The Inevitable Conversation

Realizing how much similar is the way any relationship works in this world. Last week, I went out to lunch with a colleague, his wife and their two young kids - 18 months and 6 weeks old. So, you can imagine how interesting the lunch would have been - the 6-week baby crying on and off in her sleep, the 18-month old trying not to eat vegetables and so the parents coaxing her about it and trying to bribe her with cheese cake and chocolates for dessert, the couple sharing the lunch and just conversing with me about the general nothings - the weather, traffic, Bush and Middle-East and you know, the usual trivia.

Amidst all this, all of a sudden, with a bewildered face, the wife said "You know what I found today - my first grey hair". The husband started laughing and teasing her about it. I felt like Kabab-Mein-Haddi for a little bit. But then, they recovered from the moment and my colleague started talking about how its just women who worry about grey hair, wrinkles and dark eyes. So, with two ladies around - his wife and me, we launched an argument that successfully took out the rest of the lunch conversation and the rest of the day of work. Ofcourse, you can imagine how it would have gone!

This also rewound my thoughts to the year 1994 when almost a similar conversation took place at home in Chennai. My mom is the worrier in my family. Not so much a worrier, but the most caring person ever and hence tends to worry a little. Although she worked full-time, she used to worry about me, my schooling, basically everything around me. So, once when she was asking some serious questions about school and stuff, I was too engrossed in the cricket match going on then, Kumble and his bowling antics and didn't reply to her with much heed. She got upset and it took a lot of time and energy to make things right again. I was usually a very good kid and was never a lot of trouble - at home and school. Anyhow, after that, she started talking how worried she is about me and my future (just like any other parent). My dad started calming her down and said that if she didn't lessen the worries about me, by the time I started working (after school and college), she would have her head full of grey hair. For a second then, everything almost stopped. She retorted.

Skipping what happened at home after that, trying to come back to the original point - some conversations across the globe are almost the same, irrespective of all the differences that actually exist. And this one, hair turning to grey, is an inevitable one in everyone's life. Concur?