Listen To Your Heart And Give

- Sanghamitra Chakrabor

THERE IS A TIME IN YOUR life when your child asks you questions. Lots of questions, repeatedly and relentlessly, about everything they see or hear. They then go on to validate and verify your answers like a keen fact checker would.

It was during such a time, when our son Josh had learnt to speak full sentences, that he and I were in our car, going somewhere.

We came to a halt at a traffic signal and within moments a young woman, with a grimy face and crumpled clothes, a baby clinging to her side, came up and stood outside our window. It was Delhi summer, our AC was on full blast and the glass was pulled up firmly to not allow the outside to filter in. She held a shapeless metallic bowl in her free hand and mumbled requests for some help.

I avoided meeting her eyes, but could not help noticing the infant, with its watery eyes and runny nose. Exposed to the unforgiving heat of the midday sun, he looked sick and drained. If I were alone, I know I would have missed Josh at that very moment. Stretching my arm out, I gave him a small hug.

Glancing at the ticking signal, I tried to sense if I could grab some

thing from my purse before the light changed, when a shrill voice next to me filled the moment: “Who is she, Ma?”