Dreading that day..

Jr. is part of a student exchange program and is spending the spring break in Asia. Given dads struggles in Asia over the last three years to get around, get the right food etc. and realizing learning Mandarin in your forties is not easy no matter how many languages you already have a grasp of, asked her to take Mandarin in school as the language.

She thought it was a good idea and went with it. Her Chinese is already way way better than mine, given she spends an hour at least on it every day and I spend 20 mintues in the night on days I get a chance. Also that brain is more moldable!  

We dropped her off on a rainy evening to go be part of a 9 day trip to put her Mandarin to test, be with a host family, make new friends and have an experience that she will remember for a long time..

We are going through a partially empty nest syndrome this week. The house feels empty because the mom daughter or sibling fight noises have reduced to nothing! 

I know that I did this to my parents and left the house and have not gone back, but my brother stays with my parents. Not sure if either kid will stay with us the way things are going.

The little one does come and sleep on my hand every now and then. So this morning I told her

"do you want to go to 

Daddys arm college of engineering,

Daddys arm college of Medicine,

Daddys arm college of arts and sciences or

just stay with daddy?"

She gave me a shy smile and said "Daddy, you know I will have to go to College somewhere right? Don't worry, I will come back!"

Know she means it, but things will change. Made that same promise to my mom and went back on it because things changed, I changed. 

Later in the day there was a discussion about that conversation and daddy was being psychoanalyzed and the conclusion was "maybe I am scared of being alone with my wife and worried about getting her undivided attention".. 

Now that day, I dread! Right now anyone she turns her attention to, is under pressure and the three of us take turns. Imagine all the power of that glare concentrated on one person.. I will be like those ants burnt by sunlight being focused by a water drop in one of those National Geographic programs!

It is going to be an interesting time when the kids are off.. 

Aging gracefully

Isn't that what it is all about? 

Jr. has a photo on her phone and every now and then she pushes it to my face.. It has a picture of a boy having a conversation with his dad.. Boy says "dad, I just turned 18" and the dad goes "when I was your age, I was 19!"

Everytime I say something or launch into the "when I was your age.." monologue, she looks down at her phone, finds that picture and holds it up like folks hold garlic or a cross in front of Dracula! 

Apparently I am older and getting to be begrudginly older, mistaking my experience for wisdom. 

Was having a conversation with a friend recently and he was telling me "you should be really proud of yourself for coming to the US and doing so well after all these years. you have worked hard and made it. do your daughters know how hard you had to work?" and my response was "they don't but I am okay with it now. I worked hard so they can have anything they want. why then bring up the fact that they should know the value of that? Didn't I do all this so they don't have to? They will have different challenges in their life and they should give their kids what they didn't have"

It just rolled off my tongue and maybe I was thinking out loud, but an hour later kept thinking about what was said.  What are the challenges they are going to face that they would not want their kids to face? 

My grandfather told me once that does not matter how much money you have or save.. after 7 generations it all goes though a cycle. if every generation does better than the previous after four generations it comes back down again. I thought that was ridiculous.. but maybe it makes sense now. If you are not challenged in certain things in a life time, those attributes may not be things on the "to fight for" list for the next generation, wealth just being one such attribute. It could be freedom, health.. many things and it might be in a family or as a community. I can see now how that can be possible!

The kids are growing up fast and they are sending me into some deep introspection mode on almost a daily basis. They are my kids but sometimes it is interesting to see that their logic and reasoning is very different from mine because they are a product of a different time and place. 

It is not better or worse. Just different. Takes me a few seconds to put things in context and I move on. 

Right now the trick seems to be not in accepting that my kids are the product of the way we raise them and their surroundings, but in accepting that I have changed so much over time. When your world view and your views about yourself change a lot over a few years, it is difficult to not think about your old stance when interacting with your kids.

Fortunately, they are both mature enough to let me know I am full of shit on a daily basis and I am now mature enough to smile and take it in my stride, knowing that they will get to be in my place in the not so distant future.. 

Jr.'s dancing takes another step forward

Today Jr. performed at the Pushpanali Dance Academy's annual day. She has been learning for at least 8 years now and has been practicing when she gets a chance. She loves to dance and she has come to a realization that her performing is directly proportional to the practice!

She did pose for photos before the performance (now that I have studio lights set up!) and there were some good shots during her performance..

Kept thinking about my sister today because Jr. is a splitting image of my baby sister! 

Here is a video with a few snippets of the 10 minute Thillana performance..

and a few photos that were taken in between shooting video snippets!

My baby is a big girl now! As a dad it is not an easy thing to accept.. but I will go through the learning curve and hopefully get on the other side of that curve soon!

As long as this makes her happy, it is all good!