Grown-ups never understand anything by themselves, and it is tiresome for children to be always and forever explaining things to them.
— Antoine de Saint-Exupéry
It was the frustration at the fag end of a day of hard work, which made me sit down at home doing nothing but watch the theatrics of my two-year-old son in action. He looked pretty focussed at the mission at hand — jab in a plastic screw which fell off the rear of his toy car. Quite a simple task? But not this time, for his plan was to squeeze the head end of the screw through the tiny hollow. And he was quite determined at that!
Each time he tried, the screw slipped away. But giving up seemed to be a non-existent option in his small dictionary. His mother’s suggestions to change the strategy were shrugged off. He went ahead with his relentless attempts — each time with renewed might. And finally, the inevitable happened: The plastic frame of the car yielded before the little one’s might and crumbled with a soft creak. “Foul play!” signalled his sinking cheeks. Pin-drop silence for a moment — the lull before the storm.
A chain reaction followed, the stereotypic corollary of any “democratic” outcry — despair, anguish, flying cars, clattering toys, fireworks...
Truce troops march in. Peace restoration campaign. Reconciliatory deliberations. Extravagant compensatory offers — stylish compact cars, dazzling ride-on wagons, luminous squishy balls. But nothing seems to cut the ice. He wants the flimsy car restored, nothing less.
The next line of defence is the mimicry troop. Roaring tigers, crowing roosters and whistling trains dominate the air. His loud lamentation slowly dies down. He is elated by the acoustic effects of the imitation army. As his evanescent despair receded into the enigmatic black holes of memory, I saw the reflections of my own frustrated self in the epicentre of the ‘spoof’.
My own spirits were bolstered. The heaviness of my heart receded. Clouds of frustration made way to enlightenment. With that came the showers of pearls of wisdom: Frustration often stems from our unwillingness to lend ears to prudence. While confronting tough terrain, we often resort to vigour where a touch of finesse may be all that is required. What we perceive as perseverance is often foolhardiness in disguise. We dive into depths of despair over trivialities which may never even cross our memories ever after. Infant to toddler to adult – human nature dons the same shades throughout.
As I revelled in these serendipitous insights, he turned his head, flashed his cute little pearls and gave me a hearty smile. The dimples on his cheeks seemed to be winking at me and saying: “Nice to see that smile back on your face, dad. That’s all for today’s lessons.”
A handful of lessons had been learnt — reflected from a baby mirror...
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