I was driving through the traffic and managing the 45 degree slopes that abound my city of Johannesburg when suddenly my 6 year old son said ‘Mom, why don’t you find a job in my school. This way I will get to see you all the time.’ Wow! How the cockles of my heart warmed at these words which sounded sweeter than any music that I have ever heard. My son wanted to see me all the time! I actually stopped my car by the kerb and squeezed him so hard that he almost changed his mind. Such are the joys of parenting. Endless hours of doing seemingly inane stuff are rewarded by such moments of bliss.
As a stay at home mom, I have the luxury and the absolute privilege to gawk at the fabulous observations of a child even though as the flip side to the same coin, these are almost always followed by the most unexpected and complicated questions that need answering. Bonding with your child is always special and when the stimulus is something that is already close to your heart, the bonding sessions become even more precious. We are Indians and we love our cricket sometimes I feel even more than our tea and samosas. Thanks to the magnificent World Cup victory and the fast peppy world of IPL, my son now shares this passion even more passionately. Speaking of IPL, I am amazed at the deep impact that this event has made on my son and me and how as a mother, I can use it as a super tool to benefit various areas hitherto considered completely unrelated.
Logical reasoning: We are from Kolkata and thus support the Kolkata Knight Riders, but my son, true to his religion, follows his God- Sachin Tendulkar and thus supports Mumbai Indians. Whilst trying to convince him to change sides, I tried all the tricks and tactics that I could conjure and said-“Shah Rukh Khan is the owner of KKR and we love him, so let us support his team”. My son just gave me an icy look and said “he is just a Bollywood star and does not even play cricket, so why should he matter”. Well, wish I had such sound reasoning at 30+ (ahem, that is as close I can come to divulging my age).
Fitness and Health: The healthy aspect of IPL is that now we play cricket for more than an hour every day and this also has a therapeutic effect of reducing my guilt for never going to the Gym. The sweet pain of losing to my son offsets the not so sweet pain in my knees and shoulders from the running, bowling, batting, catching or rather all this with the prefix ‘trying to’ attached. Innovation is every mom’s mantra. My son can run and make more runs, while I am fetching the ball after a DLF Maximum Six or a slashed away to the boundary four, so that he also gets adequate exercise and not just statically witness his not so athletic mom huffing and puffing and desperately trying to take a Karbon Kamaal Catch or even more desperately waiting for a Maxx Mobile Strategic Timeout.
Social Equality: No, I am not kidding. When my son says “the talented Bharat Chipli finished off the match in style with a giant six” or “oh no, not Ambati Raidu” or “yeah baby, watch out for Jakati” I feel glad that my son is able to see the players for their current talent on the field and not get affected by starry halos surrounding the international players. These vociferous comments have even served a secondary purpose in making my knowledge of players quite encyclopaedic and christening me as the IPL guru in my ladies circuit!
Numeric Ability: IPL can surely give stiff competition to Kumon Maths, Vedic Maths, Abacus etc. The surest way to make a boy learn his arithmetic is through cricket. 26+4, 39+6, 48+3, 63+9 (because as mentioned earlier, running is allowed even after hitting a six!) are now answered in a jiffy. The joy of mouthing “Mom made 34 and I made 125 and I squashed her by 91 runs” has made him a champion in subtraction too. Watching TV to improve math is no longer limited to the unwatchable UGC programmes run on bad old Doordarshan. While watching IPL he constantly tries to subtract the runs scored from the target and gives a ball to ball update on how many runs in how many balls. Waiting for the next Math test to test my hypothesis on math education!
In a nutshell, this mom and son duo loves IPL. Though like most things in life, this too has its imperfections. I had to beg my son to watch the Grand Royal Wedding while he monopolised the TV watching Rajasthan Royals take on Mumbai Indians. Prince William would surely be surprised by the competition he faced from Ashok Menaria (the best spinner of Rajasthan Royals as informed by my son) and not only Kate but also Pippa in all their McQueen finery could not put up a fight to beat Tendulkar. Come 29th May and this chapter in our life will be closed, but I have full faith in my captain, my darling son, to find out something as interesting if not more to keep this beautiful partnership blooming!
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