Wednesday, January 9, 2008

Me and my "Mii"

I've developed this habit of calling up mom when I'm on the train to work. Speaking to her almost every day leaves me with nothing much to say, except, what I had for dinner last night and what I'm going to have for breakfast. Mom though, always has something to say. She invariably starts with complaining about dad. How he did not get her the sari she wanted or how he did not take them to the restaurant that she wanted to go to or how dad helped someone she did not approve of. Then she would move onto how she bargained with the subjiwala or what my sis was up to or how Ricky Ponting is a devil and Dhoni is GOD’s gift to mankind.

So today, as my ‘Mii’(I started with ‘mummy’, then it shortened to ‘mom’ and now a mono-syllabled ‘Mii’) was going through why she had get a new sofa for the living room,I found my thoughts wondering off prioritizing tasks at work for the day. I even went through the agenda for my 9am meeting with my boss, as ‘Mii’, finished up with the sofa and started about how the flyover on the main road is finally getting re-built after a 4 year hiatus. All I had said in these 10 minutes was just a ‘hmmm’ as I missed out on all the details. Finally, feeling a little guilty for not having paid any attention to the things ‘Mii’ had to say I added a few lines in agreement to the government slacking off and that it should be replaced. Adding just two lines to the conversation seemed to fill ‘Mii’ with new found vigor and also a brand new set of things to talk about. The train closed in on New York City, as I continued to listen to ‘Mii’, and I thought to myself what a lucky sonuva gun I was. I barely had to give anything to ‘Mii’ to get the whole wide world in return. For ‘Mii’ these 20 minutes spent on the phone were probably the most important ones of the day. I’m sure she made a list of things she wanted to tell me everyday. It made me smile and feel fortunate at the same time. I wish someday I could offer so much to somebody for so little in return. I promised myself to call ‘Mii’ every morning just to listen to what was wrong with the world today and about the right way to go about fixing it.

Love you ‘Mii’