It is that time of the year, little one. Hang on, is
the word ‘little’ applicable anymore when you become a teenager?
Indeed, I cannot believe it has been almost thirteen
years since a little someone in a pink blanket had accompanied me in a car from
the hospital.
It seemed only yesterday, the greatest cliché-writers
would say.
I cannot believe it has been almost thirteen years
since I had taken two, maybe three steps at a time to carry out every instruction
of the doctor.
It was a cold winter. It remains the coldest Kolkata winter
in my memory. The rooms at the hospital were air-conditioned, but what if you
needed more blankets?
I remember the first time you took the school bus. I
had followed the bus all the way in a car. I think you saw me, us; you may not
have, too.
I could not have not gone (I know the sentence is
grammatically wrong).
I know of people who do not like their little ones
growing up. That day, inside the car, en route your school, was the first time
I had realised that I cannot afford to do that. I needed to accept you were
growing up; and would grow up into someone so wonderful that… er, what are the clichés
your generation uses?
Thirteen. Thirteen. You are thirteen years old.
Someone had told me at some point of time that
twenty-five years is the equivalent of a generation; as a result, the concept
of ‘generation gap’ occurs between people separated by a time span of that duration.
Internet has somehow crammed that gap inside a decade.
Ten years make a generation now. Twenty-five years are
more than two generations. Your generation is ahead of ours twice as much as I
am ahead of our parents’.
I am sometimes scared that by the time I bridge that
gap you will move so ahead that I will even lose sight of you — if I already
have not, that is.
But I am digressing, as is often the case with old
men.
Thirteen.
Time has hardened me, little one. Life has stopped me,
time and again, from turning into a wuss. Those kicks in the shin have been
necessary to keep me going.
How else do you think I am holding back this post,
this whatever-it-is-that-I-am-writing on the day you became a teenager, from
becoming one soaked in the most blatant, uninhibited displays of emotion?
What do I ask of life? What do I ask for you? Do I
want life to make you time-hardened as well? Or do I beg of life to keep you
away from all that will harden you?
Do I become the father who will want you to face and
conquer life? Or do I become one that vows to shield you from it?
That, little one, is one dilemma (among others) that
has haunted me since the day I had followed that school bus. I try not to think
about it, but the thought keeps coming back.
See? I have swayed again. This one was supposed to be
about you, not an old man’s ramblings.
This one was supposed to be about Doraemon melting
into Percy Jackson at some point of time.
This one was supposed to be about me forgetting
completely about my aching arms and still holding you even after you had fallen
asleep.
This one was supposed to be about that helpless
attempt to explain why a Pikesville boy used to prefer Becky Thatcher to Amy
Lawrence. How does one explain romance to a six-year-old?
This is getting tedious, is it not? I guess it is, but
then, nobody stumbles across my blog anymore. Even I do not.
We will meet, somewhere, somehow, somewhen; and we
will meet soon. I cannot tell for you, but it will be the same for me as that
pink-blanket day. It has always been the same.
Meanwhile, just reach out if you want to. You have my
number. I have been a sub-par father, but many have complimented me on my
ability to understand them.
They will hug and kiss each other tonight — at odd
hours, if you take the time zones into consideration (that is the kind of
technical specification both of us have always enjoyed, much to the chagrin of
others) to celebrate 2017.
Whether they will cherish 2017 forever is something I
mostly do not care about, but you have an awesome thirteenth, little one.
Live your teens. Never let them gnaw into you.
