hens, roosters, and lazy afternoon wishes

You are sitting by the window, and I am stretched out behind you.

And sunlight streams over the both of us, with the gentle warmth of a January sun.

I am trying to teach you to identify the crows of roosters and hens, as we look out for them.

For we come across these characters often enough in songs and rhymes.

And every time we did, your eyebrows would bridge trying hard to understand.

Now, after four or five times, you have picked it up easily.

And you point excitedly and say something in baby talk, every time you hear one crow.

When I get back to work soon, it will be hours like these, that I will miss the most.

This last year of a sabbatical has been wonderful, mostly because of you.

Work will take me away, and I will miss you so much.

I will miss lazy afternoons of snuggling, packed park visits, our fantastic sessions of singing and dancing, and breathlessly fielding ball for you.

And you will grow up so soon, before we know how it happened.

I can easily imagine you walking into a room as a strapping young man.

I know I will wear a proud grin. I know I will rise to give you a hug.

I will also cup your face and smack a kiss, no matter how embarrassed you are. :-)

But I only wish that I won't have to bore you, by talking only of all these wonderful babyhood days.

I wish we will always have something to do together, something to learn or play together.

I wish we always will be friends.

with one of the greatest loves that I have ever known,

your aunt, the window siller.

laughter

Chintoo's eyes are tightly shut, but his eyelids are fluttering, his mouth is quivering, and his tummy is rolling. And it happens every time the drizzle outside falls hard as rain.

If there is anything more beautiful than a child's laughter, it is a child laughing fast asleep. :-) :-)

The knowledge of the gods

"Tell me Ammama, why were you named Fragrance?" I ask. We are discussing stars and names, and I am curious because others born under her star are named with letters G and H.

She reluctantly spells: "My father hoped I would die young, and named me after his sister who died within a month." Looking at my face, she quickly rises in defence: "he was heartbroken. I, after all, killed my mother at birth."

"Names have a strange influence of their own," she says and leaves the rest unspoken - that her grandmother raised her for many years, that her father snatched her away from her loving care for the sake of his pride, that he paid her scant attention, that he got her married to a drunkard - that the name strangles her every now and then, and that she has had to fight it all her life.

Names are a burden, I know it too well. There are expectations and dreams that I have longed to shrug away.

And then there is my aunt, robbed of her destiny, when named to match her brother. But, true to her given name, she handles every crisis that life throws her way with Grace.

Lil' one, what do I wish for you... a name that sits as light as butterfly kisses, or one that will shape your years. Neither may work, but this I hope does. A wish that everytime you hear it, it be spoken only with love.