Parenting is a unique experience; Being a parent is a unique
experience too.
There is subtle difference between the two. ‘Experiencing Parenting’
is what parents do until children are on their own. ‘Experiencing being a Parent’
is from then on. Parenting is giving unconditional love; Being a parent is to
be, well, for lack of better words, taken for granted.
Our toddler already gives us cheeky responses. Suddenly,
after last few years of unconditional love, getting back cheeky responses kinda
makes one feel – a popular mega-serial dialog - “After all these years of love, after all I have done to you, after all
the sacrifices – this is what I get?”
But then I think about my own life. How easily I have taken
my parents for granted. How easily I cut them off, in an important discussion –
making my own viewpoint as supreme. They treated me as if I was a young prince
when I was young and, lo and behold, here I was, acting as the King – reigning over
them! And to think, they would have spent the same countless hours and days and
months and years, providing me unconditional love just like how I have to my daughter.
My parents recently visited me in US. In a small way, they were actually conscious of what I think about their paraphernalia. “What will
our sons think of us in these shoes, these suitcases?” It jolted me that they
were now actually concerned about my opinions about them, their stuff.
And then I saw around me – figuratively. This was the same
with my brother. He too towered over my parents. Yeah, there was an
undercurrent of love but on the surface, it was always – Do As I Say. I saw my
wife. She was the same too. It was as if the tables had completely turned. She
was giving advice to her mother – guiding her to do this, telling her not to do
that. Her mother was concerned about what she was doing and hence consulted her
children to guide her the right way. Remember the movie The Curious Case of Benjamin Button? In a way, we are all growing old to become the children that
we were, but the movie depicts the case of Button in true physical sense.
During my recent visit to India, I noticed my father
interacting with his parents, and alternately, my grand parents' outlook of my father. Frankly - I was taken aback. In fact, there was no change
in the way he was treating them for years nor in the way they regarded him. But, since I had recently become a
parent, I was seeing the world differently. From my grand parents’ view, and
how they would have treated my father almost seven decades ago - to now, when things had changed so much.
But then it is not easy to show the same kind of affection
that parents show to their young offspring when it comes to offspring showing
love to the old parents. For one lighthearted reason, the recipient is no
longer cute!! But on a serious note, we adults just lose the patience, and the
love we have for our parents just stays as an undercurrent ebb.
I tried to
change myself too, to step back and think about the immense affection and love
that was showered on me when I was a small boy (something which I could never
have done if I hadn't become a parent myself), just before I start ranting
against mom for some silly thing that she would have done or was about to do,
but I just couldn't. For me – and I am sure, like for all of us – a mother is a
mother, who is there for us to ‘blast at’, and yet she will always be there,
with same affection and care towards us.
And this is all around us. My friends, cousins, relatives –
irrespective of age and generation. This metaphysical feeling of us adults getting the upper hand over our own parents – and it is
the same case each time that will go on forever: Parents sacrificed years together to give unconditional
love and affection, only to become parents when they were taken for granted,
and got their quota of advice and brickbats and anxiety from their own
children. Such is this naturally unique and distorted cycle of a common man’s life.
It is fascinating, in a way, and depressing, in a way.
At this juncture, I can’t help but remember this excellent, excellent
video which pretty much covers whatever I just penned.
