There are some events which cuts through one’s life, distinctly
breaking it off into two parts like a ripe fruit which has just fallen from the
tree. Fatherhood is one such before-after event.
The day is bright one, still bearable for this time of the
summer, blessed by unseasonal rains yesterday. Nonu, my daughter, otherwise
known as Sanskriti, turns seven today. I still go back seven years back this
day. The cool, benign hospital room, her mother slept tired, having brought in
a new life into this world. The weather was kind that year as well. Sun was
bright, splendid, but kinder than the usual harsh summer day of Delhi. Still remember,
walking into the nursery, in a small world of tiny kids, yet unknown to this
world, walking into it a stranger. They would open their eyes, tired, somewhat
unhappy, out of the safe, comforting womb of their mothers and look a while,
disenchanted and go back to sleep.
I went around and saw the third bed and the little one there,
held a band on her hand which proclaimed her as Baby of Seema Suryesh. Father
is still alien, an outsider to the child, an intruder in the cozy world of
togetherness, a magical island of charm between the mother and the child. But I
walk to you and hold my finger to you and you wrapped your pink, wrinkled palm
around that finger. It is as if we had known each other when you were not yet
there beyond a dream. I correct myself. We knew each other even when we both
did not exist beyond a dream. As if all my life was a wait for this moment when
your palm will curl around my finger.
Daughters are marvelous beings. They are the soft music
emancipated from the divine worlds to bless the otherwise bleak, unbelieving
world we inhabit. I believe, the saddest, most tired and bruised souls get
blessed by daughters as if an embarrassed God wanted to compensate us for
having a soul which felt more than what mind could understand. I held you that
night, and we slept together. I supported your soft head on my palms, and it
was as if your little mind spoke to me through my palms. Little did I know that
my entire being since will become centered around you.
I have almost surrendered being anything else other than being a
father since you walked into my life with uncertain steps. Then came the
school, and still remember being first time addressing myself as Father of
Sanskriti. My whole identity, crafted and cultivated all my life will melt into
this singular identity- Father of Sanskriti.
We will win and lose together and your pain and sorrows will
find a resting place in my heart. You are growing and your world expands beyond
me. Sometime, a father may lose out to the mother, especially when you go out
to buy all pink from the market. You might be amused when I ask you to run, to
play, when I frown at you when you wear your mother’s high heels. But that is
all about being a father. I know, I can see your world expanding beyond me. I
can see my arms grow weaker, my voice grow fainter. You will have to be strong
to be able to live without me, as I will live through you, in you.
That’s is the father for you, a little eccentric, a little
paranoid. I try not to scare you when I am scared- for you. Your strength as a
person will depend upon my ability to pretend strength when I am scared as hell
for your well-being. That and a faith of unquestioned love, which stands beyond
my need to look well in family, in the society. I have suffered being measured
against the social yardsticks, being asked to prove being worthy of love. I
will never hold it against you, not ever. I hope when the world wants me to
measure you, against someone else, I will remember myself. I will be the one
standing beside you, against the whole world, even when I do not understand
you, old and ancient that I am. I will not tell you the right from wrong, I
will educate you to know that. We all make our own mistakes, I know you too
would make your own.
I will not judge you from the mistakes you make, but by
how you bounce back from them. You know, child, father is not a person, a body.
It is a cloud which walks with you on harsh summer day and it is a warm thought
which wraps around you on cruel winters. I will always be that cloud, that thought.
You have blessed my being by the first time you called me Baba, and the first
time you smiled your first toothless smile when I came back from the office, in
a bright yellow shirt and a brighter tie and you looked at me from your rocker.
You have already given me much more than I could ask for by being what you are.
I must not want anything more. You are not here to fulfil my dreams, I am there
to cherish you flights to the sun, big and small. Go my little Angel, go, be
brave and gulp the Sun, for you are loved and watched over.
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