If
there’s anyone on the domestic front who is by far the worst affected by the
lock down, it is the mom – be it stay-at-home or part-time/full-time professional
– all are in fact working moms! With “stay home stay safe” being the ubiquitous
mantra these days….home has turned into a workplace, day-care, summer camp,
online-classroom, binge-watching-entertainment centre, throwback-mythological-drama-driven-holy space,
a 24/7 eatery all rolled into one – and who’s still responsible for keeping it
together? “Amma..amma” is the constant chatter I hear from my soon to-be-five
year old as I try to write this in between finishing up some pending drafts of
petitions to be filed as soon as regular courts reopen at the end of the
lock down (whenever that is!) As we try to grapple with household chores,
cooking, tending to young kids, (with a little help from our spouses of course)
while working full time/part time at our third party jobs (at jobs when working
from home is possible), blurring the lines that separate work from home thus
robbing us of our distinct identities, all of which now seem to merge into one
– of that of a lock down mommy! Personally,
motherhood is certainly a joy to take on, but it is also true that motherhood
isn’t all of me and I am pretty sure that I don’t want it to be! But I am also a
little hesitant to admit it, as our culture elevates mothers to a Goddess-like
stature, being the ultimate destination for an Indian woman. Frankly, I don’t want to be a goddess! I am only human and I want my own share of
‘bad’ and ‘good’ days as a mommy without having to feel especially guilty about
the “bad’ days! On this mother’s day, apart from all the admiration and
appreciation for the maternal bond, I wish we could be more tolerant and
non-judgemental about the mommy-meltdowns too!
Apart
from being moms, most of us women have our own little happy places untouched by
our mommy-selves that we cherish – be it work or a certain me-time at home, or a
class we enrol into, or a hobby or an activity we take up, or catching up with
our own buddies or a yester-year serial /video/book/ dress we watch, read or wear
just to feel if “that little girl’ is still in us…don’t we? Now suddenly, we
find that the lockdown owing to the COVID-19 pandemic has suspended (albeit
temporarily) everything and our own happy place seems to have been invaded by
our all-pervading identity of being a “mom”! I’m not sure if its only me or is there anyone else who feels the same, if
you do, please give a shout-out so that I know I’m not the only weird one! 😊
As I
spend the first few hours of mother’s day with my mom at her farm Shristi at
Dharmasthala where we travelled to on a two-way inter-district pass in order to
pick up our son, Abhay who in his own words has had “the best summer ever” away
from home, I now dread having to manage two kids for the rest of the lockdown!
For mother’s day in advance, we picked an old favourite (from one of my own
happy places Kutoohala) “I love my baby Because…..” a picture
book by Paulina Simons and illustrated by Cassia Thomas, which almost serves as a reminder for us moms
as to why we are who we are! This delightfully endearing book beautifully
describes the everyday adventures in mommy-hood, the light hearted humour
depicted in the illustrations that are quite the opposite of the narration and
a realistic portrayal of how things actually pan out when you involve young
kids! It is probably the mommy’s wishful
thinking as she says “I Love by baby because ..she
dresses herself. She feeds herself breakfast ..”… and as you can
imagine, the little girl is shown doing her own version of “dressing herself and eating breakfast”! The
whole day goes by as the little girl “helps’ mommy with the household chores in
her own way (Seriously, the mommy in the book is too good to be true!) and
despite all the exhaustion, the mother can only feel unending love and warmth
as she cuddles her daughter close at bedtime and ends up falling asleep herself!
Feels familiar…doesn’t it? Happy mother’s day to all mommies!