Watch out here I come....!

I write this post to document the birth of Nishanth before time distorts my memory of the event.

Friday, April 30th 2004, Neetu was at her cutest and just shy of her 2nd birthday by about a month. Veena continued to work, she was so full with Nishanth in her that she was longing for the weekend to get her rest. As is typical of most Friday's the evenings were most looked forward to, have dinner outside and take it easy and catch up on rest from the hectic week. Veena was in no mood to let anything spoil the evening and that is when she started experiencing her contractions.

With the time getting close to 9 PM and watching Neetu settle into her sleep the seriousness of the contractions had to be considered. Confident from having to wait for a while when Neetu arrived, combined with the picture of her sleeping soundly and Veena herself desperately wanting to sleep she brushed it as just normal for that time of her pregnancy and decided that going to the hospital can wait till the morning, she fell asleep soon after. Well, with contractions supposed to be painful my thought was if she can sleep through it she is probably right, it can wait till next morning.

Saturday May 1st. All of us slept nice and sound till about 5:30 AM when I was woken up by Veena saying I think we need to go to the hospital, no problem there, I start to quickly put things together to, decided to take Neetu with us. I quickly took her down stairs and placed her in the car seat and went back upstairs to bring Veena, she emerges from the bathroom saying that there is no way she is going to get into the car and drive to the hospital, I am glad she insisted on that as I was inclined otherwise. The reason for her stubbornness quickly became apparent as the baby started to crown. I rushed back to the garage and brought Neetu who was wide awake by now, placing her on the bed side table as I called 911 for help. It was a little hard for the person on the other side to believe what he heard, he even asked me if I had medical insurance trying to determine if It was a case of home delivery due to a lack of insurance.

Remember those Lamaze classes that we took hesitatingly, well think again and pay attention. We skipped the class for this baby as we considered our-self seasoned in this area with one kid under our belt already.

With the help of 911 I was able to deliver him, bare hands and using my shoe lace to tie the cord. Initially there was a scary moment when he would not cry but I was reassured that it need not be the case for all babies during birth. A few minutes after he was born I heard the fire truck pull up. A couple of paramedics, a cop and fire fighters all showed up in the bedroom, a little embarrassing for us but they were happy to see that the new born and Veena were safe.

All this while Neetu sat quietly by the bed side curiously watching everything unfold. She seemed to remember it for a while after that but there have been no reference to this during the past 4 years.

I still vividly remember asking the paramedics if I can place Neetu in a car seat and take her with us in the ambulance. We left her at our neighbors house and proceed in the ambulance to the hospital. I was seated with the driver while 2 paramedics were with Veena in the back, as the ambulance drove to the hospital I was just staring into oblivion for a long while when the driver interjected and reminded me that everything is fine now and I was free to call and inform friends and relatives about the birth. So here I was calling Mali early in the morning(5/5:30 PST) from the ambulance with the siren in the back ground describing what happened. Once at the hospital the cord was cut and the rest of the process completed the baby was declared nice and healthy. The few days we spent at the hospital subsequently I had many folks walk up with a "wow" look on their faces and ask me if I worked in the medical field.

So here I am 6 years later on a Friday evening April 30th recalling events over a glass of wine, happy to be with a son I am so proud off and ever thankful to a superior power for making events turn up the way they did.

I am bored, I have nothing to do

Between the winter snow storms, spring break, Easter, early school dismissals and other unforeseen situations there are many days that kids get to stay home and wreck havoc. As working parents this poses a new dilemma. For longer breaks we combine with other parents and take turns being host for the kids. Having their friends over for a play date is some solace from the innumerable complaints Neetu and Nishanth take turns to bring to me about each other.











The complaints vary in scope and nature and my first thought on seeing one approach is that of "ooh no, here she/he comes". More often than not, I would not be a witness to the event triggering the complaint and usually both kids are guilty, the honesty of the kid bringing the complaint has to be judged first. Kids use the parents as a means to achieve what they desire from the sibling and so the smarter of the two who produces a convincing case with the parents get their way.

This showed in Neetu's April fools day joke. At breakfast she goes "Nishanth! you are the best brother in the whole world" she waited just long enough for it to sink in and followed it with "April fool ! no you are not, you are the worst". The expression on his face changed from a nice sunshine to dark & cloudy.

Spring break 2010 started with the kids visit to their ever favorite mama.. here are a couple of memorable pictures.

The gift of Life

More often than I would like the topic of death comes up in conversations with kids.

Questions like "Acha..! when I am 30 years old will you be dead?"
or
"If amma dies will you get married again?"
"No"
"Then who will take care of us?"
or
it's followup from Nishanth "What if acha dies first?"
or
"When you are dead will you ever come back?"

It is probably their attempt at trying to understand what death really means.

To some degree I feel we should expose the kids to the realities of life rather than shield and protect them from it. When I was growing it was not uncommon to see people suffering, getting beaten, adults fighting in streets and so on. So as kids we were brought to believe that everything in the world is not always fun and play. There is a dark side to human beings that we can fall into if we are not careful enough. Being in a developed country the kids have a lot more immunity to such realities and hardships of life.

These thoughts came to the forefront recently from two of my activities....

I have been reading a book titled "A long way gone - Memoirs of a boy solder". It is the true story of Ishmael Beah who finds his innocent childhood transform to that of a solder in the fighting in Sierra Leone. It depicts how loving humans can flip into being beasts. Reading this book at bed time would definitely give you a sleepless night.

I also spent some time watching the PBS program - frontline titled The Quake about the realities in Haiti just after the quake, human suffering and survival are the key elements. It makes you realize that when it comes to survival we are no different than any other animal on this planet.

I do hope the kids realize all the good things they have and are thankful for it.