Back To The Future

Today, an incident made me realise that it's time to take up all my responsibilities and fulfill all the duties I had been running from. It made me see my future in front of my eyes for the first time. No, it was not my marriage, it was not my baby's birth and it was not like I was stepping out to set up my own startup either; it was a simple tech conversation with my dad. My dad, a successful businessman, a loving father, a provider, a better human being than most of us, a self made hardworking man who once used to sell water is now a giant in the plywood business in the city. A simple normal man who knows everything else but is not aware of the android technology, which is a child's play now even for a six year old. But due to the need of the hour, he is now starting to use and learn all these things and as expected he's finding it quite hard to get used to it. He keeps asking all these things like how to save contacts, how to send a photo on whatsapp, how  to share a photo on Facebook etc, etc. I understand that he's doing it for the first time and it's natural to struggle in getting hold of it all, but sometimes it's so funny that I find it hard to control my laughter, but once I'm done helping, the smile that it brings on his face is something priceless.

Usually, he's busy all day with the work and everything, but once it's over, he really likes to check his facebook and share photos. He daily asks me how to share the photos and which ones should he share. He likes to see his family's pics on facebook and shows them to me every single time. While he's busy checking out facebook, I on the other hand get busy wrapping up the daily work. Today, something was not adding up and I was thinking why, I was stressed about what I had forgotten to enter, while my dad was busy checking facebook and he kept asking me how to send a friend request on facebook. I calmly told him once, but then he asked how to remove someone, and then how to message and so on. While I did not snap on my father (obviously) and answered all his questions, I was stressed, but then watching him checking out facebook while I was working made me realise that this is why I had come back home; so that he could rest and dump all the tension upon me and this is what is going to happen in the future, when the little ones won’t let me work and ask me all sorts of questions. It was then, at that moment, I saw my future and my dad’s past. Watching him smile on his newly discovered knowledge of technology made me realise that he might have felt the same when was trying to make me learn simple little things like walking and eating with spoon and this is exactly how I will feel when I teach something to my child. Seeing his relaxed, tension free face, I felt great and then I looked at him, my dad a 55 year old man who's been doing business since the last 35 years continuously day in and day out, who's been constantly pushing it for his family, who took care of all of us all this time, now wants someone to take care of him, to take all the burden from his shoulders, who now needs someone to let him be a child once again who can play all day on his phone, and that's when it hit me, I read somewhere that life always comes a full circle. All this time he looked after us, patiently sacrificing all his needs so that we can have a tension free and enjoyable life and now he wants someone to look after him so that he can just relax and enjoy like a baby. That's when I decided to try and give him all that. That's when I decided to try and be a loving parent to my parents and then to my children. I may not be able to do all the things that my parents did. I know that he won’t quit anytime soon, but I will work twice as hard everyday to keep all the tension away from him.

Love you dad, someday I'll teach you how to read my blog.