Egad! Exam Time!

It doesn’t get more stressful for parents than this – the terrifying email from school that says “Portions for the Exam” popping into the inbox.  Anxiety and apprehension set in for me as I make sense of what should have been 3^rd grade and 6^th grade portions, but appear far too advanced even for my age (perhaps my intellect, actually, I should admit). 

I get ready to break the news to the children about the dates and the syllabus. It’s a little complicated as they are busy bumping a football dangerously near something breakable and as they break into a dizzy-tripping run, my concentration wavers. Bawling “No football indoors” I attempt to draw their attention towards the sheet in my hand. “Now, quieten down because, here’s something really important.” I wait, anticipating a dramatic pause to break the news to them. This so-called drama ends up becoming one brat kicking another, the second attempting to return the favour, a lot of yelling, pulling out of the football and attempts to demolish parts of the house again, not exactly the right background for breaking news. 

Why study when it's so much fun to play?

After restoring relative peace (background murmurs and dark hints) I get to the point. “Your exams email has come”.

Oh ok, so.. said one, as if it was a poorly scripted story; ya I know that, said the other Mr know-it-all as if he was the sender, wondering why I was bothering to tell him this.

“Do you know what this means? This means you need to stop playing around and start studying.”

“But mom, we are studying all the time.” Ya really, I asked dripping sarcasm.

“How much can kids study? We will fall ill if we study so much. Well, I even studied like yesterday for like ages.” (Read 10 minutes, 3 days ago)

Never mind that, they are herded into grudging submission to pull out their books with pained murmurs of freedom, rights of the child etc. It’s probably my fault I gave all that stuff on rights to them, to read in the first place!  I watched as they attempted to first find, by that I mean actually attempt to locate their school things.

“What do you mean you can’t find your math book?” “Just because you have poked your eraser onto a pencil, it doesn’t become a flag, it can still be used.” “How do you mean that on the prime portions of the text book you have scribbled smart-aleck doodles just for fun?” “This book is in two parts? Wasn’t it in one piece when we bought it?” “No the compass is not a sword” and so on.

After a series of highly unsatisfactory answers, my persistent dire threats to cancel all their playtime and recreation forever, pulling away the football, a mobile phone, a pack of UNO cards, a miniature car, biscuit (now how can you bring that here!) and every other “distraction” in sight, they finally settle down mutinously to their books.

Silence reigned, for about two minutes. “I’m really thirsty, can I get some water?” “It’s urgent I need to use the wash”. By the time we are back after finishing these seemingly unending tasks, it’s been an easy half an hour. Meanwhile the younger boy, who has learnt to tell time, looks at the clock. “It’s 45 minutes since we started studying. Mom, we need a break. I’m so tired; all we do is study. How can you be so hard on us?” Without getting into the authenticity of this statement, just the pitiful look and big eyes that accompanied this would be enough to bring out placards of me titled “Tormentor Mom” across the entire city (public places not exempted).

Meanwhile the elder asks me the question I dread.  “Can you help me with this? It seems that Section 3 in Chapter 4 of my Physics differs slightly from the section 4 of lesson 2 in my Biology text; so how do you think I should answer this question?” As I look over the mass of words uncomprehending, my brain works furiously for an escape route. “Your teacher has told us parents very strictly not to teach stuff at home” (whew, brilliant, a little hurried no doubt).

“Then I can’t study this mom. It doesn’t make sense. What can I study? I mean, when text books don’t agree with each other, what can poor children do? There must be a law to regulate this. We can’t do anything. It’s very confusing. Come Du”. The last addressed to the younger was the signal to pack up. Dismissing the books and exams from their immediate horizon, they wandered off into far more entertaining spheres. This show was over. Emerge football, exit mom. Ahem.

As I gazed at their rapidly disappearing derrieres, it dawned on me that in the wandering showbiz of parenting, this was nothing but yet another occasion for me to turn clown. 

Exams, what exams?

Those loooong journeys with kids!

We love to travel, we thought. Oh yes, we will take all those wonderful quiet breaks, rejuvenate and give the children exposure to the real world. Ok. Reality check: before the destination, there’s a journey. So, when it is a journey with kids, a lot can happen, really a lot.

The first time we travelled on an overnight train with the kids – we were geared up for a lot of fun. The excitement of sleeping on the train, the new sights zipping across, the sounds so typically “train” and getting to meet a lot of new people – oh yes, it was going to be a lot of fun. Or was it? Fascinated by a whole new experience altogether, our sons – then aged 3 and 6, proceeded on a trip of their own altogether. Starting with dashing up and down the corridor, waving at all the passengers and climbing every bunk in sight, most of all, they decided to yell out to each other from opposite ends of the coach. It was a terrifically funny game, it seems however, to no one but their two selves. 

After vain attempts to calm them down, we crept, stealthily into our bunks and lay down, pretending that we had nothing to do with this whole circus. I’m quite sure not a single person on our coach slept till the boys did, as tired from all these antics, they climbed precariously into their berths and slumbered in lion-like attitude. Everyone slept in a hurry, wanting to make the most of this period of silence.

Of course, they got up really early in the morning – persistently requiring explanations for every little leaf and ant that the train was zooming past, never satisfied with one answer, each question seemingly intended to fox every adult in sight! They were also chirpily garrulous and by the time we got off the train, bleary-eyed, the boys had shared most of our family history (not excluding gory details) to every passenger on the coach. All of them seemed strangely friendly (or was it relieved) just as we were about to exit. I could almost swear that a few of them cheered as we left and even the train seemed to start earlier than usual, to ensure we didn’t hop back on, perhaps.

Never, we said, would we make another journey like this – a spectacle that left us tired out and ready to just get back home. It wasn’t just trains that were arduous, for the kids seemed to master the art of making just about every journey duration, more adventurous, longer and noisier than it was ever intended to have been. I remember when our elder son was about two years old and on a flight, he decided it was more convenient to stand on the seat, that is, the view was definitely better. 

The cabin crew member was persistent. Madam, she said, he will have to sit. Much as I agreed with her, there was this little roadblock in my child’s views. Stand he would, no matter what others thought of the matter. I had just communicated this won’t do to him very sternly and the cabin crew member too joined this sternness team. He let loose a piteous wail. Usually I wouldn’t have swerved but the young attendant was aghast and in immediate panic, hushed him. “It is s ok mam”, she hushed, “let him do what he wants, but do hold on to him”, she pleaded – a somewhat unnecessary caution, given that he had decided it was more fun to stand without holding anything, arms up in the air, gazing all around over the seats and out of the windows. 

By the time we got off, my shoulder was frozen in an awkward slant and I looked like I was constantly trying to hail a cab (which did look a little out of place, given I was still inside the airport). My boy plodded along happily full of baby babble about the sights he had seen – mainly the tops of the heads of those on board, please note, not the view outside the window.

Road journeys can be awesome play time! Ahem...

Road journeys were yet another story. Initially under control with one kid, strapped into a seat and dozing most of the time, as they got out of that dozing phase and after there were two kids in the back, it was constant mayhem. “No you are not supposed to poke each other in the eye”, “Looking out of the window doesn’t mean making faces at the passers-by” “What do you mean, you are hungry because you are a growing child. You just ate 15 minutes ago”, “Making car sick noises and laughing after we stop the car is not funny.” Usually, when we reached our destination, we just slept a lot of the time. We needed our energy for the drive back, although we were inside the closed confines of just a car, it was a car with two creatively riotous kids in the back seat.

This is how I walk... on my Dad's back!

Of course, the walks and the treks, I’m not even getting into. Usually, exactly at mid-point into one of these, they would collapse vowing they couldn’t take another step forward. The journey would finish on their dad’s piggy-back, us in relief on reaching our rooms. Even as we were beginning our enquiries of concern, hoping they were not too tired, they would dash off to the nearest play area playing noisily and energetically for the next couple of hours. “Yes I was so tired, that I couldn’t take another step forward by but I don’t know how my energy has all come back.”

After much grumbling about our tiring journeys, we decided to take off alone once, just once. As the drive began, we soaked in the peace and quiet in the back seat. It was so bloody quiet however, it was unnerving. We turned right around and swore never to venture in such stifling peace. That noise was an integral part of our journey of parenting, one that we couldn’t do without.

So now, we have a simple logic in the way we approach travel schedules. Rest during the holiday, rest after the holiday. The destination does not matter; the journey really is what we are recovering from; and of course, noise is supreme – very much part of the journey, very much a part of the parenting expedition! 

On a kick-stopping musical journey!

Singing to their tunes

Music, they advice – all those million books on parenting and children – is the best thing you can do for the child. From enhancing brain capacity to calming their troubled mind, it seems like the answer to all existing queries about parenting. 

Having spent a mini-fortune on all those help-me-ups to be the ideal parent, I was busy keeping my vocal chords in good form, well in time for my first child. He was the ideal listening baby. Every hum, every tune, every little song was received with grunts of murmur followed by delightful naps. Even at a few months, he had figured out ways to let me know which songs he liked and which ones needed to be repeated over and over again. I was elated.

Zooming in the confidence of my obviously (to me) prodigious musical skills, I put them on display at every opportunity – which mostly meant I was singing most of the time at home, leading to family members making hurried exit excuses at different parts of the day. 

After I went back to full-time work, the self-proclaimed musical prowess extended to my workplace. My colleagues taken aback at first – as I was in a new organization then – turned from appreciative to polite to stunned in silence. No moment was too somber or no meeting so tense that I could not belt out a number. With a bizarre sense of humour (well, ya, blame the post-natal phase if you like) I would choose my songs according to the scenario. A cash crunch in the organization for instance would result in a song that extolled the virtues of money, while a resignation would see a parody on letting people go if they wanted to. The musical experimentation increased from day to day. Fortunately for my colleagues, I took my second maternity break, and wandered into their sunset with their relieved congratulations (whew, about time, now let’s get back to work without ad breaks).

It seemed however, that my singing sensation avatar was destined to go only thus far. This boy, my second, was a different cup of tea – or a different bundle of ears!  My decision to entertain him started earlier than before as I was swollen with confidence. However, my hum clamped shut even before I could properly begin. 

Right from the time my second baby was in my womb, he would give one light kick at first, then another harder and even harder, every time I even began to hum. I was in pensive doubt. Was it joy, hunger, restlessness? Quiet when I was quiet, the kicks began every time I started singing, stopped when I stopped singing. Perhaps this was the way he enjoyed music? Ouch that was a hard kick, a budding dancer perhaps? Over a few times, the message became increasingly clear – No singing. 

Mummy, I love you, but please don't sing!

As he finally emerged out of my womb and into the real world, it was crystal clear– he preferred silence to music, my music at least. Hmph. I maintained a dignified exterior even as my husband perfected the art of converting sniggers into coughs. Silence reigned, at least my musical silence, at home and at work. Sigh... Many a flower is born to waste… blah blah..

In the meanwhile, as my babies became children following rogue pursuits, yelling hoarsely, I wondered what my inputs of music had ever done to add to their acumen. Undeterred, I collared every baby in sight to sing, simpering to unsuspecting parents that it is the best thing they can do. Some babies left my arms yelling (they were just not used to me, nothing to do with my singing); some gazed at me in undisguised awe before they crawled off to the other end of the room. 

Later one of my boys took to dancing like a fish-to-water and the second (surprise me here!) proceeded to show extreme keenness in classical music; the little blighter never let me sing even! When I ranted how, he never let me sing, the answer was given sweetly and cuttingly by a "friend" - it was not music perhaps, just your music, a remark that set off murderous longing towards this now ex-friend. 

Net-net taking these parenting tips on musically engaging your children, I found, the long hard way, can be reasonably deflating. Music can be the food of love, but only if to the taste of your choosy child! 

Shortly after, I donated a mini-fortune in parenting books that had spurred me on to a short-lived musical journey. I am quite sure I have contributed to the growth of a musical hopeful parent somewhere, belting numbers to their children. I don’t quite want to know how the kids responded. Nope. Not me.