nirali, nila, rivkah. lovely, melodic rivkah. yet, i keep thinking of her as a boy. i've thought of her as a boy from the time she was born. i even call her Bablu. she's like a little scruffy boy baby, a little jayanth.
but tonight, when i finished nursing her and kissed her in the dark, I saw her right ear, tiny and light and lavender-baby-smelling. I saw on it, a earring. a earring that would mean piercing, which would mean pain, hurting her, a white scalloped girl-baby-dress, a moment of our shared girl-hoods--mine over, hers not yet begun-- resting yet, like her, and sealed by a tiny white pearl sedate on her ear-lobe. that's when i thought, "i have a girl!" a girl named rivkah. a girl with a pearl earring that is too small to see.

aliya took her to the library. like all american buildings, it had lots of dark windows and automatic doors and tall white, spotless walls. her grandson knew his way around it like a book. aliya stopped to browse through a rack that said 'New Books' and manu said, i want to go down!
"alright, go down." she looked at her and said politely, as ever, "would you follow him to the children's section? I'll be down in a minute." so there was the grandmother following the grandson down the wide spiral staircase, her hand on the bannister, his own stretched akimbo as he hopped down the steps. he counted 23 of them. the childrens section was truly beautiful, with books at a toddlers height and red and blue cushioned seats. she wished her grandchildren in India had a library like this one to go to. she sat down, watching manu dart from book to book, filling a basket. aliya strolled in holding some bound books of her own. she smiled kindly at her ml and sat down beside her, and was soon engrossed in her book. molly kept an eye on manu. then he was at her knee, insisting she read him a book. in bangalore, she read to her granddaughter from the malayala manorama. she made up tales of women in sarees going to schools to teach little girls like her Rachel and coming home by auto in the afternoon. she was a good story teller. but this book was in english. it pages were hardboard, like the cover and she read it in her mind, 'the train runs past my house.' manu stared up at her expectantly. molly shook her head. she was aware of aliya right beside, head buried in her own book.
"mamichi! read."
"no" she said as nonchalantly as she could.
the little boy did not understand this. "mamichi! please read."
she kept quiet and looked down at the book. then manu turned to his mother and said, "mummy, you read."
aliya put her book down and looked at her son. suddenly molly knew she must read the book. it was important. "manu," she said. but the boy was already focussed on his mother. aliya looked straight at her son, not reaching for the book.
"manu" she said, louder, "manu, i'll read, mamichi will read for you."
the boy gave her the book. as she read, she could hear nothing but her pounding accent and the silence her voice fell into. when she finished, she looked up. manu smiled, aliya's head was back in her book. but molly knew - if manu had listened with two ears, aliya had, with four.

early this week, jayanth said for the first time, " amma i don't want to go to school." i was so taken aback i did not know what to say. he loves his preschool, always has, always says he had a good day, even though his praise is more tempered now he is in a class with the big guys - four year olds! (earlier he would bounce into the car and say, "amma, i had a good nice day." without me asking. now i have to ask, at which point he replies. but this was new.
"why don't you want to got o school?"
"its so long, its all day."
and then, " amma, why do i always have to be the bad guy? why cant i be the good guy?"
"when are you a bad guy?"
"when we play in school."
and then, "amma, when nathan says No to me, it makes me sad."
jayanth is having a hard time dealing with his four year old seniors.i talked to a teacher and we agreed that personality apart, it could be him being the only colored kid in not just his class, but the whole school. it could also simply be cultural. here is an indian kid raised to be polite and wait his turn and be 'good', while his american classmates seem almost automatically tuned to being 'in your face' straight-shooters. the other day, at a play date, my little boy turned away from his friend, who decided to roar (yes, roar) in anger about a toy not shared, and almost hyperventilate. i wanted jayanth to look the boy in his face and roar back, but there he was, disturbed and maybe confused. instead of gathering him in my arms and smothering him with kisses (Which is what i wanted to do, to comfort him), I apologized to my friend and then told jayanth, right in front of her son, " if xx shouts at you,you can tell him that you don't want to play with him. and if he keeps doing it, you can walk away, alright?".
the next day, jayanth who remembered his friend's injustice toward him,told me, " if i tell xx no screaming, his mom will tell me no."
i assured him that was not the case.
"but if i walk away, i will be alone."
oh man. time for me to reconsider my advice.
"that's not so bad is it?"
"no it is"
in that case, jayanth, I said, you can scream back at him.
"no, that's not nice. it hurts my ears."
i had no solution to offer. i have none now. jayanth is out in the Real World of his own terms, and all my love cannot protect him from it. its daunting, and to both of us. but its the only world we both will ever have and we wouldn't have it any other way.