As I browsed through the photo album with my mother, I
paused at the pictures of my friends circled around my birthday cake: they all
looked so excited –probably in anticipation of the chocolate treat awaiting
them- so was I. Suddenly I remembered that my birthday was just round the
corner and my smile faded. Seeing that, my mom inquired what was bothering me.
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| On one of our trips to India |
I told her how much I missed my school, my old friends and
everything I loved and how I had to leave all that behind when my parents
decided to move back to India-a new place for me then. I went on to complain
about how life was not the same anymore. I nostalgically gave the picture one last
glance and concluded with a deep sigh- “I will never be that happy again”; to
which my mom gently responded “of course you will be, in fact you will be
happier than you have ever been-you just wait and watch”!
What followed in the days leading up to my birthday was very
heartwarming. My parents started browsing stores to look for party supplies.
They had a hard time finding the typical stuff. But that didn’t deter them. For
instance, in the absence of preprinted invitation cards, my dad got some blank
cards from stationery and used his typewriter to print each invitation himself.
Then my parents put themed cartoon stickers on the cards and added glitter. At
the end of that project, those birthday invitations-oh boy looked far more
adorable than store-bought ones.
Anyway not so long before, my dad had helped put a cast on a
kid’s fractured hand. When my father started prescribing some medication, he
noticed the young patient’s father looked very anxious. It didn’t take long for
my dad to realize why. The man as it
turned out, was an electrician by profession: he was a man of modest means who
had just used up most of his money buying the plaster (for the cast) and paying
for the doctor’s fees: he was afraid he didn’t have enough money left to buy
medications. On hearing this, my father waived his fees and returned the money
to the man urging him to buy medicines with that instead. Fast forward a few
weeks, the same man had returned with his son for a follow-up: this was the
morning of my birthday. On learning that the clinic was closing early that day,
he insisted he wanted to help out later that afternoon with setting up the
chairs on the terrace.
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| A birthday to remember indeed! |
A few hours later when my mom went
upstairs with the cake, she stared at the terrace in disbelief. The setup looked anything like that
of a birthday party-it looked like a mini-wedding venue! What had apparently
happened is shortly after helping out, this kind man had returned to the terrace and set
up colored tube lights encircling that area.
Suffice to say the whole place looked surreal! Now that birthday did turn out to the best birthday I have
ever had, just like my mom had promised. I had my parents, my grandparents, a
few of my favorite cousins and last but not the least my new friends then, some of
whom went on to become my bosom friends.
Although what made that occasion so
memorable was not the delicious menu, the dazzling setup or the delightful
games; it was much bigger than that-it was something that my mind was probably
not matured enough to perceive then. But now over two decades later as I
recollect the events of that day I know: I know how deeply I have come to appreciate the
value of that love and determination which compelled my parents to creatively
overcome materialistic challenges; the significance
of a kind deed followed by an equally moving act of reciprocation!
I somehow feel that those experiences have something to do
with who I am and what I stand for today. It has instilled in me the conviction
to never undermine the power of people, oneself included, and to never
overestimate your challenges. For the problem is rarely the problem- it is our
reaction to that which makes or breaks us. So I believe the trick is to not
react to life but to respond and to respond with love, faith and fortitude.
