Fantastic Firsts

F of the AtoZ Challenge

The first everything is special. The first day of college, the first job, the first day of a new job, the first visit to a new city, the first time you take a flight, the first car, the first date, in the spirit of the election time.. the first time you vote, the first phone you buy, the first time you meet your special someone, the first time you buy a house..so many firsts!

Firsts are exciting enough for grown-ups, what to say about babies and their ‘achievements’ read as milestones in baby development parlance.  I am a mom to a 8 month old baby.  The first three months of babies are pretty much spent in sleeping, eating, peeing and pooping.  Once they get used to the fact that they are in a world outside the womb, do they start taking interest in their surroundings and gradually opening up. 

The first smile is a milestone.  The first laugh makes things much more fun.  Then are the firsts in which more strength is required. The first time she will roll over, the first time she will lunge forward, the first time she will sit up, the first time she will stand up, her first independent steps,  and so forth!  Then the first bites come into picture – the first time she eats food apart from milk, her first tooth and so forth.

It is an exciting time for parents and family who cannot help but see how fast she starts growing up.  Look forward to many more firsts for her and for me!

What was/were the Firsts  you have fond memories of?

The first time she stood

What's in a Name?

"What’s in a name?", an oft restated sentiment has acquired a whole new meaning when I recently changed my last name after some years of marriage.  The feeling is still sinking in. I am suddenly shocked by the revelation that I have gone from a Miss to Ms to a Mrs and it has suddenly made me feel several years older!

With my family hailing from the western part of Maharashtra- Vidarbha, my maiden name is KHOLKUTE pronounced as KHOL KOO TAY. Well, one would think I would be happy to shed that name! but no, it had to become SONPATKI, probably an equally difficult last name!

But now that it has been done and I see it in black and white in front of me, I ruminate, really, did I want to do this? A girl who has been carrying an identity all her life suddenly is forced to take on a new name, a new identity. Why does her existence have to be forever linked to a male in the family? Be it a father’s name as her middle name or the husband’s name.  And more complex is the fact, that world over, the last name is something that is mostly acquired from the father’s side although there are a few cultures which take it from the mother’s side or find a middle way such as taking both their names or even blending the names.

I wonder what it is that makes a woman change her name in societies where this is prevalent. It is the norm and the tradition which most of us blindly follow.  Pressure to follow what is accepted is another common reason.  There could be insecurity on the new family’s side which does not feel comfortable if the wife or the daughter-in-law still struts with her maiden name and is supposedly not integrated with the new family because she does not carry their name. Perhaps it is because the woman herself does not feel integrated enough till she changes her name to match the name of the majority she lives with! Some girls even change it to prove their love to their new husbands though I don’t see why her love could be any less or more even if she does not have the same name. Perhaps it is a little of all the above reasons that make a fairly well-reasoned person like (I would like to think) me, take the big leap.

In the days of the yore, when most women honestly didn’t have as much as an identity that they have today of their own, change wasn’t quite as difficult technically. Having a good education and multiple jobs, one is straddled with not just certificates and degrees with a different name, but also endless number of bank accounts, credit cards, identity cards such as a pan card, driving license, passport and a motley of investments and assets that require to be changed with a brand new signature. Besides the things that mandatorily require change, there is a whole virtual life out there which requires a new identity! Networks drive the world, social or otherwise and even though you painstakingly inform half of the million people you know, chances are they will most likely forget you or won’t find you ever again if you aren’t in touch.   A long arduous road it certainly is, but women do it. I am doing it and I am at a loss to understand why! It is with a foolish sentiment that I cling on to my old passport, pan card, bank cards, credit cards, identity cards, driving license and all the myriad things that are associated with a name. It is almost as though a different person had experienced so much in life!

Well, I do take consolation in the fact that my new name is atleast unlike many of the crazy Maharashtrian last names (to completely go off the topic). One would think a Maharashtrian colony were a forest with vegetable families coexisting amicably with animals in one neighborhood.  For example we had Bhende (Okra), Bhople (Pumpkin), Gawhare (French Beans), and Mule (radish) all in one colony alongside animal families such as Wagh (Lion), Landge (Wolf) and Aswale (Bears) and Undre (Mice).  Of course, an ecosystem would have its terrible elements such as Bhoot (Ghost), Aghore (the Terrible), the animal killers such as Waghmaare (Lion killer) and Aaglave (Fire setters).  Maharashtrians also come in all hues – Kale, Gore, Saavale are common place.  Amongst the other funny ones I have heard are Udyasangin (I will tell you tomorrow), Gapchup (Keep quiet), Gaitonde (one with a cowface), Paidhare (Hold legs) and Potdukhe (One with a stomach ache).

But that aside, I reckon, I will now learn to accept and live with my chosen new identity. After all, no one forced me to take it up. Perhaps change is good with a new phase in life. Perhaps it will be easier to not to have explanations of why I want to retain my maiden name.  Maybe, the new name will auger well for me! And it certainly will not break any ties with my parents of course or change who I am. It is time to ponder over the other famous nugget of wisdom – That which we call a rose by any other name would smell as sweet. I shouldn’t be moping so, should I?

Creepy Horrors

I am in shock and in deep pain.  Lizards.  Disgusting creepy lizards.  Again.  I was just confronted by a lizard in my dusting cloth in what I thought was a lizard free home. I remember some terrorizing times at my grandma’s place. Those disgusting, squiggly brown colored things have made me quake in bed in terror spending sleepless nights for fear they may be near me. I have opened cabinet doors fearfully expecting those beasts to jump out or jump away for me and for me to jump back if I see them.  I have entered rooms armed with a broom in my hand (which usually has usually fallen down since I have never not panicked and fled when confronted by those things).  I seriously don’t get it.  How can those tiny creatures incite such feelings of hate, repulsion and fear in any one! 

For those who belong to the lizard hating club whose numbers are quite large especially among females, I believe, can understand my agony when, I fled to a floor below to my MIL's as I await hubby dear to come home, find that awful creature and chase it away before I can cautiously go back.  The other thing about lizards and I think mice too, unfortunately is, once they come inside the house, there is no easy way to chase them out. One can chase a lizard around and around a room with all windows and doors and all possible openings open, but they manage to skip all of them and find that one immovable painting or cabinet above the most comfortable seat in the house behind which is security for them and insecurity for me if I dare to sit on that seat! Ruthless killing is not an option since these creatures have tails that live on and are more eerie than even the whole thing!  I remember a friend even bought this ultrasonic sound producing device that was supposed to shock lizards and drive them away.  Didn’t work.  Cockroaches and lizards have withstood the test of time and have I reckon, been through every possible calamity to be driven away by mere sound waves! The only thing that has worked is being armed with a nagging broom to chase them away so frequently that they give up and go to a neighbor’s house!

What I don’t understand, but am thankful for is the fact that guys and a few girls too never do find these things repulsive (atleast someone can chase them away!). In fact, I knew of a guy who had pet lizards and frogs.  Someone from that club, help me either overcome my repulsion or drive out that thing from my house!

Passing Words

Independence Day is around the corner now, and no, this is not another blog on patriotism, which some of my blogger friends have covered very nicely indeed. Right now I wish I could be completely dependent on someone dependable to just memorize some stuff for me.

It was way back in 2000, that I opened my first Yahoo account.  That was my first ever account in anything and I loved it.  I coined a simple id and a really easy password quickly and used it happily for two years.  And then, I also got a bank account with an ATM card, my second ever account.  Well, these were the only two accounts for I ever had to remember anything and this happy state of affairs continued right through my college and then I landed my first job and boom!

I had a new bank account opened- a new password for debit card, net banking had three passwords, the demat account had one more password, gmail caught up with me, my office assigned a new email to me and a separate login account for its intranet, I opened a demat account, my dad sent me his internet banking account credentials to manage, I got a couple of credit cards from different companies with separate login credentials! I don’t want to even start on the other string of my online accounts on facebook, twitter, Netflix, iphone, apple, itunes, indiblogger, various  random sites such as shutterfly, retail stores –Macy’s, Target, Kohl’s where I had accounts and so on and so forth.  Each account that I opened told me that I should not write down my password anywhere lest it fall into wrong hands.  I tried memorizing and using those password remembering devices that locked with another password. I really tried.

But well, security is all important of course. One has to keep updating those dastardly things at different frequencies of a month, quarter or in a year.  The brainwave of writing them down and stowing them into a locker with a real key which I don’t have to remember (unless it’s a combination lock!) didn’t work for me since I forgot to update that hallowed sheet!  Still, security is what is key for various accounts of different levels of importance and hence the different requirements – no caps, no small caps, mandatory special symbols, spaces, my name should not be in the id or password, date of birth is not allowed either in either, no consecutive letters, no consecutive numbers, it cannot be simple, it has gotta be a jumble of preferably some indecipherable non word which is atleast 10 characters long!  To remember passwords using the blessed link ‘Forgot Password?’ one has to remember answers to weird questions.  I was given the idea of putting the same answer for all, sadly the same answers were not accepted either! And the buck didn’t stop there. Now it’s the ids that make  me miserable  with new accounts demanding new jumbles of my name as my id since there was no availability of even a pathetic mix backwards and forwards of my first, middle, last name and date of birth  (maybe I made that id and forgot the id and password!).

At this point in time, I am pretty much living on my credit card which I had fortunately linked to my bank account to be debited automatically. Since I have pretty much forgotten all my debit card pin numbers, and the banks have already reissued me new cards thrice, I am too sheepish to ask for more and for fear that they will freeze my account due to suspicious activity! My bank account online has locked on me after entering the incorrect password 5 times and I cannot reactivate it as it requires my atm pin which I have forgotten and reactivating the atm card with a new pin requires atleast the phone ‘TIN’ whatever that is!  I am in trouble! I hope now, the sabziwallahs in Mumbai accept credit cards soon or I will have to turn to my friends and family for cash (I know that’s a good excuse, right?) or sell jewellery for cash! Now I can only pray that my credit card bill has been paid for and my salary continues to drop into my account. God help me!