This little incident happened few months back ( took some time to make it to the blog ) - it only goes to show that this failure has been a memorable one.
It was yet another casual weekend at the apartment that I used to live in. It simply means I am caught up with my OCD ( Obessive Compulsive Disorder) of cleaning and organising my home. Joe tells me, the only thing you do not do during the cleaning spree is to lick the walls clean. ha ha ha. I am glad he notices a cleam home (note to self - you started digressing again)
This apartment where we used to live then, is a condo, where most of the residents are young parents with children mostly in the age group below 13 or 14. The best part of living there was when I come back from work, I get flocked by an army of little girls with whom I chat for a while. Most of these girls are 9 - 12, with such beautiful names like Kaniskha, Shruthi, Payal, Neelambari ( Neelu in short) to name a few.
Before going any further, have I ever told you all I love little girls, in any form or shape or size? My heart goes wobbly when I see them smile and I go completely berserk when I see them chatter. Maybe, because I do not have a daughter, I go a bit overboard when I see a girl. I am blessed with a niece last March and I totally adore her.
So, as I said when I get back from work these little girls who are generally chatting up or praticing some dance sequences in the basement car park, adjacent to the Park in the apartment come running upto me, waving their hands with a big smile, and most of these kids have a very good dress sense, Just love the way they dress and walk around - little girls in micro mini shorts are the best. they call me aunty and they have all kinds of questions for me, what have I done to my hair to make it straight, where do I buy my clothes to why I am still wearing the ID card - they have even asked me where I have taken the pic on my ID card.
I love that chatter - typical of girls. Its like the tinkle of the glass bangles, like the pitter patter rain on a tin roof - pleasant to the ears - oh how i miss it these days. I plan to go one day in the evening to the apartment, just to meet my young friends.
There are also days that I am their referee in their little arguments, some days I got to choose the best step of their dance for their programmes at school, and sometimes I teach them little games that they can play. Whatever, I used to value this time so dearly.
One of the weekends, during my usual cleaning spree I came out of the apartment to put the garbage in the common bin which is on our floors' lobby overlooking an atrium. Thats when i saw these little girls outside my door in a huddled discussion and the moment they saw me, they came around and wanted to know what Iam upto and I had to explain. I was checking with them on what they were upto ( curious me, becuase all of them had a Dupatta ( long piece of cloth, worn on top of an indian dress, Churidhar ) in their hands). and they were beaming to me saying we are practicing for a fashion show, a ramp walk.
And I caught myself asking them, can I join you? I was in my homeclothes, a denim Capri and a casual t-shirt - and got a few supressed smiles from the little girls and they said okay aunty magnanimously. So far so good. Now one of my littlest of the girls, Neelambari told me you have to get a duppatta, and I was feeling a little lazy and I said my MIL will not give me one, which brought out a big chuckle among all these little ones.
So the judge for the show, I figured out it was Neelambari, youngest of the lot and I guess aged 7 years, gave us the rules, we have to come one by one to her starting from the stairs above our floor, and stairs go round this atrium, and Neelu sits in a chair that overlooks these stairs and when we come in front of her, we have to pose like the gilrs on these shows, and go back to where we started and she will give us marks. - They were really professional.
So all of us went up to the fourth floor landing and the little ones started dressing up with the dupattas, they draped it on top their dress and they looked so pretty. Some were so creative, they put a knot with their dupattas on their head, and the remaining fabric was held in their hands, some tucked in around their hips and we practiced how to walk, and finally we stood in height order.
Obviously I was the tallest, and was the last one in the line - and they began walking down with a flamboyance that beats a real model, doing the right shakes and steps, fabric fluttering in air ( all others except me), with nose up in the air, and paused in front of our juvenille judge for a brief moment and walked back up. I was totally enjoying this.
So our ramp-walk was over - now to the marks.
Neelu asked us all to come down : and announced her judgement. All of you did well - she said. So Kanishka asked - how many marks for me - Neelambari says 100 marks. Next was Keerthana - she gets 100 marks too. two more girls, Payal and Subha gets 100 marks. I go with a fluttering heart to Neelu and ask for my marks - and Neelu says, Aunty you didnt follow the dress code and so you get only 60 marks, with all the seriousness a 7 year old could muster.
ohhhhhhh....... I faked a sulk and everyone came to me and said next time, we will get you a dupattah...!!
There are many times this incident has brought a smile across my face and while I thought successes gave me an high, getting acceptance into an innocent group could also give that same feeling and yes, this was a sweet failure, that I will cherish.
Dedicated to my leetle gurl gang at GT Cholayil Residency. :-)
