Parenting can be quite stressful, more so when raising your first child. But looking at it in a lighter way can take away more than half of the stress. The hard moments which make you perspire and tired can be equally hilarious when you relax and recall it later.
The best way to release all that stress is to include humor in your daily routine, your day to day life as it makes even the most difficult task look and seem easier. “Take it easy” is the new age mantra. Don’t push yourself too hard trying to be a perfectionist, we all are humans and don’t have Super powers, though our children think so. But we all are their ultimate Superheroes.
With the same thought in my mind, here am sharing one of my own experiences. Sit back and relax, we all sail in the same boat.
Playing with the Mind
This story is about my disastrous first experience of baking. I had always been fascinated with the whole process but reluctant to take the first step. Nevertheless, “Learning comes with experience” was my motto.
Bought a microwave but couldn’t wait for the company guy to come in a week and give the demo.
It was my son’s birthday the next day, so had to chuck away all doubts and jump in following my instincts and help from the instruction book and our beloved GOOGLE.
Trust me your mind is your strongest opponent. Gugli on gugli, bowl on bowl it will through. Take it take it. It won’t even give you the chance to recover from the blows till you are Clean Bowled. The morning alarm is the biggest challenge and the snooze button is the gugli played by our mind. Snooze it for that extra 5 mins and you give in to your mind. So, its upto you how you play your shots.
My mind too slowly threw the first gugli – “You are too stress after running to the market thrice to pick up things that you forget in every round. Close your eyes you are feeling so sleepy”. Naaahhh. I got to do it for my child, I thought to myself, and got down of the bed after making my son sleep.
Then came the second gugli – “Come on you can’t do it as you have no idea how to even operate it. You will end up with your evergreen name, The Disaster Queen”. I didn’t give in. I will bake no matter even if it becomes a disaster again.
Then my mind tried to tempt me “Why worry when you have 2 good bakeries in your vicinity, just buy a cake and celebrate it. Kya fark parta hain, what difference does it really make?”. I replied, this mother would do anything for her son’s happiness.
I swear it was too difficult for me to push myself into a new ground and play hits when the bowler was too strong. I had no bakeware except for some bowls and a flattish dish of Borosil and the starter kit from Godrej as I couldn’t find any in our nearby market. Kya karun, I thought.
Then I decided to bake it in one of the starter kit bowls as I presumed cake or brownies can’t be baked in a glass dish. I tried and made Eggless Chocolate Brownie – easiest recipe that I could lay my eyes on, in Google.
I didn’t stop there, my confidence was oozing. Thought if I can bake this then i could bake something more. I planned to make Dominos style garlic bread as its the favorite of both of us.
First step was activating the yeast mixture. I mixed it with warm water and sugar and kept it covered for 15 mins, no result. Then another 15-20 mins with no result. Tried putting it on the warm stove but of no use.
Till this time my mind was quietly watching this and the moment it got a chance it quickly threw another gugli – “Dekh dekh dekh bhagwan bhi tere sath nahi hain (see even God is not with you). When you are trying to do something against all odds toh puri kaynaat jut jati hain to fail you. Come on, dump all this and get into bed, your shoulders are aching”.
While I was batting the guglis of the mind I noticed that my bowl had melted inside the oven. My mind laughed hard “Yeh lo ek aur kaand, another disaster”. I quickly took it out and transferred the half baked brownie mix to the glass dish thinking what worse than this can happen.
Coming back to my garlic bread, when my yeast did not work I made a dough mixing curd, garlic and a tsp of baking powder with flour and kept it covered with moist cloth for whole night to rise. Next morning I saw that even that was almost a failure.
My mind was dancing with joy over its victory. At last I rolled out the dough after taking out a little portion, grated some cheese and folded it in half just like the garlic bread and roasted it on tawa. I had no idea whether it became a naan or something else but it did become a parantha.
And at last being a non-cricket fan I realized cricket is injurious to my health.
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