FREEDOM

I am an atheist or perhaps an agnostic, I cannot say.  They will label me anyway, as they deem fit.

But, 

I do not tell anyone to accept as true one face or another structure or a power.

Nor I do not tell people that they believe in something that I do not.

I do not tell others that we are poles apart.

I never feel the burden of a missed ritual, because I overslept today which was because I worked hard yesterday.

I do not tell any one that they are different and so must be looked down upon.

I do not feel weighed down, if I did not get myself out of bed, to go a congregation, and instead spend the entire morning holding my son, watching his favourite cartoon.

I do not tell other people to do something, because when they will grow old they will feel the need for it.

I do not tell anyone to believe, because if they do not they will face dire consequences.

I do not feel anything if someone told me so either.

I am happy the way I am and yet why does it make any one else unhappy.

Am I free or am I  just bound in chains that I just do not see?

So am I a good man or am I not? Not that it matters anyway!!

Madhav Nair

Hitler Moms

A PERSPECTIVE ON THE ETERNAL STRUGGLE BETWEEN DISCIPLINE AND LOVE.

Why Hitler Moms? Coz I realized, after my baby matured into a young boy, that when I was growing up, I too was surrounded by them.

Each one of us has them in our lives. "Hitlers" in varying degrees and most importantly in varying mixes at different times.

Hitler here is a representative of the values that the military stands for. A square is represented as a square. Four equal straight lines touching each other at the ends at 90 degrees on a single plane.

All of us cousins were sure we had no other way to grow up but tow the line. One inch outside the box and depending on how far out of the box we were, we found out the meaning of the saying spare the rod and spoil the child.

Some of us were lucky to collect it on our buttocks for staying out past the "street light on" time, others on our knuckles for day dreaming at study time, others on hungry stomachs for making faces at the food. The blessed ones were made to miss TV programs eternally for scoring poor marks.  Others discovered ways to dodge the cane but gained a sense of time, and the addicted were simply not allowed to watch TOP GUN for the  sixteenth time but never got home late after that.

Those were all doing of Hitler Moms. The beauty of it was in all the illogical difference severity of the punishments for the same crime, the damn thing worked.

Then there is the other end where there is unassuming display of care, the cup of coffee at two in the morning, the glass of chilled Rooh Afzaa always there on table after the bicycle ride back from school in the scorching Punjabi summers, the Friday afternoon sweet Parathas, Huge jars of homemade Chocolate, Russian Salad in quantities enough to feed an Army, Pepper Chicken Sandwiches for the 1500 km bike ride back to my station.

And of course the stoic face hiding all the fear of the child flying the 21 at a time when the media would only report with a lot of ambiguity about a crash.

And just a simple smile on getting to wear heavy tabs or on realizing a cherished dream of flying the 21. And perhaps last but certainly not the least, they become the  eternal light that never casts a shadow around the pillar of values, even when the weakened heart wants to expose all the lies, knowing fully well that the truth is out there.

So many years down the line all that comes to mind is "Hail Hitler".