Spare the child, I really don’t care about the rod!

Corporal punishment and its effectiveness have been part of discussion for some time now, since the new fangled parenting books hit the markets. I read parenting books with a grain of salt because there can be no one formula that we can apply for every child. Each child is different, what works for one may not work for the other. I read some anyway because I can always find a new idea that I think may benefit my children and help me be a better parent.

There are some absolute truths in good parenting, though, the first being consistency. Setting out rules and expectations and following them and holding the children up to those expectations. Of course, the expectations should not be unreasonable so the child is set up for failure. While being consistent on the core values, certain flexibility often makes the journey more fun for both the parent and the child.

I do believe, however, corporal punishment is not effective means of parenting. It instills fear and in some cases, it breeds violence. Why do we punish children in the first place? The goal is for children to realize, from an early age that each of their actions has a consequence. Good choices yield positive results and bad choices bring on unpleasant reactions from the grown ups. The end result of spanking or time outs is the same – to make the child realize that they made a bad choice. The parents take the responsibility of ingraining the socially acceptable behaviors in a child when they start toddling around. Most of the parents teach their children to keep their hands to themselves since they cross the threshold of preschool. Children are naturally physical, keeping their hands to themselves is an acquired social skill that are taught by parents and teachers. If the parent uses their hands to inflict physical pain, what message are they conveying? I have seen a father swat at his child to stop him from hitting a peer. What did the child really learn? It’s ok for dad to hit, but it is not ok for me to do the same? Prime example of double standard right there. Children may display a desired behavior for the fear of getting physically hurt, but is that desired behavior ingrained in them? Will they behave well because that is the right thing to do?

Many equate lack of corporal punishment to lackadaisical parenting. Kids get spoilt if they are not dealt with a firm hand – literally. Spare the rod, spoil the child may just be the most quoted line from the bible. I have heard we are bringing up a generation of spoilt adults because we believe in the new fangled parenting of not spanking. That, I think, is far from the truth. If a child is occasionally spanked for some misgiving, yet the parents give in to all his demands at other times, he will eventually grow up to be selfish, spoilt and yes, to some extent, violent. When it is their turn to be parents, chances are, they will continue corporal punishment quoting ‘spare the rod, spoil the child.’ I do think a parent can be strict and effective without raising his/her voice as long as they stick to their guns. Some feel a spank here and there is far more effective than constant nagging. I agree nagging is useless. the children tune you out, it falls in deaf ears but kids get used to spanking too. They know it hurts for the moment but the moment passes. So it is not really a good alternative.

Most spank their children to teach a lesson, and not to really hurt them. Ideally, if the anger element can be kept out of spanking and it made clear to the child that this kind of punishment is being meted out to him for a particular bad behavior, it MAY yield result. But there are parents who need lessons in anger management. Corporal punishment is a slippery slope then, it can lead to a trip (or many) to emergency rooms. It has happened before and happens often, unfortunately. Does spanking in childhood traumatize the child for life? Most cases, it doesn’t. They grow up and live to tell the tale. I was spanked pretty regularly, now I laugh with my mother and give her a hard time about it. She says she made a mistake when she hit me. She has realized later in life she shouldn’t have inflicted pain and I should never, ever hit her grandchildren. Yes, we see some double standards here 🙂 !

Having said all that, I know it is easier said than done. I have smacked my children a few times in their lives. I have come close to spanking them many more times than I care to remember. I have seriously counted till ten to get my anger under control. I have yelled at them, nagged them, and done everything that parents do when they lose control. I am not holier than thou, by any means. But then hated myself later remembering their scared eyes. I lost control. Moreover, I lost control on little people who are completely dependant on me. I am their protector, I would never want them to ever feel I will inflict them physical pain. I am an assertive parent and I want them to recognize my authority over them for making serious decisions but not by beating them to submission. I apologized to them and promised I will never raise my hands again. I have kept my promise.

Are my kids going to be better humans than another who is spanked in childhood? Heck no! I hope they will be happy, successful individuals and so will be the child who was occasionally spanked as a form of punishment. The choice of corporal punishment is more about me as a parent. It is about what kind of parent I want to be. The idea of inflicting physical pain to teach a point does not appeal to me. That doesn’t mean they won’t hate me till they are thirty. And the same fate awaits my fellow parent who reaches for the rod instead of taking away a favorite toy for thee days for a particularly serious misgiving. I just won’t have to say later, ‘I shouldn’t have hit you when you were a child. That was a mistake. But don’t you EVER lay on a hand on my grandchildren!’ 🙂 ! At the end of the day, not choosing corporal punishment is really about who I am and what kind of parent I want to be.

The gift she gave me.

I was in seventh grade when I met her for the first time. The doorbell rang, I raced to open the door and there she was, looking back at me with a toothless grin. Not a single tooth to be seen in that wide smile she gave me. She was hungry and was wondering if I could give her any food to eat. The request for food was made in an empty stomach, but the smile that accompanied the request was one of pure joy. The smile reached her eyes.

She was an old woman, probably early to mid seventies, short, very thin, and as I said earlier, toothless. She had an old saree draped around her thin frame. The saree must have been white at some point but had turned gray with wash and use. I had watched Satyajit Ray’s movie ‘Panther Panchali’ recently and there was Indir Thakrun (a tragic character from the movie) right there in front of me. Her story wasn’t unusual. A childless widow with no money, no support, all alone in old age. She didn’t beg on the streets, but got by somehow with the help of her neighbors. She woke up that morning to find there was nothing to eat so she went from house to house to see if someone could give her food.

The connection was instant. She must have touched some chord in my young heart. I ran in to get her some provisions. Our relationship started that day. She didn’t come everyday, maybe once or twice a week. She wiped her forehead with her gray saree and rested her bony legs as she told me stories of her life. What I found wondrous about her was despite being in terrible poverty where she had to depend on neighbors to survive, she had an inner light, an inexplicable joy surrounding her. She laughed while telling her woeful tales and never forgot to thank the lord for letting her witness yet another day. And she had the most beautiful smile that I ever saw. She blessed me – every time we met. Instead of saying goodbye, she said, ‘May you be a queen one day, my girl! May you get a lot of love in your life!’ Being a queen was not on the top of my list those days, so I simply said, ‘Mashi, (aunty) come again!’

I tried to be sneaky while getting rice, dal, vegetables for my adopted aunt, but it was more of a game between my mother and I. She knew how much I was giving, yet she was indulgent and looked on quietly while I hid cups of rice from her. I still remember how the old woman’s eyes lit up in anticipation of a good meal if I could produce an unexpected vegetable or a seasonal fruit once in a while. One time, my mother bought a saree for her during Durga Puja, the biggest festival of the Bengalis. I remember, she cried.

She came to us regularly for almost three years, and then suddenly, didn’t. I thought about her sometimes, my family asked me where my adopted aunt was but I am ashamed to admit, I didn’t go looking for her. I didn’t have a clear idea where she lived. Also, youth is probably a bit self oriented. I was heady with the feeling of being young, growing up and just life. Priorities changed. I can’t say I forgot her, but she definitely slipped way down the totem pole as I moved on.

The elderly woman in my past embodied the spirit of old India, in its best and its worst. She represented the widows of India, uncared for, cast aside. Yet she remained accepting, joyful, thankful. In those days, she could ring people’s doorbell and ask for help. She wasn’t kept out by the security guards of modern-day gated communities. In those days the neighbors actually took care of her in the way they knew best. I seek for this warmth among the glittery malls and glass and concrete corporate houses in the big metros when I go back. Sometimes I get a whiff of the India I left behind, but often times, I don’t.

I think of her often now. I wonder how her end was. If death was kind to her, or she died alone. I think she came in my life at that particular time for a reason. She came to teach me empathy. She taught my tender, young heart to feel the sorrows of another and to try to help in whatever capacity. I also question who was truly helped in that situation. I gave her some food for sustenance, but what she gave me in return is invaluable. The lesson of kindness.

I later read Mother Teresa’s quote ‘If you can’t feed a hundred, then just feed one’, and I thought of my adopted aunt. As Albert Einstein said ‘Not everything that can be counted counts, and not everything that counts can be counted’. My cups of rice were indeed countable, her blessings and lessons to me, were not.

Going to the beach…

We drove down to the beach to expose my poor parents to some camping experience. We hyped up the trip, expounded on the ‘fun’ aspect of camping on the beach. The sun, the sand, the water, the blue sky, the roasting hot dogs on the fire, the camp fire songs and stories. My parents come from the congested city of Kolkata. In Kolkata, we don’t go camping – generally. In the pleasant winter, we go to the botanical gardens or the zoo for a picnic, at least we used to when I was little. So camping was going to be a completely new experience for my mom and dad. We conveniently forgot to mention the uncomfortable sleeping conditions, the bugs, the darkness, and the other negative stuff that non camping lovers highlight and true campers pooh pooh. I am somewhere in the middle. But this post is not about our camping experience. This post is about the stream of thoughts that I had on our way to the State park for our camping trip.

The back roads that led to the beach flashed some images of rural Bengal in my mind and how different the two settings are. What different emotions these two very different scenes evoke in me. Last year, Sean and I took a road trip to Shantiniketan, famous for the Viswa Bharati University that was founded by Rabindranath Tagore. Tagore envisioned a different kind of education for the young, malleable, open minds that children have. The minds with endless possibilities that can achieve great things only if they were set free to think outside the box. He created open air class rooms where classes were held under chateem trees, the teachers taught in the open air, under the sky, amidst nature. I had seen the university a few times but I wanted to show my American husband what my favorite poet, visionary and educator, Rabindranath Tagore had envisioned and created.

Our car sped through the controlled chaos – unplanned, haphazard greenery, chaos even amidst the resplendent green, mud huts, small plots of land being ploughed by man and oxen, brown-skinned people, scantily dressed children looking on at the passing cars, collecting water, playing marbles. Little ponds in between, women drawing water for household chores, the earthy smell mixed with the smell of cow dung and manure. Thin cows and water buffaloes grazing, stray, mangy dogs, squawking chicken, songs of Rabindranath Tagore playing in my mind – the familiar, soothing feeling of a scene from home, a feeling of belonging. It will be presumptuous of me to assume that the people that we saw in those surroundings were happy. I realize that thought would be naive and idealistic. But the aura was one of simplicity. I will also say this, it was easy for us to feel that way sitting in our air-conditioned car, looking out at the hard-working men and women and enjoying this feeling of being relaxed and carefree.

The contrast to here is stark. The planned stretches of farmland, picturesque houses far in between with white picket fences, healthy looking lonely, dappled horse flicking its tail, fattened cow grazing. An Amish gentleman trotting steadily on his horse-drawn buggy in his traditional Amish clothes; tall, shiny silos raising their proud heads high up proclaiming the prosperity of their owner, automatic, giant pivot irrigation systems irrigating the farmland, a farmer on a tractor – occasionally spotted. Images of apple pies and fried chicken flood my mind’s eye and make me desperate to taste some. It is neat, orderly, slightly clinical but a sense of peace and quiet, a sense of calm.

As I said earlier, the two scenes in two very different countries evoke two very different feelings in me, both positive, both peaceful in different ways.

Since I was already in a mood for comparing, the beaches brought out different feelings as well. The beaches here mostly have clean yellow sand, relatively less polluted water, lots of skin, umbrellas, beach chairs, sun lotions, beach toys and sand castles. Bathrooms and concession stands to make one’s beach experience pleasurable. I love to just get up and go for a long walk by the ocean feeling the spray on my face, the sand under my feet and the sun on my shoulders. People generally bring surf boards, go surfing, swim, eat their food, put more sunblock on, read or sleep. When I go to a beach in this country, I mainly look out at the horizon and try to fathom the expanse of the sea, and expand with it in my mind. I notice the changing colors of water more, I notice the blushing red sky at sunset, I look up at the full moon up in the sky, I notice the sand dunes and the shadows they cast as the sun changes position, I am more in tune with nature.

In India, nature for me takes a back seat since there is so much entertainment and people watching on the beach. Girls in their full traditional outfit, salwar kameezes, giggling at the edge of the water, daring each other to go in. Men in their underwear, a little deeper, in the water, maybe up to their knees, urging their respective wives to come to him. The young couple gets some sweet moments of shared intimacy in the water as the waves crash them against each other. The newly wed bride holds on to her young husband and laughs a happy, content laugh. The elders in the family, if present, look on with a bemused, indulgent smile on their faces, happy that the man is taking care of his woman. All this touching will be frowned upon as soon as they leave the safety of the water. A married woman of mature age wears a salwar kameez instead of her regular wear – a saree and revels in the guilty pleasure. The pictures will be her only memories of this change once she goes back to her regular life. She will never wear anything but a saree there. The hawkers sell their ware, photographers try to take pictures of you and make you buy them. Food sellers cook food right by the beach making the air aromatic with the heavenly smells from their smoky woks. People buy cheap shell jewellery, eat road side food, it is a carnival every night by the beach. In the midst of all this, the sun rises with the same splendor and casts brilliant light on the sea, the sea changes different hues of blue and aquamarine, the sun sets with resplendence. I sometimes get a glimpse, often times don’t, since my eyes are glued to the mass of humanity.

I am at a good place. I find my sense of balance by belonging to both these countries. I need my simplicity, and I need by orderliness, the beauty of nature refreshes my soul and my fellow humans make me feel a part of a huge plan. I need it all and lucky me, I get it all.

It took a moment….

I woke up sad. If my husband was reading this, he would say ‘Tell me something new!’ But the truth is I wake up grumpy and warn my family not to talk to me till I get that first sip of coffee, but I don’t wake up sad. Grumpy vs sad, there is a difference.

Today I woke up with a heavy heart because today was going to be my day of updating our google calendar, today would be the day to put all those hand written, hastily scribbled notes on the paper calendar, official. I had ignored them for a while hoping they would go away if I laughed with my husband, exchanged ideas with friends, played with Sage, read with Ryan and listened to music with Sahana. But they weren’t going anywhere, so today would be the day to grab the bull by the horns.

I opened up my laptop and my husband went out with the trimmer to trim the edges of the lawn. I looked at my schedule and despaired at the different color coded activities that made the google calendar a work of art. Ryan needed to be at football practice three times a week and his swim team practice was three times a week as well. Sahana had to be at her swim team practice four times a week, there would be an hour of dryland on top of that. I work two evenings a week. How??? This was mathematically impossible!!! The house was quiet, the children were still sleeping, the neighborhood hadn’t really woken up. I could hear the muted sound of Sean’s trimmer doing its job.

I felt an existential angst that I have never felt before. This was not living! This is not what I imagined life would be for me, hasty meals and quick peck on the cheeks as we exchanged car keys. We couldn’t have a meal together any day of the week. Meal times are sacred for us. We connect then, exchange stories, laugh with, and sometimes, at each other. And who could I blame but myself? I signed them up, I paid for the classes. I had over committed. Not willingly, but caved in. I couldn’t say a firm ‘No’ when Ryan requested to play football. We were becoming the family who ate meals at McDonald’s (we wouldn’t go that far, the McDonald’s part is more for effect:) )and ran to their next committment. While I was busy feeling sorry for myself, I didn’t realize the sound of the trimmer had stopped. I heard Sean call out my name,

‘Come quick and bring the camera!’

‘Not now, I am busy!’

‘Please, come now, bring the camera!’

Disgruntled, I got the camera and stormed out with an exasperated ‘What???’

Sean was standing in front of an exquisitely woven, thin, almost translucent work of art – a spider web. He stood in front of it in awe watching the newly risen sun reflecting its morning fresh light, creating brilliant hues of green and blue. The gentle breeze swung the spider web, ever so gently. There was not a sound to be heard, just Sean standing there with a look of utter admiration, his voice hushed to a whisper so as to not disturb the sanctity of the moment. A brilliant sun washed, blue sky, a few yellow butterflies flying around the rhododendron bush, bright red cardinals flying around in the nearby trees. The moment was picture perfect. Nature was mocking my sadness over trivialities of life. I handed Sean the camera, he took some shots of the web. We stood there together looking at this complex and beautiful creation. It will sound cliché, but how can I not say it, that such is life, complex, yet oh so beautiful. We looked for the creator. S/he was nowhere to be seen :)!

When I came back inside, the ‘steel girl’ was back! My confidence surged, I looked down at the colorful google calendar and gave it a ‘I got this’ smile! I was grateful for the moment of shared togetherness, when we both stopped for a moment to take a look outside at the beautiful world out there and hidden joys for us to discover. It shook me out of the ‘Oh, please feel bad for me, because I am over booked’ kind of whining! This crazy schedule is going to be over in a couple of months and life will take some form of normalcy. My worries over schedule seemed so trivial in the grand scheme of things. I counted the blessings I have in my life. I have a man in my life who loves me, I have two healthy children, who, despite being a work in progress, are really delightful, I have friends whose support I can count on in my hours of need, I just got a job that I wanted! Yes, poor you, indeed, madammommy!

The picture isn’t spectacular, the moment was. It reminded me of a few lines by William Blake that I read a life time ago:

To see a world in a grain of sand
And a heaven in a wild flower
Hold infinity in the palm of your hand
Eternity in an hour.

I happen to be a red light!

Seven year old Ryan was upset with me. Very upset. He held an Angry bird hat in his hand at a store, pleading his hard hearted mother to buy it for him. Mother was firm, the house could not handle one more hat. The cup (of hats) runneth over………in our house. Moreover the branded products are pricey. ‘Take the money out of my bank account!’ He offered. ‘No way, Jose! As your mother, it is my moral duty to teach you financial responsibility. I can’t let you throw your money away over something like this. The answer, still is no! Please don’t argue anymore!’ Mother was losing it, fast!

While waiting in front of the fitting rooms where his sister tried out school clothes, Ryan came up with one of his thoughts ‘Mom, I have thought of something!’

‘Wonderful! Would you like to share your thoughts?’

‘In every family, the mothers are harsh, dads are fun and kids are in training. I think mothers are red lights, dads are green lights and kids are yellow lights. The kids could go in any direction depending on who’s training them. The girl kids are trained by the moms so they grow up to be red lights while the boy kids are trained by dads, and they grow up to be green lights.’

‘What???’

‘Yes, see how Sahana is a cranky teenager, she is a yellow light almost turning red under your training. I will turn green because I am being trained by dad to be the fun one!’

Ouch!

After shopping for clothes, I took the children out for lunch and allowed them the ‘unattainable’! A soda to go with their meal. Not coke or pepsi, mind you, just an orange soda! My soda deprived children couldn’t believe their good luck. Ryan, whose way to the heart is through his stomach, was almost giddy with joy. It was then that I asked him the important question. ‘Do you still think mommy is the red light in the family?’ I know, I know…I went deep sea fishing.

The boy didn’t miss a beat, ‘Well, soda is bad for us, daddy doesn’t approve of it, but you are allowing us to do the wrong thing anyway. So I guess you are still the red light!’ I was so tempted to stomp my feet and sulk at that!!! I did it mentally just to get it of the system!

After lunch, we headed to the car, the red light in the family turned the ignition on to head back home. It was a no win day for the mom lady, one measly hat, or rather refusal to buy one measly hat had ruined me….for the day. That is when my aloof teenage daughter decided to shine a ray of sunlight on my dismal day, ‘Mom, just so you know, I don’t think you are a red light at all. You are a very green light for me!’ I gave her a big, wide grin and a grateful thank you. My pride was salvaged, somewhat. I looked at my son through the rear view mirror, since I was expecting a full blown debate over my red light/green light traits of character. But he had tuned us out already. He was sipping his orange drink cautiously with such obvious joy that I was about to turn green for him. But I have a feeling he wouldn’t have acknowledged my greenness unless I drove back to the store and bought him the hat. The regret for not getting his 59th angry bird hat was running deep.

‘What is the most difficult decision that you made, mom?

My son asked me a question this morning that shook me out of my complacency that I was doing a semi decent job of parenting. This morning, between ‘Ryan, hurry up and eat’ and ‘you will miss the bus today’ he asked me, ‘ What is the most difficult decision you ever made in your life, Mom? Was it having us?’ That question stopped me in my tracks. It may not have all the implications that I am projecting on it, but it shook me to the core and made me see myself through my children’s eyes.

I am their anchor, their stability and the constant right now. And I know they love me. But they also see me stressed, angry, harried, tired, not in my best state. They have heard me groan when I see a school holiday on the calendar. They have heard me complain that the kids were driving me up the wall. They have experienced me yelling at them, nagging them to change their behavior, clean their rooms, pick up after them.

It is not unusual, therefore, for Ryan to infer that maybe having them was the most difficult decision that I ever made. That was my performance evaluation right there and I was graded poorly. It was a shock because parenting is my primary job at the moment and this is the impression I was creating.

He couldn’t be farther from the truth. Sean and I decided to see the world and travel together before starting a family. But when we decided to raise a family we were absolutely ready. Of course, when Sahana came along, we didn’t have any idea how or what we should do with her. See, she didn’t come with a manual! But we figured it out eventually. By the time Ryan made his appearance, we were pros. Having them was truly the easiest, the most natural decision we ever made. I had just mentioned to a friend, not too long ago, that I have found the calling in my life, being a mother! I enjoy it the most! Then….this!

After searching around for a few minutes for the perfect response to reassure my boy that they were the best things that happened to me, I apologized. I apologized to him for making him feel that way. I said everybody needs to work on their shortcomings, my shortcoming was my impatience. I try hard to be patient with them and I will continue to try harder. That opened up a floodgate of meaningful conversation. Sahana admitted she pushes my buttons sometimes and aggravates Ryan knowing it will end up in a fight. Ryan said he will work on focussing more on his school work. Distraction is his shortcoming, and that is a new word he learnt. Then our seven year old theologist went on to share his idea on the life we lead. He said life is a walk. Mom and dad have started walking early, Sahana started walking a little later, Ryan, even later than Sahana. Everybody starts their walk when they are born. The unborn babies are still at the starting line. Mom and dad will probably reach the finish line first, before them. With that thought, he asked me to please turn on the radio to his favorite station. The house filled up with music, the conversation ended. My mind filled up with the depth of his thoughts and the feeling of being extremely lucky and blessed to be nurturing two precious beings and seeing them bloom.

But his question did disturb me. I don’t want to behave in a way where my children feel having them was the most difficult decision. A lesson learnt, time to take stock and focus on that personal growth, mama!

Lovely! Does it HAVE to be fair?

Lovely! Does it HAVE to be fair?.

The Princess reigns still, but for how long?

I heard of ‘Cinderella ate my daughter’ by Peggy Orenstein from a friend, a mother of a ‘princess’. The title caught my attention, although, being the mother of a non princess, the book wasn’t particularly relevant to me.

Sahana watched her share of Cinderella, Ariel, Belle, Snow White movies but when she was taken to a toy store, she always gravitated towards motorized scooters, magic trick boxes, spy kits and such like. From a very early age, given a choice, she chose a book store over a toy store. She wore a Snow White Halloween costume to her kindergarten Halloween party. I believe she did that to conform to the collective consensus on princess costumes among her girl friends in class, not from her heart’s desire. First grade Halloween party saw her as a ghost with a simple, home-made costume, the subsequent years were lady gansta, warrior Xena and so on. Now in middle school, Halloween means an orange shirt and a swagger.

In the book, Orenstein raises the question ‘how dangerous is pink and pretty anyway – especially given girls’ success in the classroom and on the playing field?’ ‘Does playing Cinderella shield girls from early sexualization – or prime them for it? Could today’s princess become tomorrow’s sexting teen?’

Personally, I think it boils down to what mom and dad are telling their daughters when they hand them their princess dolls or buy that ultra expensive Disney princess alarm clock for their pink room. If the message to the child is clear that the princesses and their lives are make believe fairy tales and reiterate that playing in make-believe world is ok as long as one is using one’s imagination. I haven’t seen many women walking around in their Cinderella costume, or being affected for life by the impact of helplessness portrayed by the Princess stories. It would be wrong to blame the Princess doll, a child hood playmate, for the insecurity or helplessness that certain girls grow up with. The root cause for those afflictions go deeper. In the stories, Belle changes a beast to a Prince with her kindness and love, Ariel sacrifices her voice for love. Maybe I am not feminist enough to see these acts as a submission of a woman to get a man, but as gestures of kindness and love for another human. That is how I interpreted the story to my daughter. The fact that the girl feels the love and makes a change is a positive, pro active move – for me. But I understand, my interpretation of these stories is debatable. What I find annoying is the fact that the damsels are being constantly rescued by a prince! It is always a man saving a woman, I wish once in a while a woman would save a man – if not for anything but to maintain that precarious balance in nature! But then again, these stories were written long ago, when the fabric of our society was different. The world was ruled by men. The world now is PREDOMINANTLY ruled by men, the women are making their niche slowly yet steadily. There is a difference.

Orenstein concurs with my thought on page 16 where she says ‘I have never seen a study proving that playing princess specifically damages girls’ self esteem or dampens other aspirations. And trust me, I have looked.’ She says that there are ample evidence that the more mainstream media girls consume, the more importance they place on being pretty and sexy. There is also ‘reams of studies show that teenage girls and college students who hold conventional beliefs about femininity – especially those that emphasize beauty and pleasing behavior are less ambitious and more likely to be depressed than their peers.’

She makes another interesting point that was relevant to my life and my children. She wondered which sex has greater freedom when it comes to choosing toys? Girls get to choose sequin dresses, baby dolls or spy kit, both are acceptable. But a boy, due to imposed masculinity, primarily by the dads and also by society, would rather die than be caught with a tutu or a pink bicycle. One of Ryan’s preschool friends came for a play date and teased Ryan for riding his sister’s hand me down, pink scooter. After the friend left, Ryan refused to get on it – ever again. I held my ground and refused to buy him a blue scooter because I didn’t want him to give in to peer pressure over the gender differentiating colors. He gave up riding scooters altogether and moved on to bicycles. He chose a blue one, at age four.

My husband proudly wears pink shirts saying ‘real men wear pink’ and points out the pink cleats worn by professional football players (breast cancer awareness) when my son talks of the color disdainfully. It was somewhat enlightening to read in Orenstein’s book that according to Jo Paoletti, an associate professor of American studies at the University of Maryland, children were not color coded at all until the early twentieth century. Babies wore white before the advent of washing machines, since the sure way of getting clothes clean was boiling them. In fact, pink was considered more masculine since it was a watered down version of red – a color depicting strength. Blue, on the other hand, was associated with Virgin Mary, constancy and faithfulness and symbolized femininity. I was curious if ‘real men wear pink’ idea emanated from that concept of red being the color of strength.

She made a few other interesting observations which I think are worthy of mention here. She made me see the character of Bella Swan in the notorious …errr I meant famous Twilight series. Like Orenstein, reading the book ‘makes me grind my teeth until my jaw pops’, yet she made me see the heroine in a new light. What a contrast Bella Swan is from the other heroines that main stream media churns out with perfect skin, perfect teeth and perfect body for the teenage girls to emulate and fret over. Bella Swan is a regular, run of the mill girl. She isn’t particularly pretty, nor is she the sharpest tool in the shed. She is not the most exciting girl in school yet the most enigmatic, handsome boy falls head over heels in love with her. Orenstein says ‘Twilight lets a girl feel heat without needing to look hot’. I may not turn up my nose in disgust at the mention of Bella Swan from now on since she may have given girls what they needed – find their love on their own terms.

The other issue that the author raises, which I found interesting, is the separation of cultures which results in an us-versus-them mentality between males and females. According to experts, typically girls, around age two, move away from playing with boys who are too rough and rowdy. Shortly after that, the boys follow suit, avoiding the girls as much as they can. By the end of the first year of preschool, children mostly play with other children of their same-sex. This segregation continues till middle school when children start finding the opposite sex interesting but for different reasons altogether. Studies show that same-sex play in childhood MAY lead to less relating to the other sex and can cause hostile attitudes, lack of empathy and lack of understanding, leading to increased rate of divorces and domestic violence.

I was never interested in dolls or make up, although I love the color pink, mainly because I look good in it. I was considered ‘one of the guys’ growing up and I am still ‘one of the guys’ among my friends. But I love to see a woman made up immaculately and looking gorgeous. I just lament the fact that I lack the skill to put on make up tastefully. My daughter has followed my footsteps when it comes to make up and pretty dresses. She buys comfortable shirts, sometimes from the boy’s section in the department stores, she likes prints and designs that are labeled by society as ‘boy’ prints. And she stays far, far away from anything pink/flowery and paisley. Oh, and no glitter either, please. Orenstein writes, in her zeal of steering her daughter away from pink and princess, she created a little girl who looked disdainfully at her peers who actually liked to play with princess dolls. It is difficult for a child to decipher her mother’s dislike for the idea behind the princess stories rather than the color pink as such. Her daughter had interpreted her aversion to the princess culture differently and misdirected her disdain to the ‘girlie girls’. Sahana’s dislike for pink and floral motif made me curious about how she felt about her friends who were into pink and make up. I asked her if she looks down upon girls who make choices which will be labeled girlie by many. She said “I don’t scorn make up and girlie designs on my friends if they put it on and if it makes them feel good about themselves. I don’t feel the need to put make up on my face. I do, however, draw a line, when the desire to put make up becomes an obsession and girls constantly whip out mirrors to check their mascaras. To me, that’s annoying.”

The book was interesting, well researched, well written. Did I agree with all she said? No, I didn’t. But I was happy to read her perspective that she presented so well. Certain aspects of the book was relevant to my life and my children, which I mentioned earlier. I do, however, agree to everything she says in the last paragraph of the book about preparing our daughters to thrive in this world:

‘…staying close but not crowding them, standing firm in one’s values while remaining flexible. The path to womanhood is strewn with enchantment, but it is also rife with thickets and thorns and a Big Bad Culture that threatens to consume them even as they consume it. The good news is, the choices we make for our toddlers can influence how they navigate it as teens. I am not saying we can, or will, do everything “right”, only that there -is power – magic – in awareness. If we start with that, with wanting girls to see themselves from the inside out rather than outside in, we will go a long way toward helping them find their true happily-ever-afters.’

Not an easy task, teaching our girls to see themselves from inside out, given the media frenzy environment they are growing up in. But we have to try – what other choice do we have?

When the game got boring…

Baseball aficionados, I know the above statement is akin to blasphemy – mea culpa. We took the family to see an Orioles vs Tigers baseball game last evening to do something fun for them. Fun in our household is a very complex commodity these days. What is fun for my seven-year old son is extremely ‘unfun’ and most boring for my almost 13-year-old daughter. We watched a movie of her choice recently, so we decided to go to a ball game for Ryan this weekend. Gotta balance the ‘fun’. She made it amply clear to us by words, gestures and facial expressions that she was going under protest. I told her that her displeasure has been noted, we understand she is unhappy about the situation but can we please move on and make an effort to have a good time? Give ‘good time’ a chance, maybe? Stony silence.

We entered the beautiful Camden yards and five boxes of Jimmy Palmer’s statue were thrust in our hands before we could even say a word. I was almost waving the lady away who was offering these boxes to spectators frantically, but my pack rat husband, who loves freebies, nudged me ‘take it, take it’! A rumor followed this gift by the ball park, that these statues were selling for $50 on eBay. The cloud lifted from my mercenary (in a good way) daughter’s face. She suddenly got very interested in making sure we were holding our boxes securely. She pooh poohed my annoyance at having to carry the clunky box around with ‘MOM, think of all the money we are carrying around! I am going to sell these on eBay!”

We found our seats, did the usual Tan ta tan ta taan CHARGE..thing with the rest of the crowd, clapped when players made good catches, shouted “YEAHs” and “GO ORIOLES” with the crowd, participated in Mexican waves. I almost threw the ice in my cup at my fellow spectator in my enthusiasm to raise my hands and stand up to continue the wave in our section of the stands. Then things started cooling down, for me. My eyes started wondering, I started getting into my serious ‘people watching’ mode. I love going to the ball park, 30 percent of the love is for the game and 70 percent love is to watch the people around me. Good folks of Camden yards did not disappoint. There was a very quiet, relatively well dressed group of young people sitting on my left, who were drinking moderately, and holding a quiet conversation. They weren’t clapping or seemed remotely interested in the game. The Orioles were winning 4 to 1 and the Detroit Tigers were striking out and going back without much fanfare. In the last inning, the Orioles made some errors. The quiet crowd on my left erupted in cheer, swishing their beer. They were Detroit fans trying to blend in with the Orioles crowd but showed their true colors (which also seemed orange like the O’s) when their team came back. The sneakiness! Oh!

Put your beautifully pedicured feet up and watch a ball game.

In the front row, some young folks had probably come on their first date. There was a lot of giggling, lots and lots of it. It could have been all that Nati bo (National Bohemian beer, I later found out) that they were buying from the vendors. And the girls kept getting up to bring food for the men, or use the restroom or whatever. No matter what they did, they made sure everything was followed by a sharp pitched giggle.

There was a little boy, about 3 years old, who danced on his chair almost the entire time, much to our amusement. The parents held on to the chair for dear life since he swatted their hands away when they tried to hold him. Nobody was allowed to come between him and his wild moves!!! Step way back mom and dad!

The Camden yards has this tradition of Kiss Cam. When the camera shows you, you have to kiss the person next to you. When the Kiss Cam came on, Sahana pushed Sean and I together and longingly looked at the big screen hoping they would focus on us. It didn’t, but we kissed anyway. Ryan, in the midst of all this, was completely focused on the game, except when he was hungry.

His father promised to buy him some food after 10 outs. So he started counting outs irrespective of the team. Point to be noted here is, he is a fanatic Orioles fan. Yet, he started celebrating their outs at that point as each out brought him closer to the promised food. I teased him about his solidarity with his team. Hungry stomach and teasing don’t go well together, I found out.

There was a very rowdy, beer guzzling group of men sitting right in front of us. They kept the scene interesting by pushing and shoving each other. The beers kept flowing and their transformation from men to kindergarten kids started hastening exponentially. They were ribbing each other, slapping each other’s faces playfully, play acting to snatch their neighbor’s beer and food as they went by them, eyeing some pink and purple haired girls on the other side and exchanging flirtatious comments. Then, to make the transformation to kindergarten age complete, one started naming a male private part for no apparent reason or necessity while his friends burst out laughing. Once the gentleman saw that he was eliciting so much amusement among his friends, he kept repeating the word. My son, finally, turned his head from the game to give these grown ups a strange look. I, at this point, was getting seriously concerned about how many drunk men and women will be unleashed into the city and behind the wheels going home or wherever. These men were clearly very drunk and in no condition to drive. As the game stretched on into overtime, I overheard one of my drunk friends saying they needed to get to a club and they should get going. Another commented they can go if their designated driver was ready. Designated driver? I saw an older gentleman, who, I didn’t think was with the group, rising up to escort them out. The responsibility they showed just raised them in my eyes. They had come to have a good time. Their drunkenness was not malicious in any way. Apart from the unnecessary use of the name of the private part, they didn’t bother any of the other spectators. They helped Ryan cross over some seats so he could go to the front row, AND they had thought about bringing a designated driver to take them back. I waved them goodbye cheerfully and wished them “Have a nice evening!” They were going to a bar, so I assumed more alcohol in their systems. But one less group of people to worry about, phew! These guys are drinking responsibly! Pedestrians and other drivers are safe from this group, at least for one night.

We saved two baby birds…or tried to!

While we were sleeping one night, a storm came and turned our world upside down. We woke up to a backyard filled with leaves, branches and sticks. We also woke up to an eerily quiet house. The hum of the refrigerator and white noise of the air conditioner were unhappily absent. We had no electricity. The thermostat was already at mid seventies in the early morning, threatening to rise above hundred degree Fahrenheit as the day progressed. The calm morning belied the devastation that nature wreaked upon us the night before.

While picking up sticks and leaves from the yard, Sahana and Ryan discovered three very young baby cardinals in our yard. One of them lay still, the other two were fighting to stay alive. Both the children being avid animal lovers, turned to us in tears, “What can we do? The babies will die if we leave them here!”

We had no answers, of course. Nature can be harsh, sometimes these calamities take lives, those babies are beyond help, sorry but we have to accept their fate – these sort of reasonings were blown away by the tender hearts and streaming tears. Both cried harder, pleading to their ‘all powerful’ parents, “No please! Don’t say that! We can’t give up on them! We can’t let them die. We can bring them in, feed them and give them water!”

The birds had just hatched out of the eggs, their eyes weren’t open yet. Sean and I stood there watching the laboured breathing of the babies and listening to the tearful pleas of our human babies. I looked up to see the daddy cardinal, in all his red splendor, fluttering around from one branch to the other. The unassuming brown mom twittered in agonizing helplessness. At that moment, I could relate to the helplessness of the bird parents. They were helpless against the harshness of nature. I was equally helpless in shielding mine from the harshness of this world where death, agony, pain, suffering are very real.

Sean and I slowly headed back. Hearts were heavy, we failed the children. Despite the sass and attitude we get, both the children still turn to us to find a solution to life’s problems. Their confidence that mom and dad can figure out a way to save the baby birds, and our failure to do so, touched us both. Then Ryan came running in, tears streaming down his face, “Please, please help them mom. The ants are biting them, they are suffering. Make their suffering stop!” I simply had to try to do something, for the faith he has in my abilities to ‘stop the suffering’.

We got a flower-pot, filled it with leaves, picked up the surviving cardinals with other leaves, careful not to leave our scent on the babies and put them gently in the make shift nest. The parents were still watching. Sean balanced the ‘nest’ securely on a high branch. We stood below with fingers crossed that the parents would take over.

Ryan insisted, much to the amusement of his sister, that we should have fed the babies some ‘ketchup’! Why ketchup? Well, ketchup is the only food that he could think of that has the same consistency of the regurgitation that the birdie mom and dad feed their babies. He also told us somberly that saving baby birds was much more important in the scheme of things than going to a picnic when we urged him to get ready to go to Sean’s office picnic. He stood there for a while keeping an eye on the nest up on the tree, turned around and said he was going to offer a prayer at church for the long life of those two birds.

For Ryan, I still have all the answers. That is not the reality, it is his perception of his mother. For Sahana, I still have the answers to questions that matter – again, her perception of me. Their faith truly overwhelms me with gratitude and love and at the same time, scares the living daylights out of me. I am sure the day is approaching soon when I will NOT have all the answers. I sincerely hope that by that time, they both will have learnt answers to some of the questions and more importantly, they will have learnt to explore the right resources to search for those answers.

Their grieving at the imminent death of the birds reminded me of Gerard Manly Hopkins’ lines:

Margaret, are you grieving
Over Goldengrove unleaving?
Leaves, like the things of man, you
With your fresh thoughts care for, can you?
Ah! as the heart grows older
It will come to such sights colder
By and by, nor spare a sigh
Though worlds of wanwood leafmeal lie;

Sahana and Ryan will not cry their hearts out for fallen baby birds for very long. Even if they don’t shed tears, my hope is, they will still turn around to look at the fallen, bend down to pick them up, give them a shoulder and never ever stop trying to ‘stop the suffering.’