Every week end started proving to be very lazy one for me
and my husband. It was getting worse week after week. Waking up late was the
last thing we wanted to do. But somehow our three year old would not let us get
out of the bed until it is really late. So we had planned to wake up early and
choose one of the beautiful parks in our locality to go for a fresh walk. My
daughter would readily sacrifice her morning sleep and jump out of her bed if
we would take her out. We chose Natesan Park in T Nagar as our destination.
We were all excited about the next day's event and happily
slept earlier than usual on a Friday night. The next day we were all fresh and
ready at 6:30. It was a ten minute drive to the park. My daughter looked very
happy and had imagined all about the slides and swings she was going to take
charge of. Little was she aware of the disappointment that was going to come
her way. The park was a huge one crowded with a lot of people during such early
hours. People of all ages were seen there, but definitely not as young as my
daughter. Soon we were a part of the frantic lot who were desperately working
out to sweat off. The park had a very huge walking area with lots of trees and
beautiful plants around and with spongy lawns. All types of colorful birds
could be seen. It was quite tidy compared to many other parks. They had tried
to put up a children's play area. The slides and swings were available and were
very new but were yet to be fixed. When we were nearing that area my heart
palpitated. I realized that my daughter was going to become unruly. The only
weapon I use during such a situation is, "threatening". I would say
that a man with a strange looking face, wearing a black dress, having a long
bag in his hand would come and put her in his bag and take her away if she
shouts/cries and he would always burst crackers (a thing that frightens my
daughter the most) near her ears. She would keep quiet when I uttered the word
"Poochaandi" (the man in black dress). But this time she was
desperate, she wanted to play the slide at least once. She was least bothered
about the "Poochaandi" now. She said "Let him come. I want to
play the slide now!!". We were unable to convince her that her favorite
games were yet to be fixed and she would fall down if she climbs on an unfixed
slide. It resulted in a loud cry which made many faces angry. We could
understand the message conveyed by those faces - "Why the hell do you
bring your child out when you can't manage her!!!” We had to show her some cartoons we had in our
mobile phones which always proved to work out during such emergencies. She
looked convinced after some time. We sat on a park bench watching the nature
and people around. People of all ages were walking around completing several
rounds proudly. Even a few familiar faces we see in television soaps were seen.
They all had the same goal of becoming slim and healthy.
When we reached a huge lawn we saw a strange sight before
us. Around ten people (a mixture of old and young) were standing around forming
a big circle and were laughing aloud. It looked extremely humorous. It is
called laughing therapy and is believed that the more we laugh the more we
become healthy and sound. All of a sudden I remembered my little one. She has a
loud voice and usually talks unmindful of what others would think (she is after
all just 3). She carefully looked at the people laughing aloud. "Amma why
are they laughing like crazy people?" She could not have done anything worse
than this to us. One among them heard her say that and looked at us with a long
red face. One could never believe that this person was laughing aloud, a second
ago. No wonder he had come for a laughing therapy. He was about to say
something to us, but we almost ran away and reached a farther point where we
would not hear him.
As we were walking through the long stretch, all of a sudden
a man running in the opposite direction bent himself to his right almost near
my daughter's leg and made an action as though he was picking something from
the ground. He gave all of us a big shock. He was unmindful of our shock and
continued his action alternately to his left and to his right. I gave a
puzzling look at my husband. Then my husband explained me that he should be practicing
for a cricket match and his action was similar to a fielder's and he was trying
to pick up an invisible ball. He could easily explain this to me. But how about
my little one? He will have to explain what is cricket? Who is a fielder? What
does he do? And every back ground information without which my daughter would
not be happy with the answer. Thankfully she was busy watching a wood pecker
making a hole on a tree and she was not aware of what had happened near her.
And then we encountered a middle aged lady exercising in the
park. My little one had not known what “Exercising” was. So it looked very
strange for her. She kept asking me what the lady was doing. I was trying to
explain her by all means but was unable to satisfy her. She convinced herself
and came to a conclusion that it was similar to playing a peek-a-boo game. As
we were having a brief talk about exercising, my husband was suddenly hit hard
on his left shoulder. A hefty man had hit him hard as he walked his way in the
reverse direction. He was walking backwards, perhaps suggested by some noble
man that walking backwards would make your heart, body and soul pure and
perfect. He did not wait for my husband to react. He kept continuing his journey
backwards. I thought, definitely he was going to be blasted by someone
especially if it were a woman.
After all these adventures, it was 8:00 AM and was becoming
sunny. We were prepared to leave the Park having enjoyed the fresh morning walk.
Nature provides enormous things for us to refresh and step out of our regular
schedules. We felt guilty that we had wasted our time lying down on bed missing
all of these. We made our mind to visit the park every weekend and we had been
following it as our routine.
