Cake please !!!

Oh no, rest in peace! This post is not about the French revolution or Marie Antoinette! Its the refrain my ears have been buzzing with these days!

V2 hates food. He has the appetite of a supermodel along with the airs of a diva. I would choose an hour of third degree torture over coaxing him to eat. He approaches each meal with an arched eyebrow that all but shatters your self confidence. Before V2 came along, I used to consider myself a brilliant cook. Now I am not so sure.....

Subtlety obviously is not his forte! More times than not, he just lays his meal on the floor and rolls a truck over it. And then, just in case you were not quick to catch the hint, he makes his point crystal clear by stomping over the remains with his tiny feet. Or if he is in a generous mood, he just hands you back the plate with one simple word "No"! 

"Why?" you may ask, you may plead, you may threaten with loss of privileges.

But V2 remains adamant. "No" he says and No it is till you give him a bottle of formula to compensate.

Earlier I would attempt things like make 4 different options and lay a buffet for him. Or on hearing a No, I would get up, make an omelette or a paratha or piping hot dosas, if we had batter at home. We even tried to take him to the garden downstairs or the pool to entertain him while he ate. I soon realised, 

a- it became a habit, so everyday, irrespective of what we served, he wanted to go out and eat his meal.

b- The returns were never commensurate with the effort - he would play and roam outside but the meal still lay unfinished

c- Worse of all, it was instigating the more peaceful and completely non fussy V1 to revolt!

One of the things that stressed me out every day was what to serve as snacks. Now while V1 ate his yogurt with great interest, V2 would run away the minute he saw one. V1 loves fruits of every kind. V2 on the other hand, has a internal antenna much like bats do, that points him in every direction but fruits. No matter what fruit you serve, even one he is not seen before, he will take one look, one whiff and go "No!", spit, "No", spit. So what does one do? How many types of biscuits and crackers can you serve? Tried canapes, he ate the cover and threw the filling out. Tried bread pizza, he took one look at it and left the room. 

Luckily, quite by chance, we discovered V2 loves cake! LOVES! He goes and holds the handle of the oven (when its NOT in use, incase someone is thinking of calling Child Services), uses it as a monkey bar and sings "Keyk", ""Keyk"! And there are days, when much like Marie Antoinette, he thinks we should substitute it for bread. Or rice. Or pasta. And in exasperation and helplessness, we do.

When I mentioned this on Facebook, a few friends asked me for the recipes of these cakes. So here they are. 2 simple and easy to bake cakes, whose recipes Angel 2 dredged up. 

1. Banana Cake

Ingredients

1/4 lb butter

2 eggs

1 teaspoon bicarb of soda

3 mashed bananas

1 cup sugar

1 and ½ cups Self Raising flour

2 tablespoons of milk

What to do?

Cream butter and sugar, add eggs, then milk and soda and mix together. 

Add flour and then the mashed bananas. 

Place in cake tin. 

Bake 40 minutes in the oven at 180 degrees

Viola! Cake ready!!!

2. Yummy Carrot cake

Ingredients

1 cup plain flour 

½ teaspoon cardamom and cinnamon powder

1 cup castor sugar

½ cup chopped nuts

2 eggs

1 teaspoon vanilla essence

½ teaspoom bicarbonate of soda

½ teaspoon ginger

1 and ½ cup grated carrots

½ cup chopped sultanas

3/4th cup oil

What to do?

Sift flour, soda, cardamom and cinnamon powder, ginger.

Add carrots, sugar, nuts and sultanas.

Make a well, add eggs, oil and vanilla (don't lose heart if the cake looks real messy at this stage)

Beat thoroughly with a wooden spoon

Pour into a greased tin ring

Bake at 180 degrees for 40 -50 mins. 

Let it cool for a few minutes before turning out

Icing - 

Beat 125gm of softened cream cheese with 3/4th cup icing sugar plus a squeeze of lemon. Beat until smooth and then spread over the cake

Personally I feel it tastes way better without the icing. And why give sugar to kids when you could do without the sugar rush!

And result. There is V2 below, polishing off an entire plate of keyk, while brother is busy polishing off his bowl of fruits!!! ;)

The Dance of Destruction

The Vs have thankfully gone out to play and am sitting on the sofa, exhausted, savouring a few moments of peace and quiet before the storm begins again. As I turn my eyes around the drawing room, I see around me the ruins of what was once a beautiful, immaculately kept home.

Once upon a time, this is what our home looked like.....

Today, there are cars & footballs lying carelessly on the drawing room floor, my silk cushions have drool stains on them, the gorgeous centre table lies bare, with all its knick knacks now ensconced safely on top of the crockery cupboard. There are no fresh flowers on the dining table. Before the Vs, never was my home bereft of fresh flowers. There may not have been vegetables in my fridge, but there was always a vase of fresh flowers on the table. Even the vase containing the bamboo stalks lies bare after they wilted thanks to the orange juice fed to them by the Vs. 

Holy s$%t!! What on earth are those squiggles that I hadn't seen before?? No, no, they can't be!! But they are!! Those are unmistakably crayon marks on the walls! My walls, MY walls!!! Yes, the very same Me.... who once told a friend if she cannot stop her little brat from drawing on my walls, then she shouldn't be bringing him to my place! Needless to say, the friend didn't remain friendly for very long.

So where was I? Yes, musing about the destruction that is all around me. The gorgeous terracotta soldier from Xi'an has been beheaded and now resembles a Chinese version of the resident ghost of Gryffindor House - Nearly Headless Nick. The 2 aborigine warriors statues will never again stand ramrod straight but carry a limp for life! The Indonesian bride and groom are every day without fail offered a bite of everything the Vs eat! The wooden swans are prodded and poked to see how come they have eyes and mouths like us humans! The money plant is now missing half its leaves and the beautiful pussy-willow I got for Chinese New year has none left, after the Vs took a fancy to it! 

My bookshelf is watered regularly to make my books grow. V1 has gotten into the habit of rubbing my Body Shop body butter and Clinique moisturisers on his stomach and worse, dropping my creams into the pot to see how they get impacted by their latest obsession - the "plaas" (flush).

Every man needs a facial on a Saturday morning!
V1 and V2 with my moisturiser

The iPad's touchscreen has been touched, tapped, slapped, kissed, licked, kicked and stamped on! And I don't even want to get into the destruction that is unleashed on the remotes, the cell phones and my laptop; the calamity that has hit my poor, half dead cell phone can fill one entire post!

The other day I found V2 near my prized and extremely expensive Buddha statue. I asked him what he was up to, especially as he knows there is a standing restraining order against him, forbidding him from coming within 3 feet of my prized possessions. So as I reminded him he, of all people, had no business being near the Buddha, he very calmly told me, he was looking for Buddha's 'bumbum' (butt) and he was perplexed as the Lord didn't seem to have one! Now this one, left me speechless!

My precious Buddha statue.
The Vs have been told "Badha" is perpetually sleeping & gets really mad when woken up and thus they should never ever  go near him! (Oh Lord Buddha forgive me for lying in your name but what sins I commit in your name, I commit to prevent another Bamiyan from happening). 

When the Vs started crawling, all I heard was that I need to now clear the house of all my precious artefacts before they get destroyed. But I refused. How will they learn to be appreciate beauty if they don't see it around them, I said? And more importantly, how will they learn to be careful in other people's homes if they don't learn to respect their own??

But that was all before I had to eat my own words. And before I had to hold my heart in my mouth, each time either V stood near a statue I had painstaking collected and tried to make conversation about it. Today, my most precious things are safely tucked away. More will go into storage, once we move to London and I do up the new house. 

And I am learning to make peace with the destruction around me. When my soldier from Xi'an was beheaded by V2 in front of my eyes, my heart seemed to contract and for a second, I felt like I couldn't breathe. But just as I about to scream at V2, he came running to me and hugged me tight. And in that moment, somehow the pain and trouble I had undertaken to get the heavy terracotta statue across 3 countries didn't seem so great any more. Nor did it matter that it would probably take me years to find a similar one and replace it. All that seemed to fade at the sight and feel of a little creature holding me tight and burrowing his head in my lap. And then, I did what in a million years I wouldn't imagine myself doing. I said, "Its okay baby, forget it". People who know me would know that there was a greater chance of Apocalypse happening than me saying "forget it" to someone who breaks one of my precious artefacts. But at that moment, like any average mother on this planet, I had my first brush with martyrdom!

Keeping my thoughts aside for another day, I sigh and get up and pick a can of paint that I had kept aside, expecting eventualities like these. As I remove the crayon squiggles, I notice some more splotches on the walls of the play room, this time caused by my introducing the Vs to watercolours. For once, the splotches bring a smile and not a frown. It reminds me I need to go and check our very first masterpieces we created yesterday. They have dried. And in their splotchy glory, they are no less beautiful than the paintings I have seen in the best of museums.

Our first watercolors!

Show me the money!

Its official. I am definitely getting old or at the very least, senile! I am increasingly starting to phrase more and more sentences with that taboo prefix of "when we were kids", which by the way is barely more palatable than that annoying phrase "hamare zamane mein" (in our heyday) our parents love to quote, and one that invariably results in us raising our eyebrows or smirking or both depending on how good your motor coordination skills are!

Now that I have initiated the process of establishing myself firmly in the dreary, lack-lustre land of no- return called the "aunty zone", I might as well get on with making my point about the vast, almost immeasurable difference between kids of today and us at that very same age!

A few days back in the midst of my evening walk, I came across 2 boys, barely ten, walking in front of me, having an argument. One yelled at the other "Man up!! You gay or what?". I almost had a heart attack. Don't get me wrong, I am no timid little wallflower, as my husband's school friends, (a group of Bihari men, mind you), who had to concede defeat to me in the 'Who can abuse how much' challenge, will tell you. But I cannot remember any ten yr old I knew at school talking like this. Hell, with a strict Catholic school upbringing, I didn't even know words like these existed till I entered graduation!

Just when I was getting over the shock of this, I came across a few little girls in the condo playground, barely 5- 7yrs old, wearing makeup. When I say make-up, I mean the works - rouge, eye liner, mascara, hair colour et al. Apparently it was someone's b'dy and the parents had hired a make-up person to entertain the girls! (I am trying hard here to not comment on what kind of a parent would indulge in an act so glaringly dim-witted!) As I stood watching these girls, I shared my shock with the dad of one the Vs playmates, who looked equally horror struck. The poor guy just shook his head & said, "For once aren't you thankful you have 2 sons? Atleast you won't have to stop them from wearing make-up when they should be playing with dolls". Later as I shared my outrage as an update on my FB page, I heard from friends that apparently what I witnessed was not a abomination but a very common phenomenon today! 

Anyways, the post is not about little boys using the "F" word or little girls dressing up as some horribly freakish version of Barbie meets Hannah Montana. It is about money. And its about how flabbergasting and at the same time, terrifying it is to see how quickly kids of today discover the power of that all powerful, thin rectangular strip of paper!!!

About 3 months back, when he was just 18 months old, V2 (who by the way still can't say Yes) started using a new word - "Numanum". It took me a while to realise he was talking about the contents of my wallet. And quickly to my part horror, part amusement, I discovered what V2's associations with Numanums (money) were.

First, that Numanums always followed a one way traffic. They always left my wallet & went to other people, esp to our help, Tess. How astute of V2, I thought, since my favourite adage w.r.t. to money has been, "Money talks to me. It keeps saying goodbye"!

Soon I was being forced to play villain and intercept V2 as he would go opening my cupboard, taking out my wallet, and very generously handing the cash in it over to Tess or anyone he took a shine to. And mind you, he never touched plastic or bills or anything else in my wallet. In true V2 style, he went for the jugular, which in this case was nothing less than a $50 bill! (No, I am not rich! Its just that after having my wallet snatched in Jakarta and my debit card used, I am more comfortable carrying a basic amount of cash. Saves a lot of unnecessary expenditure that a shopaholic like me would otherwise incur)

The next association that came soon along was that they are like magic beans. When you put them into the dispensing machine downstairs, it throws up those extremely exotic looking "Jooos" (V's slang for a drink). And even though they are only allowed to hold the cans and not drink from them, the whole process of feeding in the money and hearing the loud thud and seeing a can falling out is as exciting for them as watching the great Houdini perform a disappearing act would be for us!

Now every time I take my wallet out to make a payment, the V duo have taken to insisting on dragging me to the dispensing machine so we can feed in the 'Numanums' and make great thuds and generate cans of "jooos"! 

So after about 3 months of watching V2 take 50 dollar bills out of my wallet and give them to Tess or snatch $50 bills from my wallet in cabs and hand it over to cab drivers, (V2's favorite people on the planet since they sit behind a wheel and drive), I decided it was high time I gave V2 a wallet of his own. And I found a brand new, shiny, flowery wallet I had never used and with great fanfare, gave it to V2. 

Suddenly to my astonishment, I find the wallet is thrown on the ground with great disgust and there are loud "No!" "No!" "No!"s happening.

"What's wrong baby?" I ask. 

V2 stops howling just long enough to look at me with a soul melting "Et tu Brute" look in his eyes.

I rack my brains to figure out where I went wrong. As far as I can tell, I did nothing to offend his Royal Fanciness.

"What do you want?" I ask, "Stop crying and show me".

At which point V2 gets up, goes to my cupboard, takes out my wallet and takes out a $50 bill!

I had committed the grave crime of giving him a wallet with only a $2 bill!!!

As I laugh indulgently at V2's antics, a tiny part of me realises with a pang, just how untouched and naive we were as kids, compared to the children of today, who are now a whole new breed of street smart, sophisticated and scary. Today they seem to be in such a rush to grow up, grow out of the innocence of their childhood. Gone are the days of climbing of trees, of the stealing of fruits from the neighbour's garden, of making nimbu pani and pretend selling it on lazy afternoons, of raiding grandma's pickle jars, of the enacting of plays on summer holidays. Now what are left with is little clones of Justin Beiber or Hannah Montana. 

And I wonder how long it will take for my little boys to be all grown up and all knowing and join this circus ..............

And that's how this food chain works!

Food chain picture ~ Getty images

Today has been a bad day - what with the maid being on leave, the nanny giving me attitude when I had issues with her work, Vj going away on yet another of the trips that never seem to end, V2 throwing 3 tantrums complete with screaming, kicking and rolling on the floor in public as against V1's tally of only 1 and with the stress of shifting and relocating slowly seeping through! In short a terrible terrible day; usually one that calls for winding down with chicken steamed momos and prawn pepper garlic dry ordered from Singapore's only authentic Tangra Chinese restaurant! Anyway that's what I had been planning (shamelessly ignoring the fact that my last post has been on healthy living) till I have this gem of a conversation with V2.

It happens as I put down the Vs to bed and wait for the usual round of drama to begin (am not going to elaborate on that as the drama needs an entire post, which is coming soon). Suddenly, I hear this rhythmic chant coming from V2's crib, much like some strange mantra. Curious, I pay closer attention and try to figure out what he is reciting. 

It is by no means flattering! V2 is kicking the bars on his crib and chanting "Kickh mamma, kickh mamma" in a monotonous tone that would make any voodoo high priest proud! I assume that it is because I didn't give in to any of his 3 full blown tantrums today and hence I must be no. 1 on his hit list!

Swallowing my pride, I put on my most reasonable voice and say, "No kickh mamma. Only kiss and hug mamma". 

I give him a hug and kiss to further cement my point. 

Suddenly there is silence. I can tell even in the dark that V2 is thinking hard. 

He tries again "Kickh Lola?" (Lola = Gloria, the nanny, also on better days, known as Angel 1)

"No!" I say, "You can't kick Lola. Infact you cannot kick people"

V2 not being one to ever give up, tries again. "Kickh Tess?" (Tess = Maritas, the cook, a.k.a Angel 2)

"No! You cannot kick Tess either. No kicking people" I reiterate, hoping if I say the same thing twenty times, maybe something will percolate into his brain.

By now, V2's devilish little brain is on overdrive. 

I imagine it making a mental list of people he thinks are kick-worthy

"Kickh Bhai?" (Bhai a.k.a V1), V2 says in a tone that suggests "Come on, this time you got to hand this over to me! I mean what's the use of Bhai if I can't kick him around?"

"No! No kicking Bhai" I say.

V2 stands up, raises his arched eyebrows and gives me a flabbergasted look as if he is unable to believe that anyone with an ounce of brain would shoot down such a reasonable suggestion! After all in V2's world, Bhais are put on this planet with the sole purpose of being bullied and pushed around!

Finally, he tries one more time.

"Kickh Daydeee?"

Now I am tempted to say Yes! Yes! Yes!

Not because V2's persistence is endearing but because I am mad at Vj for travelling non-stop and then turning it all around and telling me, if I had agreed to shift to UK earlier, he wouldn't be travelling so much (so in a sense, its all my doing)!! 

At this point, 'Kick Daddy' sounds like an extremely sensible suggestion to me, one that I am sorely tempted to follow myself! 

I almost say "Yes". Then good sense takes over and I say "No, You can only kick your ball. No people! Now off to bed!"

Then as V2 scoots off to sleep, it comes to me in a blinding flash - this was not V2's list of enemies. It was his food chain and in exactly that very order! So here I am, with full marks on Top of Mind recall, sitting pretty at the very top of V2's food chain! I rule!!! And cool and indulgent daddy is at the very bottom! 

Now there is no chicken steamed momo in the world that can beat the satisfaction that comes from this realisation! :)

"Ma-ma does everything for the baby, who responds by saying Da-da first"
~ Mignon McLaughlin, The Second Neurotic's Notebook, 1966

Of health and (loss of) wealth....

Picture : Getty Images

"The trouble with always trying to preserve the health of the body is that it is so difficult to do, without destroying the health of the mind" ~ G.K. Chesterton

Growing up, you keep hearing the same refrain of "Health is wealth"! But ever wondered how much of it is really true??? A couple of days back, came across a very interesting NY Times article, which talked about how leading a healthy lifestyle may work wonders for your health, but not so for your wallet! Click here for the NY Times article

And of late, in my quest to finally get serious about a healthy lifestyle (yes, yes for the n+1th time), I discover how this holds more and more true! So here is the story of my quest for health and the resultant loss of wealth!

It all began when I re-read the Secret. I came across this interesting little paragraph on losing weight. It said, stop focussing on your weight. Think of your ideal weight and eat what you want. Okay, it may not have said it in exactly those words, but my ecstatic brain looking for any excuse to latch on to, reads it as "eat as much as you want and tell yourself your weight is ideal" and is overjoyed! "Bad idea" and "Don't think it will ever work" says everyone else when I share this brilliant discovery with them. "Don't be so negative" and "I shall prove you wrong" I say brimming with confidence and enthusiasm that could have spawned a few Nike "Just do it" commercials! Well, to cut a long story short, turns out everyone else was right after all! After about 2months of adopting this philosophy, my weight shoots up to an all time high and along with it comes some unwarranted health problems. 

So, I go to this doctor, who comes highly recommended. She is in this swanky clinic that serves almonds in bowls to patients while everyone else serves candy! I am mighty impressed. Then comes the meeting.....

She takes one look at me and my weight and decides rather than a doctor, I need a mother confessor, nutritionist and therapist all rolled into one. So the first session, she just prescribes some tests and then proceeds to spend over 45 minutes talking to me about my life and my feelings! "What bloody nonsense! Why doesn't she just stick to her job and examine you like doctors are supposed to?" says Vj, all annoyed with this 'feeling' nonsense, as he calls it! "Shush! She is different. She must be really good" I say, with satisfaction of one who just spent a good part of an hour speaking about her favourite topic, HERSELF!

Well, the euphoria only lasts till the bill comes along. After landing us a bill that would have certainly given me a heart attack, had I not been covered by insurance, she also does something interesting - she gives me this beautiful book called 'When Food is Love' by Geneen Roth. And charges me S$35 for the book which Amazon sells at USD $10! "Its better getting it at the clinic than going to a bookshop and looking for it. Who knows if you will find it there", I think as I try to justify to myself that I am not really a sucker. But that's the first time I begin to grasp that health comes at a price, and a high one at that!

Anyway the good news is that she has managed to scare me into going into this religious regimen of exercising and healthy eating. So I start my long and arduous quest by doing something I excel - making time tables and plans! Once the food plan for the week is made, I go looking for healthy foods. Out goes the fried pork and deep fried cuttle fish from Irwin. In comes the fruits and vegetables - guavas, apricots, prunes, cherries, strawberries, broccoli, asparagus and celery, snow peas and bean sprouts; things I would avoid with a bargepole, otherwise! Suddenly my monthly shopping budget is more than the peanut like salary I got paid as a Sr. Brand Planning Director in Lowe! And I learn another thing - that the meagre savings in my bank must have happened by eating unhealthy in the past!!!!

Any way one makes sacrifices for health, I say and go looking for the right 'grains'. Gluten free, unpolished and starch free is what they need to be. And there are only 2 such contenders - Wild rice and Quinoa. Turns out, apparently none of us rice producing nations in Asia, spend too much time thinking of health and so none of us produce any of these. Only the wise Indians in America (not the desi variety but the Aborigines of the land) with the wisdom that comes from being one with Nature for centuries, have been cultivating this crop which now is available only in select supermarkets. 

After spending hours on Google, searching for outlets in Singapore, I go to this really fancy, health obsessed outlet called Brown Rice Paradise. Quinoa costs about $6 for a half kg pack while Wild rice, hold your breath, is $12 for a 200gm pack!!!! Now I begin to grasp the true meaning of diet food; its true power lies not in its fibre or non gluten content but in the fact that it is so expensive that just looking at the price puts you off eating, thereby making you automatically lose weight! Grudgingly, I buy a tiny pack of Wild rice and some Quinoa and unpolished rice at $8 for a kg. Then as I come out, on impulse I decide to check the supermarket, 2 floors below. And guess what! It has the same unpolished rice that I just bought, for less than half the price!! Yes, the same brand and same variety!! Looks like other than losing money, being made a sucker day in and day out, is one of the occupational hazards of seeking a healthy lifestyle! WTH!!! 

I am furious. I rave and rant and feel like clambering off the health wagon at high speed! The internal sensors, watchful for this event, go off on red alert!! No!!!!! You have just started. You can't give up this easy!!! Take a deep breath. No!! No!!! What are you doing?? You can't go searching for Haldiram bhujias at this point! Wasn't that what the book (you know the one you bought for a $25 premium) all about??? So what does one do to feel better? Simple! Shopping of course! And so there goes some more of the husband's salary, into keeping Dorothy Perkins and Marks & Spencer afloat!

Then comes a second meeting with the doctor, this time to discuss the result of the very expensive blood tests she ordered. Gone are the days when the doctor said goodbye and good riddance to you if there was nothing wrong with your tests. Instead she says, "Dahling!! You need to do a Hoffman, to get rid of all the baggage and feel like a whole different person!"

"What on earth is that?" I ask wondering if its a cross between cosmetic surgery and weight loss.

"Oh it is a workshop, its expensive but sooooo worth it"

"Weight loss?" I ask again, hoping to get clarity.

"Oh no, its for holistic healing of your soul and body. Costs about $5000"

WHAT??? I had to exercise all my willpower to stop my jaw from dropping in horror!

But is this the end? No, wait there is more to come!

Apparently I also need to get on health supplements to make myself healthier! And then she prescribes not one but 7!!! 

I am horror struck. 

Seven!!! Do those expensive fruits and vegetables give me nothing useful, I wonder.

"Why so many" I ask. 

"I take about 50 a day", she says. "So 7's a really small number, sweetie", she says!

All I can think of is that if she charged me 25$ extra for one book, I wonder how much premium she would have charged on 7 supplements!

I am fuming by now! I must have dollar signs written all over me, I think! But I am unemployed and I distinctly remember telling her so. And I do not at all dress like any of the LV or Gucci toting glitterati set that seem to be frequenting her clinic, so I couldn't have given her the wrong impression that I am moneyed. So maybe I just look like a sucker! I must have have a giant sign on my forehead that says "Moron on the loose. Grab your share NOW!"

Then I remember the Bengali phrase my mother loves to repeat "The bald man never sits twice under the wood apple tree" (loosely translated 'Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice, shame on me'). So I calm myself, take her prescription and leave. And tell her pharmacist, I don't intend to take the supplements from her but look for it in a shop of my choosing. 

Having done that, I feel better, empowered even! I smile and tell myself, "Attagirl, now you have saved yourself some serious money!" And I promise myself that if I continue to keep up with the exercise and diet for 2 months, I shall utilise the money I saved, by buying myself an expensive painting or the Chinese lacquer cabinet I had been eyeing for so long! After all, no good deed should go unrewarded!! 

Meanwhile, poor Vj can go crying all the way to the bank!

A matter of perspective!

I'm thinking Octomom. 
How on earth does she do it??? 
Manage EIGHT toddlers while still managing to stay sane and not to mention fit and in shape! And to top it she has half a dozen older ones I hear! I even saw some program somewhere which claimed that she exercises for 3hrs each night after the kids go to bed! 


Respect!!!! 
That woman must have the patience of Mother Teresa and the strength of Hercules!

Here I am, after 48 hours with 2 sick boys who have been constantly shedding large drops of tears every 48seconds, accompanied by ear splitting screams and howls. I have barely slept 3hrs in these last 48 hrs and not managed to finish a single meal, without having to rush from the table as one or the other has woken and started howling for me! I have had the quickest showers of my life, have forgotten what bathroom breaks are and in an instance, come back from the swimming pool, soaked to the skin, proceeded to wrap myself in towels and then sit near V2 and pat him to sleep as he refused to be with the nanny or the daddy! 

This afternoon after 36hrs of being in the epicentre of a tsunami called 2 sick Vs and not losing my mind and not hitting the refrigerator to look for comfort, I applaud myself on my ability to keep Zen like calm. I even don't flinch when the Vs rub ice-cream all over the carpet and on the walls. Atleast they ate something, I say.  

Then comes evening, and all hell breaks loose! The newly discovered Zen like self quickly beats a hasty retreat as I try to put both Vs to bed. V1 wants to be carried. V2, high on sugar and mischief, decides he wants to throw his pillows and make me play fetch like a pet dog. I say "Cut it out" in my firmest tone, one that would get instant obedience from friends and family who would know that tone means business. Instead, V2 takes offence and starts howling in his highest pitch till I apologise! Finally giving in, I carry both crying babies, one in each arm and attempt to rock them both to sleep without inconveniencing either quick-to-take-offence toddler. 

At this juncture V1 decides to combine crying with singing in what can only be described as a non-stop monotonous drone with no change in tone or timber. V2 on the other hand, decides to poke his brother's face to refresh his memory about body parts that he has learnt. And then both join in to howl in perfect harmony with Raag Bhairav playing on the iPad. Except unlike the Raga, there is nothing calm or serene about our situation!

Nothing I say, makes any difference. I rock myself back and forth like a human rocking chair. I attempt singing in my tone deaf voice. I try to explain in my most rational voice to the Vs, the need to stay calm and go to sleep. Nothing works! I begin to empathise with the helplessness of a little ant I flushed down the drain the other day.

And as I struggle to keep my eardrums and my sanity intact and stop myself from crying out like a little girl for my own Mommy, I calm my nerves by telling myself, "Think Octomom! There she goes managing 8, apparently quite successfully, if one were to believe reality TV, while here you are, wilting under the pressure of a mere twosome!"

I try to remember the video of her household on Oprah and try imagine a day in her life - of the chaos, babies screaming, crying, howling, fighting; of the lack of sleep, of the constant running around, of the exhaustion..... In under 5 minutes I am shuddering with terror and feeling relieved. I like my life. I am glad I am managing just 2 whiny kids even if they have been whining for the past 2 days. It could have been worse. It could have been 8!! :)

Or I could be in Vj's shoes. The guy is the best dad I have ever seen, and yet every time he comes back from one of his endless trips, he has to start all over again, from somewhere near scratch - to get the Vs to want him to rock them to sleep at night or carry them around when they are sick. And he patiently does it each time, till another trip comes along and they forget him and look for Mamma and Mamma alone. That can't be very complimentary!

My sis, now overflowing with the sudden outpouring of wisdom that comes with motherhood, says it's all a matter of perspective. We are so busy looking at greener grass on the other side and feeling sorry for ourselves that we tend to forget that looking at not so green grass on the other side of the fence is sometimes far more important for our sanity!