RamGanapathy.com

Category: parenting

  • A bit of karma…

    After a nice lunch at our cousins’ place in Sydney, the mind wavered back to the events of the recent, intense weeks. Two episodes came to the surface that led me philosophising. One, involving a series of incidents at work that might refine the way I look at my role and, the other, a learning experience watching my daughter go through a bout of high school assignments and assessments.

    First, about the school assignment in this blog. (I will need more than a nice lunch to pen down the office stuff, which I will do in my next blog).

    Two weekends ago, it was quite easy for me to comfort my daughter grappling with her English assignment: to write a creative essay about a character from the book they were reading at class. Peer pressure and high levels of expectations set on her was telling, as she asked me for some advice. I gave her tips and tricks but encouraged to write it in her own style.

    She drafted it quickly and read it back to us. It sounded well as I heard her narrate, while munching on snacks, congratulating myself on how I let her do it by herself. A few days later she came home with a strange look on her face. While the teacher’s comments were positive on many aspects of the essay, he was critical on grammar and punctuation. He had gone on to state that a bit of proof reading at home could have made the result better.

    I felt guilty. I chided myself for just being observant and not getting involved in her homework. Instead of lecturing her while sitting on a couch, I should have sat down with her to work on sentences and structure. My wife politely reminded me of how I take blogging more seriously than helping with homework and wondered out loud, how one could be so casual about it.

    I then had a chance to redeem myself during the subsequent assignment about writing further on the character. This time, I spent a good couple of hours with my daughter (the wife looking over my shoulders). We researched about gothic style of fiction writing. It felt good about learning something new. After she finished her draft, I verified it, suggested corrections and ideas.

    I also expanded on how to not worry about what the teacher might think of her essay and only focus on her own effort and preparation. This was not me preaching her about do-your-karma-without-expectations (Bhagavad Gita) but more of trying to be a helpful dad, offering a logical explanation: we can only control what we do (effort) and can never be sure about the result.

    I got a pat on the back from wife once she read the final draft. It was our best effort.

    The teacher’s feedback arrived few days later. He praised her for the creative elements in the narrative. I noticed a comment in the end. “The essay would have turned out better if you had done a bit of proof reading.”

  • Gifting a surprise

    Gifting a surprise

    The kid is growing up. She just completed another year circling the sun and it was pertinent that a gift is chosen. The wife had plans drawn for months now, just that I didn’t know. In parallel, the kid wrote a wish list on the fridge – I never noticed it.

    Here I was – one week before the birthday without any ideas for the gift. I quickly turned towards the wife for some soothing words that did not include “I have been telling you…”. It was a quick and easy call that was made: we promptly purchased the ear rings that she had been planning to gift our kid. That was done. What about the wish list on the fridge?

    Shopping for a birthday gift – one that is not going to be a surprise anymore – wasn’t going to be that interesting. The only mystery that we managed to add was to dramatize the whole thing: we made fun of her asking for such childish things even at this age, which made her resign to the fact that she won’t receive them.

    Made me think about the concept behind gifts in general – the sense of expectation that surrounds us as we unwrap them – and the whole idea that we get something for free. (The word free derives from the Sanskrit word priya – which means “dear” or “love”. Yes, when we give out something to others without an ensuing transaction, it ought to be with some love.)

    Choosing vs being surprised:

    It seems obvious that most people love a pleasant surprise as opposed to fully knowing what they are going to receive. Not necessarily.

    My previous company had an annual ritual: useful things like water heaters and glass bowls were nicely packed, gift-wrapped and presented to each of the 400 odd employees every year around the festive season. But during one of the monthly forums with the MD, a section of the crowd pushed for a change of approach. Most of us were still single and had little excitement to receive a kitchen utensil at this phase of our lives. The suggestion was to either being able to order a gift (from a catalogue) or collect equivalent cash.

    The MD was struggling for words to describe the conflict between the original intent and how it ended up being perceived. But he was bang-on as he finished, “A gift is given and not chosen”.

    Eventually, we managed to buy the items in the list without her knowledge and she had an unknown gift box in front of her on the day. Surprise.

    Or was it ? Well, in her own words, the kid felt doubly happy about collecting the items in her wish list – especially after not expecting them.

    PS: Turns out, the wife had advised the kid to make the wish list all along. I learnt about it after writing this piece. Now, that was a surprise.