heaven

Two grown men, with beards in need urgent trimming and a friendship going back someway, meet after a long time and are catching up over coffee. The talk turns to their kids and after going around for a while finds its groove in the extremely intricate art of preparing them for school every morning, and the multifarious forms this seemingly innocuous task can take. Understanding the relativity of time, it turns out, does not need mastery over complicated mathematical equations. "Those fifteen minutes" are enough to understand all that is needed to be understood on the topic.

"and then there are days", says one of them, "when he just does it all by himself. It is hard to believe that it can be really so simple". The other concurs, the two friends encountering a brief plane of intersection in their separate lives, and lets his words diffuse slowly into the silence "these days are heaven".

hoo-ha-hai

Picture this: A 8 month old is lying on her tummy, palms pressed on floor, arms straight, head up, in a classical bhujangasana pose, and surveying her domain. Her eyes come to rest on her father who was trying to watch her unobserved. She holds her gaze as their eyes lock. The moment continues to prolong and eventually reaches a criticality. It becomes obvious that something must happen. Somebody has to say something. The father gets excited. She is going to say her first proper word, of course, it is going to be 'appa'. As if reading his thoughts, she flashes a winning smile. The father moves to the edge of the seat. Aha, here it comes...he holds his breath...she says "hoo-ha-hai", and turns away to continue her survey.

There is of course no doubt that at some point of time in history, in the lineage of some language, spoken somewhere, this word relates to fatherhood. Question : When where and which is it ? 

a million stars

It was 2 in the morning when Akshara decided it was the right time to play. Thankfully, she did not disturb anyone but was comfortable playing by herself and making non-stop conversational sing song sounds. I woke up to these sounds and was just lying there, listening to their melody. Soon enough curiosity got the better of me. What exactly was she doing ? I looked into her bed...I had to get closer to the bed in that low light to get a better view. She was shuffling around her dolls and it looked like she was talking to them. Few moments later, probably feeling my presence, she turned around.  In that near-zero light, her eyes shone like a pair of light bulbs. From her perspective I probably appeared as a dark undifferentiated mass. I thought she might cry. However, she stopped her sounds and tried to focus better in order to deconvolve that silhouette. It was an amazing sight to watch. Her eyes appeared to literally zoom in on me as her pupils began to dilate more and more (and more) to collect extra photons. Those already enormous lit eyes became impossibly large and neon bright. As the photons traveled via the optic nerves and reached the brain, recognition dawned on her that the figure belonged to her father. Like an elaborate fountain suddenly springing to life, like a gorgeous butterfly spreading wings in the blink of an eye, like a thousand petaled lotus opening up at the whiff of dawn, she broke into a smile. It was but a little curve on those tiny lips, however its sheer brilliance was so dazzling that the whole room was enveloped with the effulgence of a million stars.

I looked outside. The stars did not try to compete. They were content to witness the moment, with a beaming smile of their own.