A Daughter leaves......

                                        

‘Ammaaaa, where are you?’

‘ In a meeting Tara...what is it?‘

‘Nothing.....just asked... when will you be back?’

‘Soon, baby. Need anything?’

‘No ma.....just come’. And the phone call would end.

This was a typical conversation between my daughter and me...thrice a day. Not that she was waiting for me when I got home – but she needed to know why, what and when of everything I did.  At times I would wonder who was watching over whom here!

When I am in my office, she would gesticulate from our house entrance from where I am visible – usually asking me to come inside – immediately! Nothing much really - just to eat with her or discuss some pressing matters of shopping plans or gym timings.   

None of my things were just mine. They were hers as well- that goes without saying. Including clothes, soap, shampoo, hair dryer, eye pencil, lipstick, chappals, bags.....the reverse, of course, was never applicable.  And no matter where I chose to keep my new acquisitions, she would ‘smell’ them – from a mile. And reach for them – without wasting too much time! And rather unfairly, whenever I found something missing on my dressing table or closet, I would blame her for pinching it.

She dressed in my room. Used my dressing table and mirror- and for some reason, I had to wait for my turn until she finished. This, despite the fact that she has a bigger dressing table with a bigger mirror in her room! But no, mine was more convenient. And I could never close my bedroom door – not even to change clothes. She would always knock with such urgency that not opening the door immediately would make me feel selfish and rude. Once let in, she would happily saunter in and switch on the TV to watch her favourite show on TLC.

Her two huge cupboards were full of clothes that would literally tumble out when opened. Her bed was stacked with clothes. Yet, she had ‘nothing to wear’ when there was an occasion in the family. What are mothers for, if they can’t lend their daughter a silk kurta that has just been dry cleaned and saved for a special evening?

We worked out in the same gym.  And I loved embarrassing her by teasing her trainer and distracting her impossibly tough sessions with him. And she gave me glaring – why-don’t – you – work-out- and - leave – me - alone- looks. And always asked ‘Amma, how do you manage to talk to everybody, all the time??’!! Most often, we walked together from home to gym and back.

We pottered around in the kitchen together – cooking a new dish, experimenting a new recipe.  She was the royal taster – if she approved of a dish, it had better be good. We planned dinners out and snuck into our beauty parlour for some quick waxing and eyebrows. I tagged along with her to Express Avenue and hung around exasperated as she tried out clothes and drooled over accessories – protesting if she attempted to buy something that I somehow knew she would junk in less than a month. I accompanied her to movies I would never have cared to sit through, just to please her.

I marvel at her sense of fashion and style, things that have eluded me always. She knows all leading international brands; I am mostly clueless. She can read maps and find her way in any part of the world – when we holidayed in China, she would navigate through cities using all modes of public transport while I tagged along in bewilderment. ‘You can get lost in our home Amma!’ – she would often tease me.

There was nothing I enjoyed more than watch her dance. But when she performed on stage, I could never sit without getting jittery. I dreaded the footwork she may forget or the sequence she may miss. I usually stood outside the auditorium and peeped in every few minutes to ensure she was fine. And heaved every time she got it right. She looked to me for validation – regardless of the encomiums she received from others.

She is smarter and more intelligent than I can ever hope to be. She can laze in bed doing nothing an entire day. But also can work hard to the point when I plead her to get some rest. She can say things to her father that I dare not dream of (ha ha...what pleasure!!) and get away with arguing fiercely with her grandmothers.

She is quite unlike me in many ways – more practical and less emotional. She would often chide me for getting carried away – ‘Amma...why are you like this??’ – ‘this’ usually meant a quality I would be better off without. I have seldom seen her go overboard. She can hold herself very well and is amazingly sorted out for her age. ‘You have such a lovely daughter!’- I hear this from someone every single day. And I know she is not only lovely.... also very special.

And then, Tara got married last year. But nothing much changed for us as she waited for a visa to join her husband in Canada. I knew it was a question of time before she left to where she now belonged. I ardently wished she embarked on her new life soon. And she finally left on Tuesday.

The goodbyes were not too emotional. After all the voluminous paperwork, meticulous packing and last minute preparations, we were exhausted when she left past midnight struggling with three humungous bags threatening to capsize from the trolley. When she walked away from me into the international terminal, I felt numb, even a tad relieved that she was finally moving to her new home ending her seven months long wait after marriage.

Until I came home. As I walked in without her, the feeling of emptiness that engulfed me  is indescribable.  Her tiny room with pink walls; tinier bathroom with pink tiles and an array of cosmetics strewn on her vanity; her cupboards with clothes left behind; a big collage of her photos that I gifted for her 20^th birthday; a cute picture of Krishna framed on her wall; the smell of her perfumes and colognes; a hairclip here; a earring there; a bill from a reputed store; granola bars and oil free snacks that she loved; her cot with soft cushions that she hugged to sleep; her dance costumes and CDs.....it seems just the other day that I held her in my arms as she wailed her way into this world 24 years ago!

The Prophet’s words ring in my mind as I come to terms with her absence:

Your children are not your children.
They are the sons and daughters of Life's longing for itself.
They come through you but not from you,
And though they are with you yet they belong not to you.

You may give them your love but not your thoughts, 
For they have their own thoughts.
You may house their bodies but not their souls,
For their souls dwell in the house of tomorrow, 
which you cannot visit, not even in your dreams.

You are the bows from which your children
as living arrows are sent forth.
The archer sees the mark upon the path of the infinite, 
and He bends you with His might 
that His arrows may go swift and far.
Let your bending in the archer's hand be for gladness;
For even as He loves the arrow that flies, 
so He loves also the bow that is stable.