valentine day

So still catching up on the valentine day blues. Don’t worry. Just enjoy a bit more.

I had a very different notion of The Day of Love from my son D. A preteen that he is, sometimes his actions give me hiccups. Lately when he was so impressed by the Flying Jatt Akka Tiger Shroff that D started imitating him. He would stand in front of the mirror for hours to make his hair style or watch his dance moves. I was so irritated sometimes.

D even made sure that his friends both at school and at home acknowledge him by that name. And there was no stopping for him. His hair was already touching his shoulders when I had to literally pull him into the salon for a decent hair cut. All the while as the man worked on his scissors D’s tears never stopped rolling down his cheeks. In the mirror, he was looking into my eyes and spitting venom for bringing this into him. I had to beg everybody in the salon to praise my son’s new look. And thankfully they did as long as we stayed there. That did pacify D a little. And on our way back home walking I coaxed few more of his friends to praise him. Finally when we reached home and he stood in front of the mirror to check upon his new look, the crew cut. It took him weeks to fall in love with his hair style again.

I mentioned the above incident to show how children grow up sooner now a days. At his age few decades back we were pretty dumb to understand what was Valentine’s Day. But today’s generation know it. THE DAY OF LOVE is pretty well observed by them. Fair enough!

So I watched D board the school bus. He had taken little bit more effort to get dressed that morning. Lately, he had been asking questions about girls and females. So I had no doubts that my son was going to school on a mission.

While he was away I drowsed myself in watching Pretty Women on TV. It was the nth time I was watching it and somehow it always succeeded in grabbing my attention no matter what. I forgot the count of time. I watched Richard Gere climb up the iron ladder to rescue his love of life, Julia Robert and it stole my heart as usual.

Damn! My son wasn’t home yet? Where has he been? He is never late. Most of the students skipped school because of the final examination preparation that was due on 17th. So I had no clue where to look for him. He had the habit of collecting kites from the terrace that the wind brings in sometimes, so I was hoping he will be home any minute with one or two more kites in hand. But even after five minutes of pushing myself over the balcony railing to have a good glimpse of the road below I had no sign of D. I grew restless and ran down the stairs.

I found D sitting on the stairs just above the ground scribbling something on a piece of paper. He didn’t answer me when I asked what he was up to sitting there. He asked me to wait for him. I joined him and saw what he was doing.

On a small craft paper he was making some designs that looked more like a greeting card. So he was making a card for one of the girls in the colony. I didn’t have to guess who it might be. I had seen him talking about her to B, my husband his father, many often. So I guess he was pretty excited about the whole thing.

I went inside the house again to prepare food for him. Soon he joined me and informed that he wants candle light dinner. I sighed. Then all of a sudden he asked me to stand straight looking at him. I did.

In front of me was a boy with a shy smile on his face almost avoiding my gaze to surprise me. He bent down and touched my feet. Before I could understand what had happened he handed me the hand made greeting card and stood back longingly for my reaction. I opened the card that read in one of the most silly handwriting,

WISH YOU BOTH HAPPY PARENTING ON THIS DAY OF LOVE. LOVE YOU BOTH MOM AND PAPA FOR LOVING ME SO MUCH. I PROMISE TO DO GOOD IN FINAL EXAM. YOUR’S D.

The small note stole my heart. Love can have lots of meaning and one of them is parental love too. And how lovingly my son had chosen this day to declare his love for us.

HAPPY DAY OF LOVE to you all!