My mother is coming out of me 😳

 

You look up to her in your childhood, hate her in your teens, promise yourself never to bring up your kids like she did hers, slowly start understanding her in your youth, start loving her again after you get married, look at her with awe when you start bringing up your own kids and ultimately turn out to be her. Whether you like it or not 😉

Cutlets are a staple on Syrian Christian dining tables. And for a young mother who had to pack five lunch boxes every morning, it was a life saver. The accompanying concoction of sliced onions, tomatoes and green chilies mixed with vigor in the ‘naadan kallu’ vinegar was to die for. The very memory of that rice that had been blessed with the essence of this combo can still make my mouth filled with water that is enough to launch at least one of those proverbial ships. No wonder, Beef cutlets are a staple on all our tables too. And if that was not enough, she had made my son eat enough of her kickass combo of ‘kanji,’ ‘payar’ and cutlet to make him a slave to these for life. My mother, who must be chuckling away to glory in her heavenly abode. Blessed be her soul as were the cutlets that she fed us all her life long.

Believe it or not, for the first time in my life, I’ve started packing lunch boxes. May the soul of their old school be blessed, them that served nutritious lunch to scores of children over the years. And may the unearthly amount that we had to dish out as fees may lay forgotten. Anyway, coming back to the point of lunch, for the first two days I was all excited like a kid on the first day of her school enjoying the rains, grilling chicken and making steaks out of Beef. Then started the longing, for those maid-en days. When kitchen was a place I visited, maybe to get a glass of water, once in a long while. By the time it is Sunday noon, realization hits. No amount of sweet nostalgia is going stop me from being hit by bouts of reality. Better earlier than at five o’clock on a Monday morning.

So I turn into my mother. Churning out cutlet after cutlet on a Sunday afternoon. And I know this is the beginning of a weekly ritual.

p.s. Now, I am worried. What if my daughter turns out into me ? 🤔🤔🤔