Loving a baby

-

What I learnt this summer, aside from frying an egg while keeping the yolk perfectly gooey, the taste of loneliness and how to do my own threading,was the hot and immediate comfort of holding you, pressing a baby cheek to my face, watching you absentmindedly curl your small, moist hand around my finger while you stared out at the cars driving by, thrilling to the way you learnt to trust me one glance, one step at a time, until you had faith enough in me to follow me anywhere, to trust me to pick you up and wipe away your tears when you were sick in your own clothes that one time. Everytime I brushed back your dark hair or watched you fall asleep - what does a baby dream? - I wanted to stop time, turn back the hour hand on the clock, knowing that each moment I spent with you was precious and irreplaceable.
You see, I will never get any of them back. Because the next time I see you, even if it is only a couple of months from now, you will never be the same toddler that you are now. You will never be this old again, and oh will I ever miss it.

Dedicated to my littlest cousin - the newest addition to our family. May God bless you always!

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Waiting For Afternoon Chai

-
I'm sitting in my verandah right across from that big, beautiful neem tree, anticipating my favourite time of day in this city. Karachi is lovely in the afternoons.  When I'm in my balcony in an ugly plastic chair, or upstairs on the roof where the view is blocked by rows of apartment buildings, leaking sewage and other by-products of domestic life, and especially, yes, ESPECIALLY when we're driving towards Malir (preferably Cantt) or just heading towards the airport, and the sun hits everything in exactly the right place making the buildings look like they’re going up in rosy flames, I feel like I'm on top of the world. Literally. The world can't possibly be more beautiful than this. And all the ugly hatred, all the bitterness of this century is forgotten. I only see glorious, ancient Karachi. And I feel tremendously nostalgic. I guess, 20 years of this life are enough to look back on and I'm nostalgic for each one of them. For all the places I've ever b
Read more

Thank you, Mark Zuckerberg!

-
I facebook too much. Signing in every hour, hoping for a shiny, red '1 new notification' (or inbox message if I'm lucky)-arghh, I'm going to HAVE to sign in right now!!-is facebooking too much. Feeling like an idiot when you haven't got any new notifications or inbox messages or friend requests or event invitations (application requests don't count in my book), and then logging out in disappointment, vowing to never visit the darned website again (WTH, it's been four whole hours and she STILL hasn't replied to my wallpost but she's had time to like all his pictures) is facebooking too much. Thinking about your next status update while you're supposed to be cramming for your C-language test is definitely facebooking too much. I hate it. But I can't stop. Sometimes I wonder if this is what being a smoking addict would be like. Going to bed promising to never ever EVER do it again, and in the morning you're still strong, but as the hours
Read more

It's time to be a big girl now...

-
Image
What astonishes me the most is how nothing around me seems to change. The world goes on unfeeling, unmoved, the way it's always been, oblivious of the changes that occur inside us. Most times I don't notice it because who even has time to think given the busy busy schedules we've made for ourselves? But sometimes, when my brain is stuffy because of the suffocating Karachi heat or my family arguing over something or the other, I escape to the rooftop. It's not much of a view. Just a whole bunch of old apartment buildings towering above me, a deserted mall missing some of the glass panes in its roof on the street opposite, my favourite neem tree that just grows and grows regardless of the weather and my neighbours' palms, the Commecs sign blinking blue and white from far away. That's pretty much it but it's beautiful enough for me. I start thinking about where I am, who I am, and what I've become in the past couple of years and I can't believe it. I
Read more