Lost in cricket indifference

As everyone is caught up in cricket fever, heres an interesting dekko in life of a man who is passionate about cricket married to a lady whose interest in cricket is only when India plays pakistan and that too in finals and 2 kids aged 5 and 3 who are yet to develop liking for his passion. The Poor Soul has been lost in cricket indifferent family These days this is whats happening in our household:

-Saturday lunch is usually out and at place of kids choice. Daddy wants to catch not only the match but pre match analysis as well. The kids are rushed to take a bath just after breakfast and we decide to leave for lunch at 11:30. Now we have been used to a leisurly lunches for quite sometime. As three of us gulp the food as his pestering and leave,he decides to take a shorter route to reach faster and guess what - divine retribution- there is a traffic jam and rest as they say is history

- The only high point in having a son forhim is that one day he thinks they can watch and play sports together. However it reaches another level when he tries to make him watch-" See now this one will bowl and he is called a bowler and this one will hit the ball hard for a six and he is called God of cricket . FYI- tendulkar was batting in the last India-SA match. Of course the little champ takes it in his stride, hears it out and then gets busy in making imaginary tracks and noises with his cars.

- There is not a bigger downside of nuclear family then when you have to watch cricket alone. You can see the terrible soul yearning to blurt out comments but restrict himself lest people mistake it for dementia. So he either calls few friends during drinks break or connect through facebooks and twitters of the world.

- The morning tussle on newspaper has taken a backseat. He starts actually with the sports pages at the back of the newspaper so we split the paper. But theres a new tussle between him and the kids . He would like to read whats on cricinfo and multiple expert opinions while his devilish angels want to play angry birds. So theres pleading , cajoling and then threat but his own blood show their true colours- the other day, they went and hid under the table with their ipad untill father gave it all up in exasperation

and finally ,

- Just for sake of companionship, I give him company somedays- have to admit some of the matches off late has been real interesting to watch. As two mature individuals, we differ a lot - me an eternal pessimist about India's chances to win this world cup and he an eternal optimisit of seeing the dream of world cup coming true. So here goes the exchange of conversation between us

Me :" They will never win . They dont have the winning instinct"

Him : " Just wait and watch. Dhoni is really smart and shrewd . He will have something up his sleeves

Me : " They dont need to win. They make enough money through endorsements these days and then they have IPL . So even if they loose, their cricketing carrer will never end

Him : " You'll never understand. Winning is intoxicating and addictive. Its a high !

Me: " Why isnt Dhoni playing X player ? Why is he making these decisions"

Him : < exasperated> " Why do people like you who will wake up in the morning as if nothing has happened need to have opinions"

< shrugs his head further > " thats the problem in this country. People have an opinion on everything . They can't seem to enjoy the game just for the love of sports"

I am not going further into what will happen if India wins or looses - I can imagine a week full of sulking or exhilaration either ways - extreme reactions to extreme passion for the sport

To new beginnings..cheers !

I had started writing this blog more as a ramblings of my mind. With just a few posts, I have been able to find a great connect with lot of friends and a lot of encouragement. The last post actually had a 200+ hits in 2 days time. So to this new beginning, Big Thank You !. This ones for all of you...Saw this picture on the net and loved it

Letting go of a relationship- The other side...

Alright ! I had mentioned I will write something about our neighbour. Her daughter is my daughters childhood friend and I find her approach to life very intriguing. She is a PhD holder and extremely full of life. She is a housewife now - not be default but by design. She chose to spend time with her daughter. By nature, she comes across as someone who is very confident and is always helpful. She loves to interact and socialize. That's the reason despite hardly having anytime for neighbourhood happenings, I manage to catch up with her.

Few years back when we hardly knew each other, she had one of the most terrible happenings of her life. I hardly knew her then and I have vague memories of my maid coming and telling me that something has happened with the lady in the next bay. In a nut shell, she and her husband separated - she walked out , her parents came and the matter even reached the court with some repercussions. The story is not that. The story is that 3-4 months later , they had a reconciliation. She came back with her daughter in the same house with some preconditions. In a nutshell, if you see on the surface, she has given up much to get may be much less.

The natural reaction after hearing her side is to why did she come back ? There was no parental pressure, infact they wanted her to stay with her. She always knew that she is educated enough to have a professional life of her own to support herself and her girl. She also knew that coming back means severing ties with some of her closed ones. Hers was also an arranged marriage - this means no self guilt of making a choice yourself which has gone wrong and she did not believe in the cliche that she wanted to come back for the child for she believes the child will grow well on the environment in which she is brought up.

I asked her the same one day and here lies the beauty of her thoughts and soul. These are her thoughts on this and she wanted me to share it with a wider group and get their opinion.

mentioned that all the reasons mentioned above actually gave her the strength to come back. She very strongly feels that not all human beings are perfect to live in a synchronised harmony and varying temperaments often lead to clashes like in her case. But she believes that the best of yours and the worst of yours depend on circumstances. That don't make her husband a bad guy or her a suffering doll. In the heat of the moment, she thought of this being the end of the road and walked out but when she sat down to think, she realized that had the same argument/ behaviour would have happened with her father or brother , would she have decided to react the way she did. We often have personality clashes with our parents, siblings and even friends but in all these relationships, we also try to go out of our way to make changes , to amend ways and make it as smooth as possible. But when it comes to your life partner, why is the patience so thin? In her case, she also realized that often due to the laws being in favour of a woman, her husband ended up suffering more than she did in the whole process. She did not choose her parents and siblings but lived with them in all circumstances-good or bad and letting that bond of love grow. In their relationship, very early both she and the husband started evaluating whether whose changing for whom rather than working on it with a mindset that we are here for good and we will adjust to these circumstances mutually and let that bond of love grow. and that she said made her come back.

In her 2 years of marriage before the incident, she had not even begun on the journey of marriage being a long lasting institution. It was a pros and cons analysis always backed by the fact that I am a woman of today who has family support and a great job and I can walk out anytime to support myself so why do I need to even bother about nurturing the relationship..

That brought me to my second question to her : But what about your partner ? Shouldn't he be thinking like you as well ?

Here's whats her take on it . Some of which I agree and some difficult to reconcile with but then each one of us have a different approach to life. Per her, most relationships end without even an effort on the expectation that if I am taking 2 steps forward, why does not he makes the same effort. Once she decided to give her relationship another shot, it was her decision and she needs to take the same forward. If her decision to take a step forward is conditional, then she is again looking for bargain in the relationship. She was of the belief that if she makes an earnest effort , there is a time when the other person responds. She ended her story to me saying -" it might sound cliched that love can move mountains but I can tell you it does- provided you keep the faith ."

I see them as good threesome living a balanced normal life like all of us. On the surface a lot of people might think that its eventually her who made the compromise and came back . I look up to her as a person who had the courage to keep ego, hurt, anger aside and embark on to nurture her relationship with love and care. If there are women who have been strong enough to walkout and take charge of their life and children ( and personally I have the highest regard for them as well), it was endearing to hear another side.

Why did I put down her approach to life considering that I find myself difficult to agree with some parts of it .Because I find her whole approach very different and fresh. Its something I don't hear from anywhere. We are so consumed by singular individuality that probably we don't even let some of these approaches also into consideration at all. Some may say her approach is so esoteric but I see them today enjoying her family life.

I had started this post few days back and happy to post it on International Women's Day . Happy reading and wishing all my friends happy women's day - especially to male readers- they need special congratulations for being lucky to have some wonderful women in their life.