The Fall of a Hero

It was one of those dark rainy evenings when you were fighting the road and trying to reach your destination on time so that your hungry children could have their dinner on time.

I had started very early in the morning to Sambalpur and Hirakud with my wife and two kids on a road trip to experience the natural beauty of our state. Spending time with children witnessing their sibling rivalry and remembering yours and realising how similar in spirit and yet so dissimilar in shape these events are with that of yours. As nature's canvas opened up through the windscreen of our car, the kids realised how many things they needed to know about and with that came thousands of questions. It was a rewarding experience.

By the time we started our return leg, my eldest daughter of fifteen years had forgotten the initial sadness of not having her friend come with us, opined that this was perhaps the best family outing she had ever had and what she learnt from this trip would be useful in doing her project for the School Science Exhibition. You feel good in spite of the pain you have undertaken.

Tired of driving for the last 16 hours, we crossed Badkera, just before Angul around 8.30 pm., quite aware that we were almost one and a half hours away from Dhenkanal and dinner at Dhenkanal would take one more hour; I was visualising reaching home well past midnight. I was in two minds about whether to continue my journey to Bhubaneswar or stop at Dhenkanal for the night. My confidence in doing close to 22 hours of driving on this kind of road was slowly waning.

The road scene slowly changed. From our solitary car tearing through into the darkness of the night to slowing down to the parked truck-lined roads in front of roadside hotels that had just started serving their customers early dinner in total darkness. Absolutely dark  - with few oncoming trucks and vehicles blinding you, you train and squint your tired eyes to see beyond the glistening water drops on your windshield to ensure that you don’t ram into the back of a parked truck whose driver hadn’t bothered to leave the hazard lights blinking.

Just ahead, you see the road suddenly getting wider and with no trees on the side, you are at a loss to assess the width of the road. You spot a row of trucks parked on the left of the road distinguishable only from their backlight and try to avoid brushing against them by maintaining a sufficient gap from them. As you move ahead you see a mound of broken and abandoned concrete structure and avoid that by steering further to your right. The oncoming small vehicles and median to your left make you realise that what you are standing on is the abandoned toll gate at the entrance of the Angul Township which you had crossed this morning and you are on the wrong lane with one brave auto auguring his solitary head beam into your car.

A few seconds of eye-ball-to-eye-ball later I regained my composure to realised that I was on the wrong side and needed to correct my course. Lost, whether to make it to the next available cut in the median and take a left turn or back off, I waived the driver to move to the side. The auto pulls up by the side of my right window to tell me something. I lowered my window to realise that the autowallah was ferrying some 5-6 people, mostly young men with their women folk back to their village and they were returning to after enjoying some fair at Angul- high in spirit.

The visibly angry autowallah with the air of a local community leader chose to castigate me by telling me in an admonishing tone why I couldn’t see the road and warned me that had I proceeded further, the police would have penalised me for the lapse. I told him that because of the dark night, I couldn’t see the road suddenly dividing into two and there were no road signs warning me of that. Suddenly the young, barely out of his teen passenger sitting at the back of the auto spotted my glasses perched on my head and snapped with a sarcastic tone ‘How will you see the road if you keep the glass above your head’ to this his newly wedded wife and other co passengers burst out into peals of laughter.

This language can’t capture the sarcasm and disrespect the sentence packed. Completely flustered and choosing not to react to this unprovoked abuse by a young fellow, I chose to reverse.

About ten minutes into the road I heard the sobbing tone of my son saying ‘Baje Loka’ meaning a bad person; my teenage daughter joined in in an equally disturbed tone and said had there been that so-and-s0 uncle he would have given this man two tight slaps. And I suddenly found myself drawn into the discussion even though I neither wanted my kids to witness the abuse meted out to me nor wanted to discuss it further. I reasoned what can we do if they are ill-mannered? We shouldn’t go down to their level and fight with them on the road? To that my son says but Papa he is so much younger than you. Why did he misbehave with you?

I could sense that their childhood hero had fallen before their eyes. The false sense of security and pride that my perceived invincibility had given them for years lay shattered on the ground and they are standing bare and shaken in that wet dark night. Shaken with disbelief as to how could their Papa instead of pulverizing a minor street loafer like a film hero, choose to take the indignity and walk away. They created a wall of silence between me and them, nursing their bruised and battered ego, all on their own. And we drove on. While driving, my mind was in turmoil -whether I did the right thing by leaving the place or I should not have let my children down.

Wish I could tell them that it's always not wise to jump at every challenge and provocation we face every day, sacrificing the larger goals of life – even if we are right. Couldn’t ask them that, would they have liked to see their papa mouthing the same bad words that hurt them and rolling on the road fighting loafers? What would have happened if this argument had led to a bigger fight involving many bystanders? What if someone had tried to hurt all of us in the car – just not me?

The kids had gone to sleep by then and moreover, I already had lost the right to explain being a fallen hero.

First Blog: Quality Time

First Blog: Quality Time: QUALITY TIME: On a Sunday, while I was waiting in a hotel lobby for one of my business meetings, I saw a family I knew since few year...

Quality Time

On a Sunday, while I was waiting in a hotel lobby for one of my business meetings, I saw a family I had known for a few years coming towards me. We met after maybe a year. They were there for dinner. Both accomplished doctors with their two early teenage sons reading in a top school in Bhubaneswar.

The father stopped for a few minutes of pleasantries while the rest of the family headed for the restaurant to take their seats and proceed with the evening’s routine. As our discussion got a little longer courtesy MMS and NaMo, I had to egg the father to join the group as they would be waiting for him. He brushed me aside by saying that the kids are pros in ordering food as it’s their weekly routine. Weekly? My middle-class sensibilities were stirred considering the cost of these weekly routines.  

Father matter of factly confided that their routine on any weekday starts early morning with sending the kids to school and he and his wife rushing to their respective workplaces and both of them returning from work late evening and dealing with the waiting patients. By the time they are free, the kids usually have retired for the day and that leaves no time for them to spend quality time with their kids, So, he has resolved to disconnect from work every Sunday and bring the kids to this restaurant where the kids are let loose to order whatever they want and that’s the only way they manage to eke time out of their busy schedule. He has been successfully sticking to this schedule for the last one year.

Exchanges over, father left me to join his family and I was left alone waiting for my guest who by this time was cool 30 minutes late and had not bothered to update me about his arrival. I chose to take a stroll around the hotel and, through the large glass pane saw the family again. I couldn’t stop myself from being a voyeur from the safety of the semi-dark corner and behind the screen of condensed water vapour that had built up on the glass pane by then.

By then the restaurant was half full with an eclectic mix of guests. Few foreigners in the corner with the practised disinterest in their surroundings, a few lonely business travellers nursing their drinks and checking out their surroundings less out of curiosity and more out of their effort to break their monotony and seated on two conjoined tables, a big noisy group of some local businessmen, where everyone seems to be talking to everyone along with their friends who were on the other side of their oversized phones - all potbellied and bejewelled.

Food by then was served. Mother was gingerly nibbling on the starters and father was leaning over to serve the kids. Kids were in no competition with each other as there was enough for everyone. In between father received a text and left the table and got engaged in a long conversation. Nothing changed in his absence and all went about their own chores with practiced routine. The place resembled an assembly line. By the time the father returned, the captain had got the cue to present the check and the father hurriedly stuffed the cold food on his plate while the kids by them had started playing with his cell phone. The check was presented and duly paid. The family ambled out of the restaurant after spending quality time with each other.

In my engrossed engagement, I had forgotten to check my phone which had a text from the guest I had been expecting for the last 45 minutes informing me to postpone the meeting as he was stuck at a place. With no option left, I headed for my car thinking about that family and their quality time.

I saw a picture-perfect family having dinner and spending their time with each other but in the back of my mind, I felt something somewhere was missing.

They were not talking to each other.

They had nothing to share or didn’t want to know anything about each other. They had nothing to discuss with so many things happening around them. They had nothing to fondly remember together. They had no issues to debate over or to disagree with. No laugh. No argument. Everything seemed as if was in conformity with a script – an assembly line of craftsmen.

My middle-class mind trained to conform to stereotypes was not at ease. Many thoughts crossed my mind. What is this so-called quality time? What one is supposed to do there? Is being physically in one place with the other qualifies as time together? What kind of life the present-day families lead that they don’t have to interact with each other for anything even after getting time after 6 days. Have the kids been trained and taught not to share? If all their needs -both material and emotional are fulfilled? Do they have anyone to discuss if they want to?

Determined now I am to know what exactly spending ‘Quality time’ with kids is all about and if we are doing it right or not. Or we are just happy meeting the material needs of our children so that they don’t distract us from our tireless pursuit of material gains? Have we trained our own children to see us as mere ATMs? What are we doing about transferring our inherited values and lifetime learnings – our wisdom, Social Skills, and Life Skills?

Phew! I had resolved to stay positive in my mind.

My Motivation

After seeing the world for 48 summers and spending umpteen hours on the keyboard to give words to your wisdom, it gets progressively difficult to suppress the author in you. 

Even if others don't take you seriously, you do not want to miss out on the residual chances of pampering yourself.

So here is my attempt to publish my thoughts in the wide world of the weblog. 

Hope my maiden journey doesn't remain solitary for long.