Lullaby memories- A repost

( The following is a repost of an old blog- dated January 18 '05.I was reminded of it when I read a post on Mad Momma's page. Since I blog very sporadically these days, thought of simply doing a cut and paste).


Today I was reminded of the time when I used to sing lullabies to my kids when they were babies- I would sit on the floor, my back resting on the wall behind, my legs out stretched with a pillow, and my baby , I would lay on my extended legs- I would have decided it was time for him to go to sleep, because I had unfinished chores waiting- and thus having my baby gently tucked up on my out stretched legs, my hands clasping the little palms, I would set forth belting out all the songs I knew- not necessarily lullabies always- any melodys would serve the purpose as far as I was concerned-( I remember songs like chura liya tumne jo dil ko too featured in this lullaby repertoire- ) and all the while I’d be rocking the baby to and fro on my legs- the songs would be in Malayalam, Hindi and a few in broken Tamil too- when I was at a loss for the lyrics- la- la- la- la would be substituted- Needless to say I forgot the hapless neighbours, but got to say to their credit, never received a complaint or a notice to quit our flat- the lullaby concert would go on and on for more than an hour sometimes, simply because I was enjoying listening to my voice to the hilt, irrespective of whether my baby was asleep or awake. There would be little breaks in between because my baby would be gazing wide eyed at me- sleep farthest from his eyes- and I would have to molly coddle him, talk to him in gibberish to which he would gurgle back heartily- and sometimes even reply back in gibberish- and after our little conversation I would go back to my attempt to singing him to sleep.

And finally when my feet had gone to sleep too, and I was reminded of the piled up vessels in the sink, the half cooked sabji in the cooker, I would stealthily pick my sleeping baby, tuck him cosily in his bed, with pillows all around for added cosiness, kiss the chubby cheek, gaze fondly at my sleeping angel for some precious moments and finally tiptoe to my kitchen to finish my chores. Less than five minutes would have passed and my jigar ka tukda would be wide awake bawling his head off for all he was worth- all efforts of a good hour and more gone up in smoke- awww… and if the door bell buzzed when my baby was sleeping- I used to get soooo angry…

And then there were the times when I would have run out of my stock of songs and my baby would still be wide awake, and I would have been exhausted… he would have decided that he had enough of the drama/concert and he would give me a solid yelling and I had to resort to other means of placating him…


And today my elder “baby” is almost *15, he is sporting an incipient moustache- his voice cracks and squeaks, especially when he is angry, and we end up laughing together- and I think I’ve forgotten to sing…

( * My baby is now 18 years and far away in a hostel ).