Seeing my flair for sketching, it didn’t take too much for my dad to conclude that his younger son was a bit of a pansy, and would probably do well in all things pansy. Why not have a go at music, then? Sunday-mornings were marked off on the calendar for music lessons, a violin was quickly acquired, a corner of the shelf was stacked with music related books, and some cassettes were given to me for inspiration.

But even by the age of twelve, when Sotheby’s hadn’t yet called for my violin and I was still to bring home a Grammy, my parents decided to review their parenting techniques. Till now, my life had been comfortably sheltered from academic expectations; being branded ‘creative’, my parents modulated all their expectations off me to pulsate along the plane of art. But this new realization affected a drastic cutback on such privileges. Gazing out of the window and listening to music wasn’t so much a pause for inspiration anymore, as sheer laziness. The mess that was my room, previously excused as a budding artist’s eccentricity, was suddenly just a mess. And my mediocre grades were no more due to my leanings elsewhere, as for me being just incompetent in academics. I’d encashed all my ‘creative kid’ credits, and had nothing to fall back on anymore. And in the meantime, all my friends had earned themselves new identities like ‘engineering prospect’, ‘state-level sportsman’ or ‘music prodigy’, while I was left twiddling my thumbs.

Which wouldn’t have been a problem had I not been so darned fond of twiddling my thumbs. You see, I wasn’t really bad in studies. It just so happened that test scores didn’t figure at the top of my priority list. It somehow felt unfair on my genius to limit it with labels like ‘math wizard’ or Einstein’ so early in life. What if, at the age of 50, I was to look back at my trophy shelf and tut-tut at my ‘Nobel Prize for Cryogenic Freezing & Revival’, realizing that my true calling was in being a ballerina all along? What if I went through life without ever realizing my actual gift?

But, all this changed one day. By some great misfortune, I scored 96% in one of my science exams. Not knowing what to make of it, I presented the results to my Dad. He took a few minutes to rule out the possibilities of over-writing, forgery, or a cruel optical illusion, before giving me a big, broad smile; the kind of smile you reserve for when your old TV unexpectedly starts working, after receiving a half-hearted bang on top.

‘Uh…well done, Rishi,’ he said, moving the report card around and inspecting it from all the coordinates. ‘This is really good.’

Unlike in Ma’s case, I had long ago successfully quashed my dad’s expectations of me to manageable levels. He didn’t have very high regard for my intellect; the only way he could see me being of any use to the academic world was by being the subject of a thesis on ‘What’s Wrong With Today’s Generation: A Psychological Study.’ But when presenting the results to him, I had obviously not foreseen how this single incident could have a profound impact on dad.All the doors and windows of expectations, long locked up, were flung open once more. Photographs of hope were dusted down, reframed and put up on the walls again. And for a fleeting moment, we almost made eye contact.

‘Good, good. Now, get me a 96% in Math,’ he said. ‘Have you seen my lighter, by any chance?’

I hadn’t, luckily. For at that moment, I would have probably gulped it down. As a sort of parental duty, I had always been asked to do well. But doing well, in my mind, was not a very specific target. It was like a large expanse of greenery, with an endless variety of flora and fauna that I could interest myself with. And I always assumed that I was doing fine till I couldn’t see the edges of this green patch. But now the comfort zone had all of a sudden shrunk. Like a giant lawn mower, Dad’s words had gone all over my garden, progressively denuding it in concentric circles till there was just a single tree left to cling to. 96% in Mathematics.

Things sort of started going downhill after that. The world around me had changed, and prowess at grabbing others’ lunch-boxes or stealing pencil-boxes was not a recognized talent anymore. With each red mark on my report card and with every unanswered question, I kept inching backwards in the classroom; until one fine day, I had my back to the wall and Varun by my side. His big, round eyes, plonked into a larger sphere, on top of a still larger sphere, welcomed me with empathy. I could see he had been there at the back for a long time. For, God had been particularly unkind to Varun. Being academically hopeless and devoid of any talent otherwise, he had stopped giving a damn long back. And instead, had a Zen-like calm that absorbed every abuse, taunt and insult and turned it into a perpetual smile. It is not easy admitting how reassured one feels about oneself in the company of a friend more miserable than oneself. Being in the pits myself, it comforted my neck to have someone to look down upon.

‘Who was the last Prime Minister of India, Varun?’ the teacher asked.

‘Huh? Last?’ Varun expressed surprise. Apparently, no one had told him about the annual Prime Ministerial triathlon.

‘Who is the current Prime Minister of India, Varun?’

‘Huh?!’ Varun answered, this time cleverly altering the pitch of his voice to match the question.

‘Where is India? Can you point it out on the map?’ the teacher would ask in a final desperate attempt before switching off life-support.

‘Eh…’, would come the response, prefaced with an appropriate pause to signal that he at least realized that he was supposed to know the answer to that one.

‘Rishi?’

‘There!’ I would say, triumphantly pointing at the required spot on map on the wall, with an imaginary spotlight on me, and celebratory bugles going off in my head. Varun was an indispensable part of my persona from then on.

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Photograph Courtesy: © Ta Duy Duc

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