play a sport with your kids

play a sport with your kids.
my morning swims in the company of my father are still punctuated with stories from times when swimming meant lying stomach down on daddy's back pretending to be afloat while he pulled an imitation breast stroke in shallow water amidst gurgles and giggles.
so drop everything else and play a sport with your kids.

✈

Summer in a Bottle

My dad packs my lunch (and breakfast and munchies) for me every morning.
I know, I know, I'm definitely one of the luckiest girls in the world!
It's one of those things I have come to feel grateful for when I see people in my office scampering to order lunch everyday.

This morning when I came to work and took out my bottle I found it all orange.

Taaang!... and it was so perfectly made.

Well played, Ma

Yesterday, my mum bought me diamonds.
Today, she made me cook.
Well played, Ma.
I hope my generosity and tact equals yours when I am 59.

Thanks, Mum

Taking me shopping is a great way to luring me towards marriage, mum.

Photo Booth Fun

Just another day with my dad.
P.S: I was truly that excited.

Conversations with My Mother

This morning...

I've just stepped out of the shower and my mum's wrapping up her morning yoga.
She's probably weighed herself and left the weighing scale out.
Naturally, I go stand on it to check my 'progress'.
The scale reads a little lower than the last time I checked, which was about 2 months ago.

Conversation ensues...

Ma: How much do you weigh?
Me: Same. 41. No wait, the last time it was 43.
Ma: You weigh as much as a child. I was 50 kilos when I got married.
Ma: Ok, then wait for me to get to 50 and then get me married. Hmm?
Ma: *silence*
Me: *wide smile*
Ma: *abounds with everything that spells hopelessness*

Conversations with my Father

Dad: You know, you're going to have to learn how to cook by the time you get married.
Me: No! Why? By the time I get married, I'll have enough money to pay someone to cook for me.

There's a hole in my stomach

TODAY, I HAVE EATEN A BAG FULL OF KISSES, A PACKET OF GEMS, FIVE MARSHMALLOWS, A MEDIUM SIZED PACK OF CHOCOS, ONE CHOCOPIE COOKIE, SOME GATORADE, GRAPES AND DINNER SOMEWHERE IN THE MIDDLE.
I HAVE NEVER BEEN MORE THANKFUL FOR GREAT GENES AND A DANGEROUSLY HIGH METABOLIC RATE.
EVER.

Conversations with my Mother

You know those sentences where a comma or an apostrophe makes all difference and adds a whole new meaning? Unwarranted most of the time, but none the less? This conversation with my mother was exactly like that.

Mother: We will find you a nice boy.
Daughter: Ok.
Mother: No really.
Daughter: Ugh. Ma please!
Mother: What please?!
Daughter: Arreh I’m just 24 ya!
Mother: I know! But do you know how long it’s going to take to find you a boy?
Daughter: Umm…
…
Perhaps if my mother had emphasized on the ‘how long’ instead of the ‘you’, my brain wouldn't have exploded in my cranium... so soon... so silently.

7.55am : Head Stand Conversations

Regular morning at home.
Newspaper reading and lunch boxes are in order in the living room and kitchen respectively.
In the bedroom, routine exercises and intensive yoga peacefully coexist alongside each other.

Conversation between 24 yr old daughter and 63 year old father while doing head stands side by side:

Me: Mom's asked you not to make my breakfast today.
Dad: Why?
Me: She thinks we use it as an excuse to fool around and throw banana peels all over the house
Dad: Nonsense.
Me: And she says that sometimes the banana peel goes and hides in one corner of the house somewhere and stays there if the bai doesn’t find it while sweeping
Dad: She should’ve told me this earlier. I already made your breakfast.
Me: Where are the banana peels?
Dad: On the sink outside the bathroom.
Me: You couldn’t put them in the dustbin or what?
Dad: No, I thought we could throw them at Mumma as soon as she came out of the shower.
Me: Hee hee (Deep breath) Hee hee (Deep breath)
Dad: Keep quiet Gijja. You'll lose your balance and hurt your neck.

This is the same conversation I have had with my Dad since forever. I remember it happening when I was 8, 12, 18 and now 24. Well, the numbers aren't perfect, but you get the point! And maybe not while doing head stands, but still.

Clearly, neither of us has gotten over throwing banana peels at each other, or on an innocent unsuspecting victim (read: my sister or mum).
And clearly, we're not at all about acting our age in the comfort of our home. Or otherwise.

Sigh.
Some things never change.
Oh the sweet comfort of family!
If it wasn't for them, I'd be throwing banana peels at you. Or people passing by.

To, Daddy

To,

The first giant whose shoulders I stood on,

And the one who has scared me… never!

The one who suggested I should seriously consider riding his Enfield,

And who bandaged my wound and then said, ‘Girls don’t cry’

The one who called his cardiac arrest a ‘heartbreak’,

And worried about my Biology paper as he checked into an OT.

The one who can do a perfect headstand at sixty,

And who constantly tells me to “Wear some more clothes, please!”

The one who still sends me away with chocolates,

And who greets me with a ‘Hi Munni’ phone call everyday at lunchtime.

The one who’s started listening to new music so that he can experience all the ‘fuss’ about Frog,

And the one who’s crazy about Hitchcock and Simon and Garfunkel.

The one who wrote me letters when I was 4 years old,

And told me Tarzan(who lived in the tree opposite my house) missed me.

The one who gave me my first ever ‘I am Sorry’ card,

And allowed me to quit piano lessons after my tiny hands refused to jump octaves fast enough.

The one who collected shells with my sister and flint stones with me,

And who skillfully and painlessly pulled out my dangly milk teeth so that I’d stop scaring people with them.

The one who argued with Mrs.Pathan the day she caned my six year old bum,

And who told me he’d home school me if Mrs.Das threw me out of Chemistry.

The one who made us prawn sandwiches everyday when we got back from school,

And hid in the balcony to eat all the cholesterol laden jalebis and mithaees in the dark.

The one who thinks men who make music with their mouths(read:Bauchklang) are crass,

And who tells me stories of African safaris and English breakfasts every now and then.

The one who raised me like a boy, and made me my own tool box,

And a major chunk of whose life was spent taking us to table tennis, swimming and athletics practice.

The one who laughed off all the complaints at PTA meetings,

But came home, begged and then bribed me to stop talking in class ‘For God’s Sake’.

The one who threatened to send me to boarding school every time we spotted one,

But cried the day I moved away from home.

To the man who will never fail to cheer me up,

And to the man who people are going to have great difficulty matching up to.

Here’s to you, Daddy,

Celebrating exactly ten years of zero cardiac trouble!

*Addendum: The man who told me get plasic surgery done when he saw one of my tattoos, And who's blisfully unaware about the few others.