I poked my son once or twice to ask if his 3 D glasses were okay. Figured out from his impatient nodding of the head, that they were. I took one look at the filled seats to my left and resigned myself to watch the movie with my defective glasses at least till intermission. When I couldn't take it any longer, I channeled my inner ' crouching tiger, hidden dragon'  spirit, muttered a series of "excuse me , so sorry", (who in the world booked our seats right in the middle of the row?) , and hobbled to the bored looking attendant, near the exit. Cornered him and in my perfect blend of an accusatory and a hurt, 'How could you fool me? ', tone, whispered,  "these glasses are spoilt, please replace them."

The guy peered at the glasses, and then at me and then said "Erm..Maam, you've been watching the movie through your sunglasses." 

Uhoh!  I touched my head and sure enough, found the ugly square rimmed 3D glasses, perched unapologetically on my head. I grabbed my sun glasses back from the 'trying very hard not to laugh" attendant,  and went hopping back sheepishly to my seat, with as much dignity as I could muster.

The son when he heard it , rolled his eyes and laughed : "Why am I not surprised, Amma?"

I've always been err, to put it politely, quite absentminded.  I married a guy who's equally so. He's misplaced 3 sun glares, one of which he placed on the roof of his car and then drove away. He used to forget which grades the kids were in (I NEVER forget that!!) We've forgotten flights and luggage and lived to tell the tale.

As the years pass us  by,  thankfully, he seems to have toned down a bit, thereby balancing the family sanity scale. I, on the other hand,  seem to be aiming for some doctorate in the science  of forgetfulness. 

There was this time when I opened the door of my parked car and sat down, only to see a stranger there. His jaw dropped. My eyes popped out. It happened to be someone else's car. He was too busy sweating(probably his wife was due back any minute) by which time I had made good my escape to my own car,  where my driver (a necessity since a car in my control is always out of control) was hyperventilating because he thought I had lost my mind!! In my defense, it was not my fault, it was a white car, it seemed the same size , I just hadn't noticed it was from a different company.

This syndrome seems to have rubbed off on my driver too. The other day, after buying the week's groceries, I walked back to the car, dumped my packets on the seat, and had barely walked to the other side, when the car lurched forward. A long 5 minutes and 500 metres later, the car slowly reverses back to a gaping me and a sheepish face pops out " I thought you were already sitting in the car".

Sigh,  he thinks too much. 

Three thoughts occurred to me.

1) So that's how it feels to be on the receiving end.

2) Goodness, could this absent mindedness be contagious?

3) Poor poor G!

What's in a name?

I get invited to join kitty parties or coffee morning groups, which is probably a good way to acquaint yourself with your neighbors or the community residents. Of course it would help if you are socially  inclined and you don't mind some gossip and general bitchiness. I end up declining most invitations,   because I'm not exactly an extrovert, I prefer small gatherings where there is more possibility of having a fabulous  conversation  and I happen to be quite possessive about my 'me time''. 

And so when I apologetically  decline,  they look at me as if I were an alien and whisper "But then what do you do, how do you spend your day?"

That question puts me in a dilemma. Do I give them an hour by hour analysis of my day or do I break it gently to them that I sit there and blink my eyes and 5 hours pass by just like that. Going by past experiences, and depending on how communicative I feel at that moment, I reply 

"Nothing" or "Something" (You cannot have teens in your life and not have their monosyllabic responses rub off on you)

There are times when I turn amnesiac and I animatedly answer " I love to crochet"

Which is the truth. After story writing, content writing, paper quilling, painting and blogging, crochet is my current passion and work. Creating trendy designs from colorful yarn fuels my creative energies and gives me immense satisfaction, not to mention the pleasure  I feel when people  send me pictures of them wearing my creations or using them. 

I get various reactions to this simple statement.

Reaction 1: " Blink, blink blink, and then a very knowledgeable " Aah,  you must mean knitting?"

I roll my eyes, heave a sigh and hiss ferociously  "NO, it's not knitting, knitting is different, DIFFERENT. You hear me,  DIFFERENT. This is called crochet, it uses a hook and yarn and have you heard of google....hello, come back I was talking?!"

Reaction 2: "Blink blink blink" 

a pause 

and then "but I thought only old people do crochet"

I roll my eyes, and peer at the offending soul who has just realised what he/she has implied. Before I can get myself into sarcasm mode, the person has beaten a quick retreat, thanking her stars that her good sense has kicked in faster than my tongue. 

Reaction 3: "blink blink blink"" and an "Okayyy" accompanied by a "deer caught in the headlights" look which implies  "I have no clue what you are talking about"

That's when the fog of temporary amnesia lifts and I realise the futility of even trying.

So the last time I got asked this, I answered "I'm a yarn artist". After all, my eyes needed rest. Rolling those eyes can get quite tiring, besides there is only that much that they can roll back.

Reaction Magnifique : "WOW! Can I have your card? Do you have a website? What do you do? blah? blah?"

And just like that , with just two words. my image got a makeover. 

Sigh.

Do you remember the time when....

A memory comes floating back to me.

Of the 'once upon a time' phase in my life. Of cupping our palms under a tap at school and tilting it just so, the cool water from the tap wetting the parched throat. Of standing in queue at railway stations impatiently waiting for our turn. Filling giant waterbottles for the journey till the next station, apprehensive that the train may leave without us.



And then because all good things must come to an end, bottled water and water filters made their appearance. Water could not be drunk without double boiling it or passing it through the RO process. It was a necessity. Mineral water became a must on everyone's table.

And with it the usage of plastic and waste grew.

This memory got placed in the 'once upon a time' slot in my mind. All it needed was a trigger to get it out. Which happened when I saw this


At Singapore

and this was in Sydney

I used to love it when the boys would cup their hands under the tap and drink greedily. The water fountain required some practice, and it was fun to watch them trying to place the mouth just right, splashing themselves in the process. It was a luxury to not worry about the water being safe or unsafe, to drink water straight from the tap. It was nice to see something as basic as water being easily available to us, thanks to the government.

I'm glad that the boys got to try this simple pleasure even if it was for a short while; because, sadly, we are back to boiled and bottled water.

And this memory will slowly go the way most memories do, back in its slot, waiting for its next trigger.

Stop picking on me!!!

Ever read the book:'Nineteen minutes' by Jodi Picoult? Read it especially if you have pre-teen children...Though the ending fell below my expectations, the story didn't...The story revolves around a school shooting, the impact on the survivors and the shooter. What circumstances could drive a normal child to pick up a gun and blindly kill? This child had no dearth of reasons - being picked upon because he was weak, being called gay because he had no girl friends, being constantly compared to a bright brother, falling short of his parents' expectations, being publicly degraded. When you feel shunned by people you know, you retreat in your own private world where everything is according to your rules and you are in control.

It's scary what the world expects out of the young generation. It's also frightening to see how little these children value life. A so-called elite school in Delhi had to issue a circular to its teachers to henceforth highlight only the positive aspects of the students' development in the parents teachers meeting. The reason - a student had committed suicide because she could not handle the criticism at the PTM. Every board examination sees the deaths of young lives because they were unable to handle the pressure.

From the time the little child is put in playschool, he/she begins to understand the meaning of pressure. The mayhem caused by the admission circus every year has added fuel to the fire. A child of three is supposed to know his alphabets, be creative, sing songs, dance, be confident,and talented. Give him a break!!!

A lot depends on how certain situations are handled. A friend was called to meet the school counsellor to 'discuss' her son's disruptive behaviour. Since he happened to pull a girl's pigtail, they assumed that there was 'violence'(read marital ) at home. The result of this meeting was a hurt mother, who tried to bribe and coerce the child into better behavior. A more sensitive approach would have helped in finding out the cause of the problem. Likewise, my 4 year old came home with bite marks one day, a fight the next...a boy,K, had been targeting him. Though worried, i didn't want to take drastic steps like issuing a formal complaint. I met the teacher and together we spoke to K. There were issues bothering him at home, we tried to get it sorted out. I made it a point to talk to him every morning to find out how he was doing and every afternoon the child would look out for me to tell me the news of the day. Full credit to the teacher for defusing a situation which could have got out of control...Here, K's parents were equally concerned which was commendable. Generally the parents go into the 'denial' mode which makes it more difficult.

Some say that today's children have too much too soon...That they don't have tolerance...and maybe a child would say that today's adults have too many expectations from them. `Expectations! Peer pressure! Acceptance! Survival!...Any wonder that the kids are walking a tightrope here... Of course the right mix of tolerance, freedom, confidence and self esteem would create a balance...Easier said than done, but definitely worth trying.