We are the stories we hear…

The evidence of an interesting childhood follows us well into adulthood. Yes, the childhood scars on my knees, shins, elbows, wrists, forehead and other random places all bear witness to that active childhood. Slowly, the scars seem to fade away with age. And with it, memories of events of how each one came to be… 

I have stitches on my chin. From two separate incidents, if I remember right. One has something to do with falling off of a guava tree (I hope that guava was super sweet), but it’s the other one that I remember clearly. I am about six years old, standing on a swing, and swinging away, when I see my parents and decide to wave. I know…I know… always the smart one….

I fall on the gravel, straight on my chin. Miraculously, none of my limbs are broken, but I am in a pool of blood. My father picks me in his arms and rushes to the street outside the park, where an autorickshaw driver is standing by a street food cart, and eating something yummy.

When asked, if he is available, he shakes his head to say no, without looking up. But when he catches a glance of a blood-soaked me, without another word, scrunches his snack in a paper, leaps into the rickshaw, and pulls to start it. We are already inside the humming vehicle.

I have no memory of the hospital or doctors or ensuing procedures. What I remember, very distinctly, is my father narrating the kindness of this rickshawala. Several times. To several people. I remember his joy and gratitude (and possibly relief), as he narrates the story.  

Yes, we are the stories we hear. Although I do remember plenty from when I was as young as three, the “clearest” are those that I have heard narrated, either then, or later.

Some are fun, some make me shake my head. And of course, there are always the silly embarrassing ones, that I continue to hear even today… as do all of you, I’m sure.

You don’t remember her? She lives in Mumbai – you broke that big vase in her house, remember?

Great. Now I do. Very well. Thanks Mom.

Funny thing though, is that I’m still not sure I remember her. I remember mostly the proceedings of that day, after I break the vase… ahem…

Yes, our memories of events of our childhood are often a mélange of our own scattered memories as well as the events as recounted by the adults around us, colored by their impressions of those events.

And that brings me to now. To our bizarre and unusual today, where we have all been cast in a strange sci-fi film with an ending that is yet to be determined. 

In the future, how we remember the events of Covid19 will be different from how our children remember the events. But along with their own impressions, they will also carry our impressions that will be etched in their memories. That puts us as parents in an odd, subconscious place of power.
It asks for us to ground ourselves and see the world with its bad, as well as its good. To notice the kindness, the courage, the generosity that is prevalent, as much as is the panic.

Who will we be? And how will that affect how our kids remember the events of this pandemic?

I have been asked about the scar on my chin often. Each time, the guava tree story somehow fades in the background, and I mostly mention the swing incident. And each time, I remember the rickshaw driver who took one glance at me, covered in blood, scrunched his food in paper, jumped into the rickshaw and beckoned us in. It was an awful fall and I was probably in a lot of pain, but years later, what I remember is the riskshawala’s kindness… and that may be a gift my father left me…