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"
