Of magic and miracles
By Rooma Mehra

I REMEMBER that day, at the end of our eighth standard examinations in school, when, much to the chagrin of my science teachers, I opted for arts instead of science.. burying, once and for all, my childhood dream of becoming a doctor. The artist in me had egoistically mused that there had never been a conscious choice, because I could never help painting and sculpting anyway.

But somewhere in the midst of wistful longings eclectically sprinkled over heart and mind, always quivered the question why I could not be both. The answer was, of course, the complete and whole-hearted devotion required by either of the two life-goals..

However, although I always carried my "healer’s trailers" with me on my journey in the world of colours — and the other black and white and grey one that seeped in all the time I never really imagined I would actually, one day, have the privilege of being witness to the unfolding of God’s greatest miracle — the birth of a child.

I, a layperson, inside the operation theatre of a hospital, holding my sister’s hand through her tortuous ordeal stretched over seemingly unending hours, till the miracle happened.. was more than I had ever dreamt of being party to..

I found myself thanking my sister’s doctor in thought and from the heart (for quietly nodding her consent to my being inside the O.T. upon my sister’s panic-stricken insistence on not leaving my hand), that moment when my sister’s baby opened his eyes for the first time in this world and looked at me.

A zillion stars sparkled through his just-opened eyes, obliterating, in a flash, all the smoke that my eyes had witnessed rising from burning deaths, if for just a moment. I was so completely awestruck for those few timeless seconds that I am sure I achieved a momentary nirvana — till the funny thought jumped into my head from nowhere what the newborn might be thinking about my ugly horn-rimmed spectacles. The preceding 24-hours had been such a terrible ordeal that I had had no time to look for my contact lenses, leave alone wear them.

But his eyes twinkled at me for but a fraction of a moment registering, of course, nothing of the appearance of his tired aunt. I also realised that the baby was a boy and I was the first person in the family that God had cared to tell. It occurred to me simultaneously that now was the time to realise my childhood dream of playing doctor for a fews minutes.. I saw another sparkle in my sister’s eyes as she registered the news of her baby’s birth and went back, relieved, into deep slumberland.

I said a hurried "see you" to the little one and sauntered out, hands behind my back, to confront a line of anxious faces of relatives, before announcing that both mother and son were O.K., and the new addition seemed in a good mood.. his eyes had twinkled at me..

Congratulating myself on my cool and calm tone and fielding a flurry of questions with the medical-person’s ease, I wondered if I had missed my true vocation — the theatre! (If I had not been so camera-shy that I had done a ridiculous volte face everytime I had been forced to face the T.V. camera before or after an art exhibition, much to the amusement of onlookers).

And, who knows, if the sight of a dissected frog had not filled me with such horror the first time I saw it crucified in an experiment dish, I could perhaps even have been a doctor!

Now, almost three-and-a-half years after that day in the O.T., as I make an incredible dive to save my spectacles as my almost three-and-a-half years old nephew sends them flying out of window — (I was right, he dislikes spectacles), I decide angrily that children, especially boy-children are not my cup of tea.

They have a curious knack of hunting our even the most ingeniously hidden pair of spectacles, and I have yet to develop the art of controlling my temper while my best spectacles are being smashed against walls. Noting my expression, the little one’s eyes fill up with remorse and he says, "So sorry — I’ll never do that again — sounding so woebegone and sincere that I almost believe him.

But then there is the familiar twinkle in the brat’s eyes and the dimples in his cheeks deepen as he throws a ball at the moving ceiling fan, missing my painting on the wall by inches. The fan comes to a standstill and I look incredulously at "pieces of ball" raining on me.. and then I look at little Saif.

His eyes quickly fill up with remorse as he begins on a heart-rending stifled-sob-note, "So-sorry-I’ll never.." This one has a definite future in theatre or films — I decide ruefully as he pauses to stifle another sob.. that is, if he does not run away with a circus before that!

Talk about miracles and magic..

I pick up another piece of ball..