The End Of Innocence

From the mouths of babes, come words of wisdom and indeed if you philosphically reflect on "Aiiiee oowww.....YEEEEEAA" , you actually experience an epiphany, which will change the way you look at yourself.......primarily because after that sound, you will be covered by an amalgam of baby puke, mashed bananas and the morning milk. But that is how babies are. Babies have this rule, if they want to be happy, you have to be uncomfortable. e.g

a) When you are in right in the middle of your meal , your baby will decide to unload the trade surplus of Japan in his diapers , accompanied by howls of joy that to the untrained ear sound like cries of discomfort. While you are getting up from the dinner table, swearing silently so that your wife doesn't skewer you with her looks, actually those tiny baby neurons are busy giving each other the high fives , wondering how can they improve upon this new record.

b) When you have just returned severely jetlagged from travelling a 18 hour economy class flight and have settled in your bed, showing just about enough movement to keep the lawyers from reading your will, your baby will tear the night skies with an incessant howl. This howl will marginally decrease only when you carry the baby in your arms, drop down drastically when you stand up and completely silenced when you stand on one foot. (For best results stand on broken glass)

c) When you have freshly showered and preparing for a tuck in and going against your common sense, you decide to take a small peek inside that cotton camouflage called diapers to asses the situation at ground zero. You decide to approach stealthily and take the briefest of looks through the tiniest of openings by lifting the flap when like a coiled up cobra , a high pressure jetstream of a supercompressed motion shoots your dry cleaned silk kurta to pieces.

Happiness is a zero sum game for babies. That's the reason why the happiest babies are the ones with the most miserable looking parents. I am sure the actor Alok Nath has extremely happy babies. Babies are indeed miles ahead of anyone in this game of subterfuge and deceit and what helps them have a natural advantage are those innocent eyes. Those are the real weapons of mass destruction. Someone should tell that to George Bush instead of asking him to look into the camera like Emrann Hashmi does. These innocent eyes while seducing adults,lull them into a safety zone where they unknowingly step into the dangerous circle of inanity. This is the circle where normally sane adults end up going down on all fours and make nonsensical statements. A bit like Manmohan singh infront of Sonia Gandhi. This is the point when adults are going ,"oogie..boogie.......luchhu...buchhu" and the babies are going " OK that's it smartypants, you are doing fine, just come a little bit closer because your face is going to look like a cheese margarita Pizza, when I am done with my regurgitation" (PS : Contrary to conventional wisdom, babies have an advanced vocabulary of food processing. Most babies also know reflux, projectile motions etc).

My baby is no differrent and I suspect when she grows up she is always going to resent the fact that we did not name her gl_77669 despite the fact this email id is available on Hotmail as well as yahoo. But that is in the future, at the moment I really see no reason why there should be unprovoked physical attacks using body fluids. I am faced with the quandary that all parents the world over find themselves in provided they are able to spell "quandary" correctly. How do we get back ?

10000 years of human existence on the planet is yet to lead to a solution and I have a suggestion. Give them a taste of their own medicine....literally. The next time your baby starts howling, I suggest you join in . It is easy to do . All you have to do is
a) Get down on your back and raise your arms
b) Start howling at the top of your voice
c) Explain clearly in a normal voice , the reasons to the police and the courts as to why exactly were you doing that.

Hey, I never said it was easy. But when you are fighting for a just cause , it's all for a worthy reason. Generations of future parents will thank you for it, worship you in their houses, erect your statues etc, the possibilities are mind boggling. So all those parents out there , remember my words ..........,"oogie..boogie.......luchhu...buchhu".