Heeya & Rhea

You have been reading Heeya’s Daak-Baaksho blogs over past 6 years.

This used to be the story of a little green pea.
Her first tears and topples and tickles.
Her birthdays and dances and hairclips and fancy dresses.
Her newness and the newness of her mother’s motherhood.
And her little toes.
Then her bedtime wishes that changed as she grew up. As she had to. Like all little girls do.

I had been secretly listening to all her little wishes through these years. Little wishes she wished just before going off to her dreams. Some spelt in words, some not. One night, she wished for a baby sister. And God did give her one, just like her. Just like she was 6 years back.
All pink, all cuddly, all tiny and full of love. :)

So then this now becomes the story of a little green pea and her littler sister. Heeya and Rhea.

And a collage of curious emotions of their ‘no-longer-new’ mother’s forever motherhood.

A Little Good Girl

There is this very little girl who is also a very good girl, and everyone knows it is not easy to be so little and so good at the same time. She goes running to her school from the gate to the classroom, and she writes her alphabet and tiny words that she learns every day. She eats her lunch and dinner although not a lot of it always, except when she is really really hungry. She chats with her best and better friends, and loves birthday parties and gets sad when the magician would not call her on stage for the tricks, and gets nervous when he does finally call. She gets bullied by other girls and boys of her age who are not so little for some funny reason. She gets scolded by her teacher often when she talks in class, especially on Mondays – but I know she is only telling stories of the weekend to her best friend, and it’s okay to do that. She runs sweetly slow and never wins a race and dislikes all things sporty, more or less. She likes teddies and dolls and little invisible toys and friends and I think she secretly likes those princess Barbies that she is not allowed to play with. When she laughs, our home gets lit up and fills with tingly music. When she cries, her face goes really sad and beautiful and it rains quietly, in a sad corner of the bedroom that is kept aside for tears and other such stuff. But good thing is that she smiles and laughs much more than she cries. She does a lot of things really well – like she dances like a flower in the breeze, without a care in the world, and that too Bharatnatyam which is very difficult to spell and dance. She reads so amazingly …and reads and reads up all her storybooks so fast that she needs to start all over again. She always listens to what Maa says and Baba says and you would not have seen a more obedient girl in the whole wide world. But most of all, what makes her the best little girl is that she gives the best, tightest, warmest, smiliest hugs and cuddles and love to you whenever you are sad and ask for it.

Motherhood

Got myself subscribed for several baby newsletters in 2006 while I waited for Heeya. She was born in January 2007.

One subscription continued as she kept growing up. And among other things, it still sends me these nothings that I love to read.

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Even as your child strives to become her own person, she can never break the bond she has with you.

You have a connection that goes back to before she was born, one that's propped up by affection, memories, and hormones.

When a mom holds her 8-year-old or watches her in a school play, she gets a little hit of oxytocin, a literal reminder of the first hours with her baby.

And when she will kiss an "owie" or help out with homework, they're cementing an attachment that will last for years.

It's enough to make the mom fall in love all over again.

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In summary, a little part of me existing outside of me as another human being. With a scent I could separate from a million fragrances. With a touch that is unexplainably personal. With a voice that echoes my pet words. And a smile that reminds of a warm moist bundle dropping in my arms with her string still tied to me.

Yes she will outgrow. My arms, my cuddlings, me. And soon.

Still, there will be no passion in life more poignant than motherhood. No memory that will remain more treasured than hers.

No person who will ever matter more.

Heeya’s New Glasses

Once you love something, you become responsible for it. Forever.

Responsible for managing every little fear, every drop of tear and the mildest pain.

Signs at the airport and blackboard from last benches were blurry and 2 numbers were copied wrong. A paediatric optometrist, some eye drops and eye tests. Then came an alien object on the nose that was to become a part of rest of life, with 19 half known and unknown tiny worries. “I dont want those drops Maa, ple...ease! Wont I be able to see without these ‘things’ anymore? Will friends make fun of me? Ma! Someone pulled my specs off today in school!!! Will my nose hurt? Will it sweat too? Were you also scared to wear your first glasses when you were small, Ma? Do I have to put these on for bedtime stories? But this keeps slipping down…” - Tiny anxieties, tiny problems – very big anxieties and big problems for my 6 year old.

It is easy answering childhood apprehensions with grown up wisdom. The tough part is when you are not practical enough to handle it passively, when you are not adequately disconnected. Then you get all noodled and mixed up in your head … all the tiny anxieties suddenly mingle with your own worry threads … bits of your own 6 year-old-first-glasses-deja-vu-from-years-back add to it … and you are just about a little helpless in the head. :)

At that point, you are no longer a mother sharing wisdom. You are the little daughter as well. Questioning and worrying and at times, unreasonably crying together.

Because you see, once you love something, you do become responsible for it in a very strange and mixed-up way.