....and all that jazZ

Wednesday, July 22, 2020

Counting down to 10.

Mowgli : Amma, Am I adopted?
 I look up over the heavy pages I am holding : No.
M: Amma !!, Tell me the truth,
I am smiling now : No Kannu kutti, you are not. But why do you care? I would love you just as much.
His expression is grim so I add : However, neither of you two monkeys is adopted.
M: Where is the proof of that ?
I put my book down. : Just go look in the mirror.
M: I don't look anything like you.
Me : Okay, but you look just like dad did when he was a kid.
M: That does not prove anything. Maybe I was born and my mother died and he married you and you are now hiding it from me.
I am now worried : What have you been reading ? Are you watching random things on YouTube again?
M: I just want to know the truth.
His eyes that are, according to him, just like mine, are filling up with those tears he can summon like magic.
I sigh : Babe, If it matters so much to you, I promise that you are my biological offspring.
M: Any proof ? Who was present when I was born in that room other than you and Appa ?
Me : Ask Patti, she was there in a corner in the delivery room shivering with nervousness. She was there.
He is still defiant : But she is your mother. She will say anything just to support you.
I am smiling and I add : And what is it that I am doing right now ?
He is unfazed : I need proof, Amma !!
Grudgingly I get out of bed and pull out the folder with his name on it from a box of files.
He is watching me. Eyes are still brimming with tears. The folder is stuffed with papers, many that are random "I love you Amma, or You are the best Appa" notes from when he was not a teenager stuffed into a little kid. It was a brief precious window between toddler and till about when he turned seven. One of them is his birth certificate. I take it out and show it to him : See it says here, when you were born, which hospital, who your parents are. This here is my signature. I cant forge this. Its illegal to do so.
Just like that, the clouds vanish. The sky clears. The threatening storm is gone. The sun shines again. My mad boy smiles : I guess you are my mother after all.
I want to know now : But where is this coming from ? Whats going on ?
He is grinning from ear to ear : It's nothing !!! I just had to be sure.
I probe : And is love nothing ?
His eyes narrow : Ammaaaaa ... !!!! he groans...
I watch him walk away and I think of all the times in the last 10 years that I have wondered if I was a good mother, if I had a do over, would I choose motherhood ? The times I have felt trapped and shackled and struggled, when I have dig deep deep into nothing to find a trace of who I was and what might be and what else I might have been. Its nothing, kid. I would have found a way to you. Of all the shooting stars in the universe, you are the one I wished upon. In every universe and every version of my life, I would choose you !



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