Sharmila Adhikari
I was reading this piece of writing by John Updike named ‘Should Wizard Hit Mommy’ where Jack herein was all efforts trying to appease his little daughter with stories which as insisted by his daughter was to be out of the ordinary. Jack was visited by ennui, doubts, confusion and so on to satisfy his daughter’s curiosity and subsequently this set my mind rolling.
The first wail of the infant brings happy tidings even to the poorest of the parents and this is a common happening down the ages. What is of concern and different is the parents’ dilemma today as the years creep by and the parents are given to deal with a growing child who, in today’s context has very different connotation of everything that is absorbed in their sponge like mind. The parents find themselves flailing on water to save themselves from drowning in their attempt to bring up good children in times when even the connotation of ‘good’ has changed.
The question of how much is too much and where is the end line, put parents in a maze and they are left twiddling their fingers and making guess works about which fertilizer would yield a rich and satisfying harvest of upbringing.
Lamenting on outcomes, on the unpalatable changes, air of retorts and rebels has now become a common ground on which parents bond with each other.
The parents of today cocooned in nuclear families are standing against the wall of desperation with attempts to look for the needle of solution in a haystack.
The parents are now trudging in a nocturnal forest with flickering torch lights looking for solutions to bring up children who would be worth their salt.
It is as clear as the morning shaft of light that parenting has become a Herculean task. It has become almost a fine art and to produce a Picasso like painting is the dream that every parent dreams as a matter of right. Yet somewhere the process sometimes gets blurred. However, let us still hope that parenting, the good, bad or the ugly still prevails because the intention behind the effort here is always laudable.
