The dentist finally gave me the verdict. Root Canal it is. I hurried home and the first thing I did, was to call my sister, reason being, if something is painful she plainly says it. For her, sympathy and consolation comes later. It was helpful to me many times before, as I could mentally prepare to face such situations. (The other instances I asked her this, was about threading eyebrows and recently about delivery - and for the latter any mental preparation doesn’t help)
Me: Does it pain?
She: No, not at all…They give you an anesthesia before doing it. You wont even know it.
Me: Really ? You sure?
She: And yes, I had a small jaw ache initially, but that’s nothing to do with root canal…its because I had to keep my mouth opened for a long time.
Me: Ohh !
She: But for you, that shouldn’t be a problem. :|
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Now that our baby is here and we do most of the talking to him (which I think is better at this stage as he isn’t old enough to respond) , the only time we get to talk to each other is during the long walk from the parking lot to the grocery shop.
Me: You know, Mummy said I have lots of patience when I give oil massage and bathe Aaron…my sister also said the same. Why don’t you ever appreciate anything about me..?
Few seconds later. (Ya that’s all he takes to find a convincing answer to death questions)
He: “There are too many good things about you that I don’t know where to start from”.\
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When Aaron was a couple days old, and we were still at the hospital, he started crying at night and my Mom picked him up. I’d been flamboyantly living like a bachelorette post marriage and now post delivery, and so wasn’t used to baby cries or waking up in the middle of the night. I slowly opened my eyes and saw my Mom pacifying the new born and he soon drifted off to sleep in her arms. I dint get up from my bed, instead peeped into his cradle through the two round holes of the arm rest of the hospital bed.
As my Mom turned, with an expression which clearly said ‘will she ever learn!’ , all she saw were my eyes, through those holes. As she walked back to the bystander bed, she murmured, ‘Reminds me of the dinosaur’.
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Although my Papa advices everyone to drive safe, one needs to be life insured and iron hearted to be in the car while he drives. He uses neither of the rear view mirrors - I was told that it wasn’t in the syllabus during his time. That our car rests unscratched in the garage is the simple testimony to the existence of God and that he listens to our prayers. Once as we were speeding on a particularly busy road, I noticed a small cat which was about to cross. I yelled ‘Papa, don’t !’ and closed my eyes tight…In a split second I turned around and saw that the cat had escaped unscathed. Papa continued the drive totally oblivious of me, or the cat.
Then I asked, ‘Papa, have you ever run across a cat and killed it?’ ..
Papa: ‘No, but I badly wanted to’.