Column

Dear Aakanksha and Gaurav,

Can you believe that in just a week, all of us will be welcoming the New Year? It seems to have sped by so quickly! What a rollercoaster of a year it has been for us. As I look back at the last 12 months, for once, I would like to say what I normally don’t to the two of you, thanks for being there. No matter how much I have yelled and berated you guys, your love has enveloped me. And both of you are a great support (so what if you do not live together for half the year) to each other. As a parent, I feel immense warmth in my heart — one that would drive even the Arctic icicles away when we are all together. ‘Ah, mom, you are getting sentimental,’ I can almost hear you say. Don’t embarrass us more.

Like it is for the world and its aunt, the end of the year is a time for introspection and forward thinking. So, let me ask all parents, that while we expect our kids to turn around and say thank you for what we do for them, or expect perfect behaviour in return, how often do we stop and tell our little ones, “We are proud of you. We love you for just being yourselves.” So caught up are we in our humdrum and hectic lives that we overlook so many small things — while literally flaking out over frequent night outs, disappointing pals and even more disappointing performances, long hair and even longer mobile conversations!
Coming back to you kids, when we started this column, I remember you asking why ‘Parent trap’? And the obvious answer then was it was a phrase that came to my mind from the film that starred Lindsay Lohan as the lovable twins who reunited her parents.

Today, as I look at it, I feel that the phrase has much more meaning. Do we ever outgrow our parents, even though we have turned into parents ourselves? As I see both of you trying to carve your own identity, I admire your efforts to strike out on your own steam. But, this year more than others, I have realised more than ever the joy of being referred to as my parents’ daughter. Perhaps it is the genetic resemblance — at a small dinner hosted by a friend I had someone ask me if I was related to my dad for I looked so much like him. That made my evening — as it had years ago, when I was in the tenth and the resemblance to both had been noticed. Today, (and I am not referring to all things material and worldly) the goodwill they both created lives long after they stopped working — embracing in its fold not just me, but the two of you as well, as it does my brother and his family. That is priceless and for that, I am grateful.

It is a legacy I hope I succeed in passing on — even though both of you are treading a different path from the one I took. I, suffering from stage fright of appearing in courtrooms and a phobia of the scalpel — steered clear of both my parents’ professions. You both are (at different intervals) on the verge of plunging into one of theirs (law)! For that, as your mother and my parents’ daughter, I am happy that you are carrying the beacon forward. And as you have started moving around in the familiar world, I have begun rediscovering it again, as an observer.

From the past, back to the future. As many newly-minted parents spend their first Christmas New Year eve with their tiny tots, I too am keen on wishing both of you a great 2012. So, what is your resolution going to be? Mine — the obvious battle of the bulge as always and the equally obvious resolve to let you be what you want to be. Amen to that!

-Love, Mum.

PS: Dear readers, A Happy New Year to all of you as well!

The writer, Executive Editor, Verve, is, in her personal space, often driven to distraction by her two growing ‘young adults’, but she loves the madness of it all.