Teach me to Pray , God!

I was returning from my work in a bus when I asked the conductor why no bus came for the past 45 minutes and suddenly one behind the other 8 buses came like a parade , much to the bewilderment of the frustrated passengers. The conductor told me that someone had stolen 1 sovereign gold ornaments , cash and some valuables from one unsuspecting customer and there was a severe investigation in all the buses that had the same number in the route and all of them were stalled at a station . My heart ached on hearing the news . With what prayer and expectation the concerned person would have bought the articles . The creative turbine in me began to process this incident in the below manner :

Oh Dear God, Teach me to pray ,

For I see just what I see ,

But your vision extends above and around ,

And I don't know what to pray or how to pray ,

For I believe in my prayer , And you

Always grant my prayer , So I am worried ,

How to pray for the correct blessing ?

Should I be sad that the person was a victim of robbery ,

Should I be apathetic to think that person was paying back their bad karma ,

Should I understand that you are teaching them the painful lesson of sacrifice , thereby bringing them closer to you ,

Should I be angry at you for allowing them to go through this incident,

Should I be angry at you for allowing them do a sin in the past there by making them face the consequence of this bad karma from the past ,

Should I be rational to think how desperate the Thief was to earn a livelihood by stealing ,

Should I simply be emotionally charged up to scorn the thief for the very act of stealing , no matter what his circumstances were ,

Should I be worried about the thief's future destiny when they themselves will have to payback for this bad deed of theirs ,

Should I be angry at you in the present , for allowing the thief to commit this sin ,

Should I be angry at you for not placing any good angels when the robbery was happening , thereby all their karmas are executed - the person becomes a victim of robbery, the thief commits the robbery but by your grace some good person watches this and catches the act , thereby themselves earned Good karma...

Oh Dear Lord , Teach me to pray ,

For I see just what I see ,

But your vision extends above and around ,

And I don't know what to pray or how to pray ,

For I believe in my prayer , And you

Always grant my prayer , So I am worried ,

How to pray for the correct blessing ?

Marriage - A Ribbon of Human Emotions

 

I never expected it to come to this. Perhaps I thought I was one of those who will never fall for this . But the situation sometimes , consistently tempt the horses of my self control who are grazing on empty lands of grass and almost at the verge of yanking themselves out of their moral reins. I brought it closer to my lips when a hard but comforting hand pressed my shoulders and slowly brought me closer to them into a hug of oblivion. It was my buddy Rohan . He gently took the cigarette caught between my amateur fingers that were about to release the very first arrow of death to my lungs . He looked at me , still holding my palms tightly into his , and said "It's fine." . Sometimes, a simple touch at the right moment can unlock the depths of your heart than an entire hour with a therapist . The dams of pent up unvoiced thoughts collected themselves into a highly pressurized water drop that was so viscous with months of my emotions finally fell down my cheeks , getting the release it needed. I moved closer to him and didn't speak anything for the next few minutes as one by one the pressure of the tears reduced . I began to undress my pride and self control. Rohan like me, is a parent of 2 children , except that his marriage was not at the risk of a divorce. I am Kiran , father of 2 kids , once upon a time participant of a happy marriage. 

It all started when I began coming back from office late at nights , mentally squeezed due to the pressure at work. All the political phony conversations, unexposed disappointments, unfulfilled recognitions but consistent role of an IT rat that made a decent living. Shylaja, my wife ran her own business with her friends and was an active social butterfly. We used to even go for morning jogs in the nearby park and please each other emotionally with our beautiful mannerisms. We silently envied ourselves, thinking will anyone else get a marriage that is void of ego but brim with emotional sexiness. Happy days turned into Happy nights which resulted in one fine day , when my first child Pravalika was born in a C-section procedure. This was the most ambiguous period of my life , when I was a circus of emotions. Tiredness, Fear, Fulfilment, Responsibility , Pride etc. Though it was my partner who delivered the baby and was rightfully entitled to be a powerhouse of hormones, I myself was having an orchestra of mood swings. Parenthood unlocks a whole new chapter of behavioral patterns in you that you believed never existed in you. Like for example, swallowing words that sped out of your mouth before during arguments , because now you understand that your wife is worked up with maternal duties. Pravi thankfully didn't give us nightmares as she was co-operative , except in matters of eating food, getting a bath, sleeping properly, breaking costly articles etc. Ah. I got you there - didn't I ? She was every bit of a horror story. But magically, somehow when she comes running into my arms asking me to lift her up so that she can smell my hair and scratch my beard, I instantly forget all the drama she caused as I blindly feel my heart wrapping around hers in an explained fatherly love. 

Days at the office were colorful, some days good , some days pure hell. But I never shared this with my wife nor allowed it to influence the time I spent with pravi. I was beginning to think I was growing an impervious mental fortress immune to any kind of turbulence . I grew on the job even as parenthood grew on me and quickly 3 years went by when my wife walked in one day and asked me to start saving money for buying diapers. We stopped putting diapers on pravi last year itself and this kind of amused me , until a full 60 seconds later when I realized Shylu had cloaked the message that she was expecting our number 2 in her charismatic sarcasm. I pulled her close and kissed her hard much to the point she yelled and pravi waltzed in her walker to protect momma lion. We stayed glued to each other like lizards for the next few minutes when my wife asked me, Can we do this ? . Little did I realize that the answer to this question was about to pivot my life in a whole new direction. We started baby proofing the premises, started coaching the very young pravi towards the concept of sisterhood even as we drowned her by our love assuring there was enough for the both of them. Pravi turned 4 as on her exact birthday Shylaja got admitted into the Pregnancy ward and out come our Boy wonder. Rahul , was our chosen name if it was a boy. And Boy it was. Sleepless nights ensued, Emotional roller coasters began for round 2 as we fought with fortitude trying to manage work , family , sleep and savings. Somewhere down the months, I invited some attitude cracks into my mental psyche as I began to grow short tempered at the slightest of triggers and Shylu began to be a complain box that just won't shut up. Our smiles took a reverse dip as we began to speak less and act more , catering to the duties of family, to a point we divided our day time into set of chores to keep the 2 children alive , happily. We stopped laughing at jokes together, romancing together , like how sometimes back in the day, I used to pull her by the waist to bite her neck and she sometimes slapped my behind etc 

Things took a turn for the worse when Pravi started going to kindergarten and Rahul was an exact replica of his sister in all her naughtiness. Both my kids are such high maintenance, to such an extent, I started apologizing every hour mentally to my parents for all the ruckus I might have done in my childhood. I started wearing a spectacle as long work hours and continuous cartoons put a strain in my eye and Shylu gained weight and began to lose shape. I too, started getting dark eyes and lost the youthful smile that I was once proud off. Now I simply looked like someone always rubbed chilly on my arse while I was drinking raw lemon juice. One day, when I was at home checking my work emails, Pravi was jumping and running and she came close to my desk and unexpectedly pushed my work laptop off the top as it fell down into 2 rectangular slabs. I was a hot mess. I can't a hit girl child however grave her error was, I can't shout as Rahul was being put to sleep nearby a half asleep Shylu and I simply threw my phone at her out of utter anger. I had to express myself in someway and my wife bore the brunt of it. The phone hit her forehead and fell flat on a sleeping rahul who now wailed at the top of his lungs. Chaos. I literally saw Death. I stood up instantly , cursing my existence and the turn of events as Shylaja with great great maternal instinct took rahul into the next room and pacified our boy. I looked at Pravi who now froze in shock as she could see that I was not her usual dad and she began to tremble and sob uncontrollably. I went out of the house and went to the nearby shop and asked for something which I never imagined will do. A Cigarette. I grabbed one and came to the nearby park , huffing and puffing , leaving our house in shambles , our daughter unattended, uncomforted, and my wife and son helpless. 

Rohan, who spent most time with me as we carpooled together daily to office and back, as he was also my neighbor, had followed the sudden noise in my house . He had asked his wife to go to my house to take stock of things, even as she brought her own two kids to our home and went to our room where Shlyu was at the verge of exploding. When she saw Rashmi, Rohan's wife, she erupted in a huge cry and began to yield to an uncontrolled flow of words that darted out of her mouth. A grown man myself , still required comfort and moral support though I can't just ask it as easily without appearing weak. My man , Rohan, who recognized that his usually composed  alpha buddy was now a mess of frail human emotions , sat beside me and took the cigarette out of my hands. We both returned, me still holding Rohan's hands in a very shocking display of masculine intimacy in an otherwise homophobic neighborhood of ours as we entered my home. There was an abominable graveyard silence as it increased my heartbeat even higher. Rohan pulled me near , held my head and said, Be yourself, breathe and don't hold back.  I then went to my room and when I saw Shlyu's forehead was bruised slightly because of my rant, I broke down into tears and shouted I am so sorry Shylaja , I just coudln't handle this much pressure , I am so sorry even as she gave Rahul into Rashmi's hands and dashed at me and hugged me so violently that we both fell down on the floor flat on my back and started crying our hearts out . Rashmi , couldn't hold herself any longer and began her own waterfalls as Rohan came in and played the lone warrior . He kissed her Rashmi on her forehead and said he will take the kids out to her Sister's place nearby, and asked her to guard the fort until myself and Shylu gained composure. It was a good half an hour , me and shylaja began to speak our hearts out, at the sudden distance that had developed invisibly between us as parenthood drew a wedge between us despite wearing the cloak of Family. 

Rashmi stepped out , the decent woman she was, as she realized our emotional outburst began to get personal and she didn't want to be attendance to the privacy of a married couple. She began to prepare coffee and some snacks, she knew our house well enough as our families are well acquainted with each other. All of us got a splitting headache and we settled after an hour. I messaged Rohan that the coast was clear and that he can return. I bent down to take my damaged laptop and collected myself . I was staring at unattended work emails, expense of repairing my laptop and a sure shot dig at my reputation. Not to forget , make Pravi understand that Daddy was not angry at her and he still loved her. And poor Rahul. What can I even say to him. He didn't even know dad almost injured his wide brown eyes out of anger and this is what ate my insides the most. With great gargantuan strength, I spoke to my boss
and explained my situation and offered to resign if they were unhappy of my conduct. Much to my surprise, my superior reminded me that , Managers and above who recently became Fathers had a clause in company policy where they can insure any damage to official property with a premium that got charged once a year as "Collateral Insurance". I totally forgot about this . First sign of peace enveloped me as I didn't have to pay any money from my pocket and simply had to worry about the rest of the matters. 

Noon crawled by , as still our residence wore the ambience of a storm that died. The kids were fed and resting when I pulled Shylaja closer, looked at her and said "Let's talk".

Marriage is never an easy affair. The honeymoon period is dangerously slim compared to the challenges it brings in our lives. But if we reminded ourselves to be connected with each other, no matter how consistently marriage caused tremors to our peace of mind, there is not a force that can break the bond. Never stop talking to each other - your mannerisms might change, the way you express your emotions , bodily and verbally might change, but the love in the heart will never fade unless you don't function from your heart. Don't go into automatic gear. Live by your valves. Put some life into your blood and oxygenate your being with empathy and the love with which you began your marriage will automatically circulate your relationship Every one of us deserve to live a happy peaceful satisfying life and it is the responsibility of both the partners to remind each other that they are source of this Love for each other . Peace.