Thursday, March 17, 2011

A Child's Play!

I was playing with my neighbour's daughter today. She's a sweetheart. Just about to finish a year, she taught me quite a few lessons. Let's call her 'D'.


D just learnt how to climb up the stairs, she still doesn't know how to climb them down though. She climbs a few stairs and then looks back at us - checking if we're there to ensure she's fine and also to encourage her, applause when she climbs. She pauses for a nice time and smiles to her own content. As I applause when she finishes climbing the set of stairs, she starts clapping as well. Enjoys it thoroughly. 
The lesson learnt here was, that when we achieve a particular goal, before moving ahead, we should totally savour the moment. Get encouraged, and most importantly, applause for self! In the rush of climbing those stairs, we might just fall on our face - flat! And when you finish climbing your own set of stairs, apart from you there'll be others who will stand in awe of you too!


The next favourite thing for D, after climbing the stairs, is to observe the world around. Observe in every sense of the term. She pays thorough attention when I point out the colourful cars passing by. She admires the birds flying across the sky, without blinking her eyes. She tries to call the dogs that roam around. She observes people, gestures a 'hi' when we ask her to. Admires the flowers that are in full-bloom right now.
Haven't we forgotten all these things somewhere, while keeping up with the world? Who stops and looks at birds? They've always existed and hence are easily ignored. While walking on the road, when we see flowers fallen below, do we take a moment to look up and see the same flowers in bloom? Gone are the days when we could trust anybody on the road, and hence fail to give any stranger a smile!


Like any other baby, D likes to do things which we ask her not to do. And if anybody resorts to scolding her, she pretends to be upset. But the moment we smile or laugh, she bursts out laughing as well. Trust me, that happens every time we scold her!
But as we grow up, we take things to heart. We don't take the lesson out of it and make merry, like D. We choose to savour the sad moment that comes after being scolded...


One favourite thing about D, for me, is that if you look at her and smile or laugh - anytime - she replies with the same. A happy baby that she is, it just ensures that my habit of smiling is definitely worth something. Even if it means watching a baby's face glow up with a brilliant (and toothless :D) smile :)


As it is, growing up changes a lot of things for us, which is inevitable. But if we give it a thought, life just might be a child's play!



2 comments:

Anupama said...

Sweet and simple and reminds us of the important things in life...true that kids seem to know how to live just right...we seem to lose it along the way!

Nirupama said...

@ D
Yeah, life's biggest lessons are sometimes taught to us thorough simple ways I guess :)