Naisha has started to ask about me. Poor little girl, so far it was all game and fun for her, no school, travelling and new places, new sights, new dresses and new toys...and now the reality has begun to set in for her little mind that Papa is missing. Usually I am away from home on training trip for a few days or a week, but now she’s beginning to feel my absence. This is longer than usual, and something is different!Shami explained to her why I am here and they are there – the reasons for why we are away and not together; she had a ‘Hmmm...’ as a response - the language of an enslaved heart when the reasons of mind overpowers the desires of the heart - a 'hmmm' contemplating on the reasons and making sense out of it, and a silence that followed. What must have been the language of her silence! How those thoughts of such silent moments must be effecting her view of life around her; how that view must be moulding her character; how it must be strengthening that little mind, or causing cracks from the unspoken anxiety of the absence of her beloved Papa!
Every time we sleep, she would simply want my hand for her to hold; that’s all what she wanted. How many times she would come and cuddle my face, saying “I love you papa.” How many times she would walk to me, for no reasons, with her arms stretched, and to simply give me a hug and say “I love you Papa.” I know I have responded to all her loving gestures all the time, but when I think of all those moments now, I feel I could have said a word or more, I feel I could have hugged her a moment more, I feel I could have sat with her and fed her with less irritation, perhaps listened to her childish gibberish for a few seconds more…
In that silent ‘hmm…’ contains the nourishment of growth, I believe. In that silence, and the contemplation that of the meaning of words defining the rationale behind our need to stay away, what would have been her thoughts? How would she reflect on it, a few years later? What am I making of her, as a person, by putting her through this patch of life and asking her to endure the truth and its emotions, for no reasons of her!
She carries the weight of her thoughts; and perhaps that’s how her shoulders will become stronger to carry the weight of life gracefully.
In fact what would she want in life? The potential wealth and security that I suppose I am building for her by being away, or the instant joy and the warmth of love and care that she enjoyed while I am with her? What would she have wanted, if she had a way to ask me?
The logic of wellbeing demands that they need for them the security in life by having ‘enough’ to support them. The pulse of heart attempts to scream loudly obliterating the logic of mind, saying it is in love and being together that the life will flourish!
It’s a battle between the pulse of heart and the logic of mind!
Shahir
