OUR GLASS BOWLS...

She is just twelve… and she is the only child to her parents. Two years ago, her mother died in a road accident. The father always loved this little girl and treated her more like a friend rather than like a daughter. She would talk to him about anything and everything. But, now, he is a lot worried. He had come to talk to me, this morning.

“Sir, she listens to you,” he said. “I want you to talk to her.”

Talk to the little girl about what?

The girl doesn’t talk to her father the way she did before. Whenever he tries to talk to her, she either doesn’t open up or argues, yells. 

“What is wrong with you?” he screams at her angrily, “Why do you behave like this?”

If only, she knew -  ‘Why?’

I am not a psychologist or a psychotherapist. Nor am I a psychiatrist. I am just a normal teacher… and, I didn’t even have a daughter to raise and, thereby, know why the little girls change, why they sulk, why they rebel… yell back at their parents.

“She is growing up… she is just going to be a teen,” I told him. “I think, it is just a normal behavior.”

“But, sir, it is too much.” He told me. “She doesn’t respect her elders at home; she has forgotten how to ‘talk’… she only ‘screams’; She doesn’t tell me about her school projects except on the morning she has to submit them and, makes me run around… She makes me mad.”

“Is it more like this, now, after the death of her mother?” I asked him.

“I think so,” he seemed to agree. 

“It is normal, then,” I told him. “She needs to be handled with love and firmness both. Her world is fast changing… and, as a father, you need to adjust to this change.”

“Still sir, I would appreciate, if you could talk to her one of these days,” he insisted.

 

“I would, certainly,” I assured him, “She is such a sweet girl.”

He thanked me with all his heart and went about his work.

My mind went back to that tragic accident, two years ago. It was on the eve of Diwali. He was taking his young wife on his motor bike; they were on the way to one of their relatives’ place. It was mid-noon time and there was heavy traffic on that highway. A small mistake the car in front of them did, and the bike lost its balance… the young lady was thrown off, bang on her head, and she bled profusely. Only a miracle saved them from getting totally crushed under the crazy traffic. He survived with minor injuries; but, she lost her consciousness. By the time she was rushed to the hospital, she had  lost too much blood. The doctors tried their best. But, the lady never returned from the coma; after three days, she gave in!

What we all can not still believe is: In that accident, the Diwali gift - the glass bowls – had tossed itself about twenty-foot distance. But, it had survived without even a scratch!

After two years, this man had survived this trauma… 

“I must be him to feel what it takes to do that,” I realized.

Now, he was here with,what looked like a minor problem compared to what he had gone through. 

“But, was it ‘minor’?” I wondered, again.

“I must be him to feel that,” I reasoned.

The lady who died in the accident

was someone else’s wife; 

the little girl who is rebelling 

is someone else’s daughter. 

The world that is filled with painful memories 

and crushing anxieties,

too, is someone else’s.

“Whose plan was it – that, the Glass Bowls had to survive?” … I still wonder, this mid-noon.

The little girl will come tomorrow. I have faith in simple miracles our daily rides offer… I have a little story to tell her, a loving poem to recite… I have asked a Star to stay there in the sky till she comes... and I have saved some raindrops to make her dance like a little princess. 

Well, this man has faith in me. 

I have faith in simple dreams… 

I believe in miracles that safe guard our Glass Bowls!

GERALD D’CUNHA

THANKS:

            The brilliant images used in this Post are by Ashok Ahuja. He is a professional Photographer and a very dear friend of mine. He is also one of the founder members