Na Mazoot

Of late, I have noticed that Jispa’s voice has changed. She now has a little gruffness in her voice. A nice older gruff that compliments with her girl voice. Till very recently, her voice on the phone to me did not match with her brain. Whenever I used to speak to her on the phone, I felt I was talking to a kid. Now when I speak to her on the phone, she seems to be much more adult like. That’s nice. She is coming of age. This is one thing that I keep trying to get everyone around her to accept. She is 14. At 14 I remember myself. I was a complete independent adult in many ways. I thought of myself in this manner, reality be damned.

At 14, I was aware of the girls around me, I was aware of what I looked like, I was aware of friends, competition and some of the tragic realities of life. I knew, I guess, for the first time that I was alone. Whatever I had to achieve in life, I had to get there myself. At 14 – I had my first real big achievement. I took part in the drama competition and won the second-best actor’s award. I should have won first but I will always believe to my grave that, partiality was done, at the behest of the school vice principal. That was the first award I got and that was the one that gave me tremendous confidence that I was something. That I could. I always knew or believed I could (do something, anything), but this was the first external ratification of the same.

So yes, she is 14. She has the ability to make boyfriends on her own, handle girl friends on her own and handle all relationships on her own. I think she is a stable kid, while at the same time I think at some times, she is a little amenable to what we parents believe is wrong peer behavior. She seems to be swayed at times in her behavior, in the company of her friends. But that’s a cool thing. If she doesn’t learn now and she doesn’t fall now, when will she learn to get up and grow? She must actively fall now. Actively.

What’s my role then as a father? – to lend her socks. Actually I don’t even do that. I don’t LEND her the socks, she just takes them and my job is to be all cool about it. She loves my Happy Socks and my Avengers socks. We both love these socks which are colorful and full of personality. She just takes them from the cupboard and wears them at will. My job is to look at it approvingly and manage. Like a friend would. Its ok – of course, use it. This weekend we were in Pune and she hadn’t packed an extra pair of socks. She just took mine and wore them. Cool girl. I will wear mine for another two days. No problem.

The way I look at it, with a daughter you as it is, have very few things to share. She cant go raiding my cupboard the way she raids Jasmine’s. So quietly I look on extremely happy that she can at least can wear my socks. Hopefully, as she grows, we can share jackets (more likely) or T shirts (less likely), but for now – these awesome socks are the way to go.

What I also like about her these days is that she has also learnt to speak well and argue well and contribute well. She is more aware of the tone of the conversation and adds to it very well. The simple matter of saying “I could be wrong, but” before saying something potentially controversial. I learnt this when I was 28 years old. Yes I clearly remember when and where I learnt that art and who taught that to me (Prem from Momentum, not intentionally). I am so happy that she is doing this and therefore is able to hold conversations better. I think I had taught this technique to her while she needed to argue with her teachers on potentially volatile topics or to prove her teachers wrong. She learnt that knowledge is not necessarily a simple one way street. Not everyone is receptive to knowledge, especially when it comes from a younger, less heralded source. This is something that Jispa understood and learnt. So, she has adapted. She thrives with teachers who allow her to go beyond the box, to explain, to think. Also, she is learning the quiet confidence that comes from being a moderate. Whenever they have some controversial issues to discuss in class, she tells me that some jokers with the dumbest opinions have the loudest voices. Ya. She will learn.

Growing up is going to give her a fair share of awesomeness and pain in equal measure. She will realize that people aren’t what they seem and everything has a back story, an angle, something that is not apparent at once.

Just as another note. I came across this book which I promptly purchased. “Du Iz Tak”. Its an outstanding children’s picture book written in an imaginary language. Jispa and me went through it yesterday and we went absolutely nuts over it. We deciphered the meaning of the language ourselves. there is no legend along with. The language is the language spoken by insects and it conveys a beautiful meaning and has some absolutely amazing poetry in its illustrations. If there is one picture book that I would treasure, then its this. It’s a pity that it fell in my hands when Jispa has grown up; it would have been awesome to share this with her as a 6 year old. But I am not complaining for now. We both will enjoy it for some time to come. It now a shared memory. I want to record myself reading this book in the insect language along with Jispa. :)

And for the record Na Mazoot in insect language, supposedly is "i dont know"

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