Oh hey, Tanturm! it's been a while.

It’s what horror movies are made of. You could be anywhere, the mall, a nice quiet restaurant, a park... and without warning, like thunder clouds on a seemingly sunny day, it appears. It’s loud, blood curdling and just paralyses you. what do you do? should you yell back? walk away? Throw holy water on her like some sort of exorcism? I’ve tried it all, everything short of holy water.
My four year old has been surprisingly well behaved during this lockdown. There have been online classes, arts and crafts, singing and dancing, and devouring sweet mangoes that taste like summer. So it was peaceful…until it was not!
Why did it happen? Because I happened upon her hiding place and she did not want to be found!
So the yelling started. Even our dog started to whimper at this small creature who was kicking her legs in the air with the force of a grown man.
How did I react? Well, I yelled back, I shouldn’t have.... even while I was yelling, I knew I should just walk away and eat a cookie or something but like her, I just couldn’t help myself.
And all this unfolded, minutes before an important work call. The first work call since my maternity leave ended, so it was a big call.
After a few minutes of incessant yelling, she suddenly calmed down, wiped her tears and walked into the garden, hopped onto her pink scooter and rode around with carefree abandon. Like none of it ever happened. Did I imagine it? And as for me,I had two minutes to calm the fuck down so I could sound professional and not like a crazy mother who just lost her shit. I succeeded.
And mid call, she slunk into my room, wrapped her arms around my knees and said, “I’m sorry, mama.”
 And everything’s peaceful again. Until it’s not.

My little person.

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When you have a baby, you really don’t know what to expect, no matter how many versions of ‘what to expect when you’re expecting’ you read.

I read blogs, and watched vlogs and thought I had a plan. But, 9 months later, there she was wriggling in my arms, incredibly tiny, surprisingly loud.

Everything I had learned began to unravel. Everything I watched became a blur. And I realised that this little person and me had to figure it out on our own. 

The baby phase ends pretty fast. One minute, you’re performing painful foreplay with your breast pump and the next you’re watching your baby take her first steps in those squeaky- cute- at-first-but- not- so-much-later-on shoes. And those very steps eventually lead her away from you. Ok, I read that line on a Hallmark card at an Archie's Gallery. But it's true, isn't it?

Anaya is three and a half and is officially a little person, and like every parent, most of my days are spent watching her grow, not just physically but into the person she is meant to be.

And she amazes me. I see the way she observes her world. How she processes it all. How raw her emotions are and how she feels things the way they’re meant to be felt- If she’s sad, she’s sad. She laughs wildly when something’s funny. She rolls on the floor when doesn’t get her way, because she only knows how to be herself. No one else, but her.

I see how she loves her friends and even though she’s unwilling to share some of her toys and launches into a series of “ it’s mine!” battles, they’re short lived. She doesn’t hold onto grudges. She forgets. She lets it go; just like the balloons I often get her from the mall.

I watch her in the park, playing freely- shoes off, muddy toes, windblown hair.  A swing, a slide, a rubber ball, and a friend, that’s what her perfect evening is all about.

And the best part about my little person is that she pays no attention to physical appearances. She’s barely noticed my baby bump that grows magically by the second or a new haircut or a pimple that has erupted on my protruding chin. It means nothing to her.

But she does notice when I’ve got a band-aid on, or if I’m teary eyed, or silent on some days. She wants to know why I’m sad, or who hurt my finger. She cares about her mama, more than anyone ever has.

My little person is the best person I know, and she makes me want to be better. Because I know that she watches me, feels my moods and absorbs my energy.

On days when it’s just the two of us, lying on her bedroom floor, me scrolling through the insipid world of instagram, while she’s mothering her many baby dolls, I stop and look at her. I see the person I used to be, living in a happy, fearless bubble that I thought would never pop. But it did. Because when you grow up, everyone tells you to get out of your bubble and to stop being a child. Silly big people, we had it so good, we just ‘bad worded’ it up. Which is why I hope that Anaya, my person, grows strong, grows bananas, grows loving, grows kind… but never really grows up.

So, yes, if you're also wondering what to expect, expect this...you will learn more from your baby then any other person in your life. Oh, and you'll also become an expert butt cleaner. Oh, oh, and you'll also learn to balance a human on your lap as you use the toilet. Yes, it's all pretty magical. 

Thirty five

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I am thirty-five years old. But I honestly don’t know when I stopped being 25. When I look back, it’s like the last ten years are blurry and yet filled with so much clarity. Make sense? Maybe it doesn’t, I seldom do. Besides fine (and not so fine lines), gravity playing havoc with parts of my body and a few grey hair, age to me, like my father loves to say, is just a number.  

And I thought long and hard about this while grappling with this new number that now defines me as a thirty five year old woman. What does that mean? Do I need start dressing different? Should I fight the urge to say ‘that’s what she said’ at let the sexual innuendos pass without so much as a smirk from me? Should I organize play-dates with tea and cake instead of wine and pizza? Should I stop taking selfies and looking for perfect filters that will make skin glow and teeth sparkle? Should I talk slower and gesticulate less? Should I not about my boobs and orgasms at public places? Fuck that. I will forever be inappropriate, even my number is  88 and my teeth are fake and tits wrinkled.

But also, how can I be thirty-five when I still throw tantrums with my mother? I stomp my feet and hold my breath. How could I be  thirty five when I’ m a teenager when I sit with my friend’s staring intently at instagram stories and talking about mental nights and nursing I am dying, I just did ulti on my pillow hangovers. How can I be thirty five when I feel like a child  when my daughter and I make up dances and songs, colour outside the lines and laugh wildly at nothing at all.

So I am not 35 at all.  I am what papa says, I am as old as I feel.

It’s about how I feel during moments that have woven my life together, creating my story, one stitch at a time. And not every stitch is perfect; in fact so many have come apart... but the number thirty-five has taught me that it’s perfectly fine if they do.

TWO

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Dear Anaya or Nunu that you so proudly call yourself with a mouthful of spit and a baby lisp,

How can a person so little, with such few words, communicate with me in ways no one else ever has? My little girl you never cease to amaze me, and you aren’t even two yet.

Wow, two years.  At the risk of sounding like an old lady sitting on her front porch, cleaning her blotchy spectacles, I will say it nonetheless, it feels like only yesterday when the doctor handed you into my arms. You yelled at your new reality and me and I welcomed you half in awe and half in ‘what the f have I done! Will my life and my once beautiful friend Vaj… um… Vajanti ever be the same?’

But we’ve come a long way haven’t we? I don’t just love you like a daughter, I love you for the little person that you are growing into.

Your love for animals and fart jokes. Your loud laugher and dizzy dance moves. Your tiny kisses and 10 second massages. Your love for noodles and bites of papa’s dark chocolate. Your descriptive eyes and buck- toothed smile.

Oh, how I love you. I want to break into song about my love for you, but I’ve weighed the pros and cons and this lullaby will probably wake you.  In my head it will sound like Madonna in Evita but to you it will sound like a baby seal choking on a gum-ball. Good lord, sorry, I keep going off on a tangent, don’t I?  I hope you have a better attention span than your old woman.

 So where was I….aaah, yes..

As you lie next to me right now, wiggling in your sleep, I’m trying really hard not to drown you in my sloppy mamma kisses. Since you’ve come into my life, you have become my bestest homie…. Homedawg… bff…. Best biatch. And no matter how shitty my day is, even the semi- atheist in me thanks the sweet bhagwan that I have you to come home to.   When you run towards me, yelling  “mamma.. there mamma” every thing negative inside me shrinks. My silly fight with a papa over whatsapp, or a petty comment that plays in my head on a loop… whatever it might be, you and your magnificent baby hugs have the power to make it all vanish. Because you remind me of what’s important. Not pettiness, or jealousy, or anger. But stories, kisses, dances, bow- bows, birdies and the many adventures that lie in the parp (park).

Please don’t grow up, mama needs you.

OK now stop wiggling and go to sleep.

 There are Netflix shows to watch.

Workin' it.

WORKIN' IT

My daughter is now 14 months old, and with a heavy heart, I made the decision to finally join the army of working mammas, as we’re often called. I say “heavy heart” because I felt like I was abandoning her and the wonderful routine we had created for ourselves.
Our morning chai and breakfast with Mia awaiting scraps with greedy eyes and copious amounts of saliva. Our unannounced visits to nani’s house where we’d stuff our faces with mangoes and bang our hands on every piece of thoughtfully placed furniture. Our lazy afternoons made up of stories, seflies and long naps. Our park sessions where we’d swing and slide, pluck the grass, and attempt to kick papa’s deflated football.
That basically sums up my entire year. Of course there were play dates, too. Hers include toys and mine usually include wine, and, well, more wine. So you can imagine how saying goodbye to my baby, for eight hours a day, was going to feel like I was breaking our unspoken pact.
I prepped myself by talking to working moms and also reading blogs about 'mom's who work.' and it actually helped! i got the gentle kick to "get back out there." So the day before my first day, I carefully picked out an outfit for my office that is brimming with twenty something millennial women, with perfect figures and on-point outfits. I began to feel excited about my new job and partly new life. Different than the life I had gotten accustomed to over the last 14 months. So when the day came, I kissed her tiny mouth, fought back the tears and walked out of the door.

It’s been a week and yet I feel like I should get an award. Yes, lots of moms do it but when you do it, you feel like someone should dedicate a novel to you or name a drink after you. Because being a mom is hard enough and then you throw in eight- ten hours of work. And when you come home, you can’t put your feet up and peacefully zone out to a rerun of friends or Seinfeld. You have to be a mom, and not just any mom, but the greatest mom that has ever lived. Because you feel this need to make up for the time that you weren’t around. I am lucky I have help otherwise I probably would be hiding in a dark room or basement without windows. OK, that’s a tad excessive. But what I am trying to say is, and you’ve probably heard it all before, but moms don’t get breaks. Yes, you might physically get time away or off from your child, but your brain doesn’t quit. Why hasn't she eaten today, is she teething? is she constipated? what if she gets sick again or the plant in the living room falls on her, or she slips in the bath or chokes on her pasta, etc etc etc etc and etc!
It’s non-stop, and somewhere in the midst of those thoughts, you also miss your old life and the freedom to be able to have loud sex without worrying about waking up your baby, or lying in bed all day after a cray (yes, moms can say cray) night out or just spend the entire day out with worrying about another human whose entire existence depends on you and the decisions you make. Fuuuuckkkkkhhh.

But, when I’m at work, I can switch off from being a mom. I spend my day using my mind to write and be creative, compete with the hot twenty something year olds, make after work drink plans, and order momos at 5 pm.

But I still wouldn’t trade in the year I’ve had with Anaya, for anything. And though during fleeting moments, I secretly wish that I was a rich person that could stay at home and plan fancy dates where I’d feed Anaya baby caviar, I know I’ve made the right decision.

So if you're conflicted about going back to work or doing something else with your time, don't be. If you have a good support system, just do it. Because honestly just because you’ve pushed a baby out of your vagina, it doesn’t mean that your world has to shrink, in fact it should grow bigger every day. I'm just learning that now.

OK, now I need to go clean a very dirty bum. Toodles.

dear daughter- never be a lady.

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Dear Daughter,

You turn one next month. Yes, I am going to be like every other mother and say that time flies. But it really fucking does.  (Sorry, mamma said a bad word.) But no other word expresses this sentiment better than ‘fucking.’  And just like every other parent says, before I know it, I will be at your high school graduation, with tear-streaked cheeks and a runny nose. Of course there are days when I secretly rejoice at the thought of you going off to school so I can regain some of my freedom, but the rest of the time, I just want you to stay this little so I can always scoop you up into my arms and kiss you relentlessly. I don’t want you to grow up because the world is a scary, scary place and I want to keep you safe, tucked under my armpit forever.

My love, you are probably the most beautiful you will ever be right now. Your inability to see the world for what it truly is makes you so pure. I hope that you retain that innocence so you can always see the world through your baby eyes.

Sorry for getting soppy. My nose is already watery and I’ve swallowed a few gut wrenching sobs. But my darling daughter, when the inevitable does happen, remember that you never have to be “lady ladylike.”  The world lady has been misconstrued, manipulated and shat on by men and women who don’t like other women. “They” think that you should sit with your legs crossed, talk in polite whispers and never say fuck out loud. That’s bullshit. I want you to be loud, opinionated, and sit like a contorted circus freak if that’s how you like to sit. I hope that you’ll have broken nails and scraped knees from playing outside all day. I want you to curse loudly if the situation demands it, and curse in your head if you can’t do it out loud.

I want you to love yourself, and that doesn’t mean your boobs or the curve of your back. I want you to love the person you are. My love, forgive me for sounding like a cliché but it is so important to love the things that make you YOU.

But go ahead and love your body, your face and your hair too but remember darling, your laugh will always be more beautiful than a perfect pout.  

Also, I don’t want you to be perfect. Just always try to do the best you can, love the people who love you and stand up fearlessly to those who don’t.

As life continues to weave you into its web, you’ll make some bad decisions and that’s okay because those eventually lead you to the right ones.

You will also fall in love and probably have your heart broken by self loathing asshole who didn’t know good he had it. (Sorry, that’s the mamma in me getting ready to beat the crap out of the hypothetical dick head.) But I promise that you’ll recover because you have so much more falling in love to do. Also, vodka helps. (Kidding. Sort of.)

So these things will happen. A lot will happen, and to quote another melodramatic cliché “life will happen.” And even though I might not be there to help you meander through it all, my daughter, I will, with every bit of my existence prepare you to grab life by the balls.

 Oops, I did it again.

I love you.

Your mamma and your best friend.

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