One day the little enchantress will know the power of the craft she is so naturally potent in!

I take out the flash cards hoping we will go further in recognizing the opposites. Secretly also hoping it will help her memorize the shape and texture of all words we read and see. But she? She gives me this

And I say.. Dia look this is a..?

Dia: Giraffe mama

Me: yea and see they are two this one is (pointing at the taller one)

Dia: This is maamaa giraffe

Me: right.. this is Mama so she is tall. And the baby giraffe is?

Dia: Smallerrrrrrr

Me: yea and also he is short right

Dia: right he is short

Dia: and baby giraffe loves to run... and every time mama says slow down baby giraffe you are going too ahead of me you will get lost.

Me: Ahan.. (wondering where is this going... please dont go all Freud on me there are more stories coming)

Dia: But the baby giraffe runs faster and faster and mama comes behind slowly she is tired :(

Me: wow thats such a nice story isn't it.
and she says no this is not a nice story because the giraffe runs and doesn't listen to mommy. and I am thinking ... "is that morality" or is it just her way of telling me that she recognizes all those times I tell her to slow down that running far away she is testing her boundaries...
she doesnt give me much time to think and draws another pair

Dia: Look mamma a finished apple

 Me: yea and look at this one this one is?

Dia: whole

Me: yes and its also an apple that someone may have just started to eat right? so start and finish

Dia: yea start

Me: (wondering if i will get lucky with another story i ask) Dia so do we have a story of apple?

Dia: yeaaaa

Dia: One day Adiyah was hungry (am absolutely marveling at her start). And she went to the dressing table to look for noodles (why dressing table? why not kitchen? noodles because that what she was eating when we were doing this activity)

Dia (cont): but there were no noodles on the table instead (she used the word "balkay" i was so proud lol) there was an apple.

So dia ate the apple until it was half done and here is the rest of the apple (while pointing at the finished apple)

Me: Oh wow now this was a nice story wasnt it?

Dia: yea mamma you liked this story?

Me: yes i love you story

This time i pick another pair and say, "Look dia, whats up here"

Dia: Oooh look at this ship one is Nazdeek and another one is sooo far

Me: right and nazdeek in english is? 9and she gives me a quizzical look... its almost funny how she can still not tell which words are English and which ones are Urdu.. but am kinda glad for this blessing)

Me: its also near

Dia: Oh yea near and far, and mamma you know

(and I could see another story coming in....)

Dia: when the ship for near they shouted common Adiyah hurry up lets get on the ship but i could not reach to the ship on time

Me: and then?

Dia: then when I reached close to the river the ship was far far away and I said "wait i want to go also"

Me: oh o, then what happen

Dia: (she makes her voice dramatic) and then mamma i jumped in the water and swam swam swam until i reached the ship. Then i climbed up the ship but you know what

Me: what

Dia: the ship was made of wood and when I jumped on it I hurt my knee

Me: oh o, did it hurt

Dia: yes but I am ok now, I am so brave

Me: That you are my love!!!

This was the next pair

now you guess what the story went like.... a hint... it had a dream sequence lol....





  

Metaphors Metaphors.... incompatibility

So I am playing with my daughter and here comes another chain of thoughts i couldn't get myself to ignore....

I am trying to show Dia how to shoot at a magnetic dart board we bought for her long back which she only used to identify Dora for the longest time. But now she is gaining interest in the fact that darts have magnets on them and if she throws them from a distance towards the board it still sticks/ Just when I thought she has got the hang of it and I am about the celebrate another tit bit milestone she starts to try and join the two darts which obviously are two similar ends of the magnet and are repelling each other.

Now she is really interested as she tries to push them together and they refuse and keep moving forcing her hands to paddle and she goes "mamma look" with her quizzical stare meaning to ask me whats going on. And me being me I try to teacher her a fancy word saying, "Dia this is what we call repelling, the magnets repel each other" but she probably didn't pay attention as the fact that an object is not moving as per her desire was something definitely more intriguing.

Then just like that she handed them to me as if trying to say you try and I tried. I tried to put these magnets together, I forced them the same way she was poor little magnets scummed a little to my 70 kilo pressure and I was under the illusion that I have put them two together triumphant i looked up only to realize that a slight lapse in my attention and they had once again separated despite the force i was still applying.

I played this game for a bit and then thought maybe its better just the way it is, sometimes we are just incompatible and it doesn't matter how much effort, how much force we put to make certain relationships work, the fact remains that every single ripple no matter how small would not only put us apart again but will also make the effort put in place go all in vain. Maybe sometimes its just better for some relationships to not exist and for some people to remain apart.

We as individuals for various reasons try to put these relationships right, sometimes bound by self righteousness, other times for professional courtesy but also sometimes out of love and desire. We try to change, we try to mend ways, we put too much effort, we suffer as a consequence but we try too hard to not give up, we try too damn hard sometimes not giving up and losing ourselves in the process.

Am sitting here thinking while my daughter has moved on from the dart board to the doll house, "How is it that I teach her this? how is it that I teach her that it is better to try not put together things that repel due nature?"