Friday 20 April 2007

Independence, is it?


Attendance to a family get-together organised for the Grand Papas & Maas, accentuated a few facts which I overlooked for reasons unknown. Yes, I shall categorically call it an ‘Attendance’, because it was only abiding by my parents. Lack of communication with parents is contemporary or some who would brave to claim that the parents-children relationship is “healthy”. To give them the benefit of doubt, let’s say, it’s merely out of unawareness of the ‘Healthy Terms and Conditions’. Just having a rapport limited to an exchange of words cannot be termed as healthy, or for that matter, even a relationship.

Looking at all the middle aged relatives entertaining the older generation, it struck me that such smoothness in the bonds is rarely established within our generation. By the way it all went; it was crystal clear that the long years of ‘Healthy’ interactions with them was the only reason for the ease. It looked so simple yet complicated! And it occurred to me that talking over the generation gap which provides as a chief justification these days is futile.

With the ‘work-earn-enjoy’ phenomenon being an imminent feature of the new millennium, we seldom realise that there is no time allocated to ‘Home’. And spending time home is just the beginning. Being transparent about your plan of actions and so called personal life seems to be a new theory for us. My biggest insight was that such kind of transparency was the backbone of our parents’ success. We often misinterpret the personal plans and life as independence. Not being able to have open books is not independence neither is it a sign of growing up. It is a straight path to compulsive lying. I fail to understand how does ambiguity about ones actions gets interpreted as independence. It should rather be termed as blunder!

The maturity here lies in the acceptance of the fact that we need to admit our failure in our duties and act accordingly. Having a progeny is the highest form of completeness. Our parents have rightfully given it to their parents, unfortunately we haven’t. Independence for the generation of the new millennium needs to be redefined. Life is not about fun only. We need to understand the significance of our duties towards our preceding generation. No one refuses the gap, and amongst the two generations, it has to be the youngsters’ sense of duty to be flexible. The elders have done their adjustments with their preceding age group.

If we know there is a gap, being the bridge goes without saying. If we despise asking for permissions, we need to be transparent about our actions. If we want financial independence, we should be capable of supporting our parents. When we are capable of becoming the bridge, addicted to transparency and financially sound, only then will we be subjected to independence. And it doesn’t end here. The authentic accomplishment is sustaining it forever.

5 comments:

Unknown said...

hey,
tht was well said....

it all depends upon ur surroundings and with which thts u r nurtured by it.....

just need nt call those surroundings as Parents, Grandparents, frds, relatives...

its how u take those on ur own without the feed!

its u ..and u r Born with tht sense for ur own growth..

u r Independant..
with lies, distrust,less faith, no confidence, u throw away Independancy, and u urself Accept Dependancy and then fight to get that Independance!!

"The Man In The Mirror " is the answer for all..till the end of ur life..

keep writing..

Pranav Jayade
9823051862

Ketan Risbud said...

With Mirrors i remember a saying... "Mirrors are more fun than television" Introspection is better than Extrospection. BTW the line 'It looked so simple yet complicated!' explains it all..... so it has to be that way its gonna be .... noone alive on this earth can change it ...at any point of time...

Unknown said...

snig...da writeup sme how sounded 2 me as incomplete....nt tht i ve a clear frame of mind on ths...bt dint realy trace out da way u wanna tke da reader ...i thnk ths is all vry subjective n kind of difficult 2 generalise...as far as da writeup goes....m no surprised by ur command on da language...bt wish tht whn u wan a lay man as me 2 comment on it...y dnt u make it a bit mre clear n smethng thts....bingo!

Bharat said...

hmmm...expected clarity of thought from you..a parallel line of thought perhaps..a sense of obligation, the recurrence of history (in many ways) has been the biggest bane of the Homo Sapiens..

Bharat said...

BTW, the lingo needs tuning...fine tuning actually.And i differ with "Lack of communication with parents is contemporary.." it is a state of mind which has been so indelibly imprinted on the Indian psyche since eons that it's gonna take quite a few generations to shake it into order.For eg. i think our grandfathers didn't talk to their fathers about sex...though i'm sure 90% of them got married in their teens..as is obvious, friendly neighbourhood talk gave them the neccessary info to conssumate their marriages. The same happened to our father's and the same is happening to this generation, the only difference being that friendly neightbourhood talk is being replaced by prime time tv,the world wide web,the unbridled media and last id not the least - our closest friends.So the lack of communication has almost assumed hereditary proportions in this country.

If I am a memory

  Our meeting was a stroke of serendipity, There was no history neither familiarity. Yet we bonded like a house on fire! So if I am a memory...