Something of Myself
Wednesday, February 07, 2007
Father and Son
I just began reading Man and Boy last night. It was Tony, my M.A. supervisor who had referred me to read this book, as he thought it encapsulated the stiffling, contemporary, split British individual, as good as a leaf from an Irvine Welsh or a Martin Amis. However, what gripped me from the first sentence of the novel was the relationship between a father and a son. The sheer joy that a male individual experiences when he becomes a father (or in other words, the joy he experiences when a male individual's wife gives birth to a child)! ;-) Tongue-in-cheek? No? Never mind!
I wondered how I would feel when I become a father.
It would be a full circle to say the least. Keep aside the joy of having a new born in one's arms. Keep aside the joy of having the pride of calling oneself the 'father' of a child. Keep aside the pleasure of watching a one-day old human being smile/yawn/sleep. Keep aside the sense of fulfilment that comes along with being a family man! Hell, it would mean that I, a 30 year old individual would no longer be a man, but a 'Dad'. Some years down the line, he would actually call me 'Dad.'
There was a guy in my school. He was also called A*******. He was excellent at English elocution. He always used to recite one piece that started - 'Dad! Dad! Wake up Dad! It's nine in the morning, breakfast is done. Dad! Daaaaaaaaaad!' He used to elocute wonderfully, like a ten year old waking up his lazy-arsed father.
Imagine my son waking me up (of course my arse is the laziest you will ever see). ;-)
It would be beautiful. Hot babes will not live up to that beauty. Sex will not get me to that high. Drugs will not offer the permanent bliss. A child will. A child can. God, I sound like some 35 year old woman, approaching menopause and craving for her first child! ;-)
But it is like that you see. Life's simple joys are born at the brink of some simple thoughts.
I know it will be hard being a father. I know it will be hard moulding an individual, shaping him up, roughing him up, scolding him, annoying him...but then, when a man walks back to his house after a hard days work only two things make a huge difference in the quality of his life - a comforting wife and a loving child.
No, this is not about a middle class Indian family. It's about an universal truth. Experienced by the blessed. And it might sound like the chapter of a Mistry novel, but it is the truest and perhaps the most commonest aspiration of all young males with a desire to have a family.
No, this is not me who is writing this post. It's a ghost writer. I will sue this bugger for doing this to me. I swear this is not me.
It is times like these, brittle and vulnerable; I somehow, for one fleeting moment feel that I could just end up being like my Dad. Human. Proud. Loving. Responsible. And selfless. Therein lies the joy of being a father. :-)
I just began reading Man and Boy last night. It was Tony, my M.A. supervisor who had referred me to read this book, as he thought it encapsulated the stiffling, contemporary, split British individual, as good as a leaf from an Irvine Welsh or a Martin Amis. However, what gripped me from the first sentence of the novel was the relationship between a father and a son. The sheer joy that a male individual experiences when he becomes a father (or in other words, the joy he experiences when a male individual's wife gives birth to a child)! ;-) Tongue-in-cheek? No? Never mind!
I wondered how I would feel when I become a father.
It would be a full circle to say the least. Keep aside the joy of having a new born in one's arms. Keep aside the joy of having the pride of calling oneself the 'father' of a child. Keep aside the pleasure of watching a one-day old human being smile/yawn/sleep. Keep aside the sense of fulfilment that comes along with being a family man! Hell, it would mean that I, a 30 year old individual would no longer be a man, but a 'Dad'. Some years down the line, he would actually call me 'Dad.'
There was a guy in my school. He was also called A*******. He was excellent at English elocution. He always used to recite one piece that started - 'Dad! Dad! Wake up Dad! It's nine in the morning, breakfast is done. Dad! Daaaaaaaaaad!' He used to elocute wonderfully, like a ten year old waking up his lazy-arsed father.
Imagine my son waking me up (of course my arse is the laziest you will ever see). ;-)
It would be beautiful. Hot babes will not live up to that beauty. Sex will not get me to that high. Drugs will not offer the permanent bliss. A child will. A child can. God, I sound like some 35 year old woman, approaching menopause and craving for her first child! ;-)
But it is like that you see. Life's simple joys are born at the brink of some simple thoughts.
I know it will be hard being a father. I know it will be hard moulding an individual, shaping him up, roughing him up, scolding him, annoying him...but then, when a man walks back to his house after a hard days work only two things make a huge difference in the quality of his life - a comforting wife and a loving child.
No, this is not about a middle class Indian family. It's about an universal truth. Experienced by the blessed. And it might sound like the chapter of a Mistry novel, but it is the truest and perhaps the most commonest aspiration of all young males with a desire to have a family.
No, this is not me who is writing this post. It's a ghost writer. I will sue this bugger for doing this to me. I swear this is not me.
It is times like these, brittle and vulnerable; I somehow, for one fleeting moment feel that I could just end up being like my Dad. Human. Proud. Loving. Responsible. And selfless. Therein lies the joy of being a father. :-)
2 Comments:
Loved it, loved it, loved it. Want to add something here, just like men, even women desire pretty much the same things, a loving and supporting husband, and a healthy child. No its not a middle class Indian mentality, it is an universal truth. If this is all that we desire, then why r we so unhappy, why r we running after that illusion called fame, money and success? Why cant we just enjoy the simple joys of life and make it worth living? Why? Why?
:-) Thank you, thank you, thank you! In an attempt to answer your questions, this is what I think: we run, we chase 'cause without it, as the above extract from Ulysses reckons, life would be 'dull', it would be boring to sit back and be contended. Imagine life without challenges. While we do aspire for the bed of roses, without the thorns, the petals wouldn't make much sense. We run, we chase to make an impact. To influence. Power lies at the core of it. We are, at some level, power hungry beings. And that sadly or not will remain the case. Of course, exceptions are to be found. :)
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