About a boy ...

What happens when you hold your firstborn close to your heart for the first time ??
You are filled with joy,ecstasy. More than that you are content. Full like a glass filled till its brim.
Not bubbly like a glass of champaigne, frothing and overflowing. Inviting and tempting others.

But a glass of calm water. Pure and transparent. Happy in itself. Content to be left alone with your bundle of joy. Maybe a cocaine junkie may feel so. Or a sufi does so. Maybe they feel different, who knows, who cares after that day??

I was at my best jittery when I used to hold any infant in my arms. Not that I went out of my way to hold them. I mean I like kids and all, but infants look too fragile to me. My relations with them can be summarized in one word: amazement. On both sides: I am amazed at God (Ok, amazed at evolution) and the kid amazed at my nervousness. I used to have two left feet, several uncontrollable hands and used to tie myself in knots all over. It was second biggest miracle of God(after the infant) that I did not drop any of those.

When I saw him first, he was just half a day old. Was resting from the strain of birth, near to his very tired and equally excited mom. She beamed a smile to me and I fell in love all over again, we will talk about that sometime later:) . Breathlessly she reported the baby's progress. He had cried very little, was curios about everything, but not over-excited. Took the surroundings in, made necessary connections and drawn necessary conclusion:"vokey so this lady is tending me and all over me. She must be my mom. Point noted. Who are others. Let's see .. Hmmm .. Nobody very important, at least right now. But let's just flash a smile: just in case.". Here he lets out one of his first smiles. Cheers erupt all around. His granpa and granny are clean-bowled.. "Vokey-dokey. That should keep them on the edge for sometime. I think I need a small nap." Here he goes back to sleep.

This is the time where I enter the scene, maybe after it has repeated many times. Again there is a small commotion in the room. He just majestically lifts one of his eyebrows. "Vokey, so it is not about me." and promptly resumes his slumber. I gloat over him, reach him to hold him when several of them admonish me. I had committed a crime of trying to wake a sleeping infant up. I try to engage myself in conversation with others. But my eyes are riveted on the sleeping beauty. Okey, his face looks like his mom. But you can never tell. Everybody says: he will settle down in a look only after 1 month. Somebody covers him with a small blanket. He wrinkles his nose, tries to kick away the blanket. Blanket being heavy is a little difficult to move. Suddenly he furrows his eyebrows, kicks and punches in all directions uncontrollably. My heart skips a beat: was he using his left leg/hand more? "You can not tell right away": elders go up in unison. Okey, you wait:says me. He is definitely a lefty. Meanwhile after getting rid of the blanket, he has had his small victory and goes back to sleep, both arms raised above his head, a la laughing Buddha.

I take this cue and declare the action as a sign of waking up: Pouncing on him, my right hand goes behind his head-shoulder-neck. Left one supports his tiny buttocks. Nice and easy and he is on my lap. He wiggles and writhes in his sleep, maybe trying to make some sense of this new touch. Any other time this would have given me a heart attack: an infant wiggling in my arms. But I knew I was not meant to drop this one. Not even meant to be worried about causing him any harm. We are going to go a long way, father and son. So many things to do in so many years: Things I did and things I did not do but really wanted to do. Things HE will like to do.

He lets a minuscule smile from one corner of his mouth. Opens his one eye, maybe to check whether it is worth opening the other, opens the other slowly. Tries to focus it on my bent face. Sees me and again smiles his tiny-winy-out-of-the-corner-of-mouth doubt of a smile.

I kept feeling like a damn stupid glass full of water I mentioned before. I can not help it. I can not feel otherwise.