Wake Up ! Mampi

I have been away from this mad mad blog world. Reason is Yoga. Yes, I have become one of those who would sit on their aasan in that ultimate yoga pose and chant OMMMM, and laugh pointlessly when the rest of the class does that, and clap like mad when the instructor tells them to clap. Right in the middle of the clapping session do I realise that I am such a fool and that if one of my students were to be brave enough to pass by this garden while I sit in the front row clapping my brain away, he would go and report in the class and they would all end up sniggering.

Going to yoga class at 5 .15 am since October has had its own advantage. I have suddenly found that over the years I have become stiff as a log of wood. And that I cannot do the SarvangAsan anymore. That of course hurts. By god, it is actually devastating. I mean I could never do a headstand but then SarvangAsan culminating in a Halasan was the best alternative for that. Add to that the fact that I cannot twist my arms at my back and in an attempt to sit in a Gomukh aasan, I tend to sway and finally fall like a broken statue. So I have found a way out. I pretend to sit in the Gomukh aasan and support myself with my hands while all the grey haired men and women around me perfect themselves in the art of twisting their bodies wonderfully and looking at me with a what-a-lazy-bum-she-has-been-till-she-came-here look.

So, day after day, I go to the Rose Garden to learn and enjoy yoga. To be able to reach the yoga class at 5 a.m., I got to get up at 4:30 a.m. Yes it IS an UNEARTHLY hour to wake up. But I have been braving the urge to have another 10 minutes of snooze. Not only that. So conscientious have I been in waking up early that you would be amazed at me. I myself have been.

The other morning, I woke up, suddenly panicked that I was late for my yoga class. Without switching the lights on, I looked at the wall clock opposite my bed (from the lights streaming in from outside). I rushed to the washroom and quickly bushed my teeth, freshened myself up and ran back to the room. Changed from the night dress and then loked at the cellphone to see the time. And boy, it was 2.30 a.m. Wow. What a big fool ! And without switching the lights off I fell like a chopped tree on the bed-laughing hysterically and alone, hit myself on the head and got into my blanket again. Then the alarm went off at 4:30 a.m. as usual and Mampi woke up pretending nothing had happened in the night.

Hota Hai, Hota Hai !

P.S. This post was written sometime in November 2008. Now that the conductor has taken some time off work, she thought of posting it.

P.P.S.- Happy New Year 2010. I would read blogs regularly and try to post regularly. No, it is not a New Year Resolution. It is just a resolution.

Peaceful Co-existence...

...with lizards, ants, moths, dogs, frogs is what we are practising in the new house. Remember, I told you that it is an old old construction with old fashioned high ceilings and lime plastered walls?

The first night we stayed over in the newly distempered house, I kept an all night vigil for any lizards falling from the ceiling. In the weirdest of my imaginations, a lizard would fall onto the fan blades and would cut itself and its pieces would fall on me. Scared, I covered myself in a white sheet-thinking it would double up as a scary sight for the old girl and make it retract into its house high up. There is one particular lady who lives in my drawing room and somehow lifts her head in the typical dinosaur fashion and sways to and fro. Possibly it enjoys Abida on my blog as much as I do or possibly it is threatenting me as if it is going to jump down from the wall straight into my book-cupboard. I often wake up with nightmares of lizards jumping out of my almirahs. However, a month into the house and they have gotten used to me just as I have also gotten used to them. Only yesterday my mother in law and I celebrated the birth of new ones of the lizards in the house (she was actually in the favour of celebrating their lohri-since she is now the official flag bearer of the NGO that fights female foeticide) by chasing a few out. I am sure they will return with the same scary pomp and show as the Return of the Mummy. And mummy and I will go on fighting a losing battle with brooms in our hands and war cries in our throats.

The ants in the house are such patient beings that they adopt the same old paths that they are used to following generation after generation. I use the insecticidal spray on their regular routes, they mourn their dead and again resume their day-to-day life. After all they are Indians too. We raise a hue and cry post incidents like 26/11 or gruesome deaths at unmanned railway crossings, tremble a few times at the repeat shows on the television and then start our day to day life – as if nothing ever had happened. One thing more, the ants in this house are so desperate that they don’t even leave the salt container alone. I mean their attacking the flour container, the sugar container, ghee or stuff like that-is traditionally acceptable. But my ants are a little hatke you know. I love them. Now I’ ve gotten used to cleaning the kitchen counter (if you can call the 2x3’ shelf a counter) about 200 times a day. The ants are actually angry with me and are biting me on my feet as I type this.

Moths felt almost at home when we had just shifted. They actually resented our presence. They tried to attack the youngest of my brood. I remember Jai was so scared of them that he refused to brush his teeth in the verandah wash basin. I told him that actually they themselves were scared of him and that they would not dare attack Inspector Jai. But he believed in the theory of ‘better safe than be sorry’. The very next day he was so irritated with their continued presence around the tubelight that he started to stamp his feet. When asked what he thought he was doing, he said I am trying to scare away the moths. Wow, by stamping his feet about 4 meters away from them. The moths have since taken a flight, due to the heat, or due to the scare of this brave guy-but gone they have. Till it rains.

Then there is a black emaciated dog who has attached itself to the house. She lingers on outside the door and sits under the sukhchain tree right outside my gate. In extreme heat conditions it moves inside to the verandah. Now I hate dogs. Sorry, dog lovers, but I had had dogs once and they caused me much heartbreak. Vowed never to have a pet. However, this dog has attached herself to this house and Jai has attached himself to this dog. He ensures that the dog has three square meals a day, enough water to keep herself hydrated. In return this stray dog has pooped in the lawn, snooped in the dust bin to scatter away all the rubbish and has expressed love when I threatened it with a stick. What do I do folks?

Frogs-their music is our everyday food for the soul. The other day, in a post dinner stroll, Rasan and I found a big fat dodo kind of a frog. I tried talking to it, it didn’t respond. Today, post dinner, we strolled and talked about that frog to Jai who was very curious about its looks and its persona. By chance we saw it again by the roadside. I insisted that it was the same frog. Rasan disagreed. I said, “ Let’s check.” I again talked to it, it didn’t respond, I called it names, “You dumbo, deaf fella, idiot, don’t cha hear I am talking to you?” It didn’t respond. Proven that it is the same.

Oh, by the way, there is a big fat rat that sneaked into the washroom from the lawn today. Here goes the lady with the broom to chase it out.

Some Co-existence !!! Till the ants die, the moths fly, the dog yelps, the frog jumps; the lizard falls and the rat crawls.... away...

Life Starts Anew

What happens when you shift your house? You suffer from a short term memory loss; and in the rarest of the rare cases like mine-you suffer a long term permanent memory loss. The short term memory loss was a family contagious disease that afflicted us for about 4 days and then it got cured by itself. When I say 'us', I include my children who also happen to suffer from selective hearing syndrome at times. When I say 'us', I also include Mahesh, who glared at me everytime I said, “No, I don’t want to throw this away.” When I say 'this,' I mean the art sheet that Rasan had made about 9 years ago. When I say 'art', I mean to say a whole cardboard carton full of sheets colored in myriad shades, variety of styles, and lines and doodles. Phew, as a result, there are two big BIG boxes of this ‘art’ that Mahesh wants to throw away telling the kids, “You can always make new art.” Come on Mahesh, no one can make NEW art, art is art, it stays with you for the rest of your life. If you destroy it, who knows you are destroying a potential Michael Angelo or a Raphael. I will not allow this to happen. I would rather go down in history as a martyr to the cause of saving art and the artist. I must do the saving stint even if it means a big big fight with you. Partly because I know the next axe will fall on my clothes that I simply packed and brought to the new house to give away to people. However, the emotional attachment to these clothes is by far too large for me to give them away. The real secret is that I am living with a vain hope that a few of these fine dresses will finally fit me when I lose weight, in the distant future. W-h-e-n I do. I-f I do. Hope sustains life after all. But I better start giving these clothes away in the really Buddhist style of detachment, otherwise I will end up stacking every box and cupboard with my clothes.

When Mahesh said, “ Look lady, I have only 5 pairs of shoes and you got 36," I was not in the least ashamed. I was actually grossly offended like hell when he said throw all but 5 away. Are you kidding Mahesh? I need them all. I will wear them even if i have to wear them one upon the other. For sure I would. I simply onioned* myself to develop the symptoms of selective hearing and swiftly walked away from the offending words.

Coming back to STML-short term memory loss. Everytime we opened a box, we started to keep the stuff at the right places-only in the middle of the journey to the ‘right’ place , we forgot where we were going and why. Five zombie like creatures - (Mahesh, my mother, Rasan, Jai, Mampi )still managed to give a shape to the new house-and in the middle of the STML also managed to laugh out loud at the one who came saying, “Yaar, where was I going? Where did I place xyz?” The zombie situation came full circle on Friday last when Mahesh and my mother - after I lay dead in the bed with rough feet and dry hands-spent a whole night in moving furniture and shifting stuff. Moving as in moving things physically. Thank God I am a heavy weight otherwise I would have woken up with my bed shifted under the mango tree in the courtyard. The most interesting part is that they would stand still when I would sleep walk and sleep talk asking them what were they doing moving about at that god-forsaken hour. They would grin and pat me back to sleep. In the morning, I would have believed I was in a dream if I had not seen the furniture moved to strange corners.

Enough about the people-here is something about the house. This government accommodation came into existence sometime between 1920 and 1947. Yes, I am the unofficial restorer and caretaker of the heritage buildings of the Punjab. Only they do not offer me any honorarium, rather I have to spend from my own pocket to indulge myself in maintaining it. Okay, not my pocket, but Mahesh’s. However, doesn't gurbani proclaim us Ek Jot doye moorti (We are one in soul though two physically)? Therefore his pocket is my pocket after all-especially when I put my hand in the pocket and come up with crisp new notes of 1000 bucks. We had to spend on getting the big watertank of 300 litres replaced with a bigger 1000 litre ; a flush system had to be put in place – for there was none. The previous occupants made do with throwing bucketfuls of water in the pot after potty. As an aside, I wonder how do you save enough energy to do this exercise after a good session on the pot? Even the kitchen supported the old Indian style of sitting on the floor and doing the dishes. My thundering thighs would have been strengthened to rocky hardness if I had to do dishes like that. The primitive style has now been replaced by a stainless steel sink. The taps that had forgotten to deliver water are now gracefully throwing out water. The quantity of junk thrown out of the stores would have put a good junk dealer into thought and would have made me richer if only the departmental policies had not required me to procedurally write them off and sell them to fill the governmental coffers.

For now, we have settled in the house. The house has settled down on us, I mean it has gotten used to us. We do not have an AC, nor a good old khus-cooler, but the mad May heat has not gotten us down yet. The high ceilings, the 18" thick walls with lime plaster, the cross ventilating windows and doors are a bliss. And also thanks to the loads of vegetation around us, we are enjoying almost sylvan surroundings. Soon we will make the house more livable and then I will probably post some pictures also. This was primarily the reason why I had disappeared from the blogworld.

*little boys (never heard of any girls doing it) in Punjab keep a peeled and raw onion under their armpit to induce fever-so that they don’t have to go to school. (there is no such word as onioning, but then who says we cannot make new words?)

Babe's Followers

That day a few months ago, when I opened my blog, it showed a follower.

Follower? In terms of admirer? At this age? As a teenager, it was scary to have boys following us girls. Yes, it was abuse. As a young woman, I had followers-friendly as well as unfriendly followers. Ah abuse, thy manifold manifestations ! But a follower on the blog? I must say I was flattered, happy, scared- all at the same time. After all, what did it mean? I had never seen any followers on blogs. Whatever it meant. Curious, I opened the blogger dashboard and it revealed a follower. Blogger merely said," *** is following your blog." And I began to think, does it mean he/she knows whatever activity goes here? Does it mean he/she knows my password? Is he a stalker? I can tackle a she-stalker. I would have to bring in M to tackle a he-stalker. A few days into this following business, and there were more. One, two, three, four, five-by now I was in a wow mood. It meant I was being read. There were people trying to know what I was writing. I should write better. I should try to post more sensible stuff here.

One night I had a clothed Eureka moment and that woke me up with a start. It dawned on me that having a follower automatically means I can start a cult. Or even a religion. All that a religious leader needs is a few followers and I had, after all, a total of six. Thereafter, networking will do the rest of the job. If those fancy vilaiti companies can offer bonus on networking, I will give everybody some incentives too. Incentives like kadah parshad (flour halwa); or pinni parshad; or perhaps patasa (batasha in hindi and sugar candy in vilaiti English) will do instead of Phoren travel or big time money. Yes, I will resign my job and wear a designer suit and be a religious leader with a difference. A charming babe of a leader with a good hold on Punjabi, a non-accented English and a ‘cornered’ Hindi – and the magic would be complete. I said cornered Hindi, because most of us in Punjab speak out the language making it as abrupt as a turn in a room with corners. (Surjit Bhaji calls our hindi “nukkra’n kadh ke boli hindi’) I would be a babe as the feminine gender of a young baba – there are plenty young babas in our land. The feminine gender of old baba is bebe in Punjabi, bebe being an old (mother) woman. Now there is not much difference between a hi-fi babe and a Punjabi bebe. A mere ‘a’ I dare say. But then we digress. Coming back to the accent, I know my followers would forgive me any accent and actually will make a trend of my style. After all, what are followers for? But the dream soon shattered badly. For I was just one among all the blogspot bloggers who had followers. Whom-so-ever’s blog I visited on blogspot, almost everyone had a follower or two.

Gradually the followers reached a number of 38. Then the university sent me a letter, “lady, you have your dreaded viva voce with an examiner soon. Stop this follower business and get back to your studies” and I went back to my thesis, to my books and all that stuff. As if that was not enough, kids’ schools conspired with the university and they sent their date sheets. Poor babies started to get big time howling and cribbing from me, because my viva fell in the middle of their exams and there was no way either of the two tasks would allow me any respite.I forgot my blog, I forgot my followers. And my followers forgot me. Like the TRP of an Ekta Kapoor serial in which she finally killed Baa (did she, or didn’t she?) after Baa became about two and a half centuries old, the number of my followers fell. It fell from 38 to 36, then plummetted further to 32. I was sad, a little. Then one night, I woke up laughing out loud. I realised that only the true followers remain. They are the ones who have stayed by my side in my lonely and trying days spent compulsively away from blogworld. Mampi, think positive. Wow, I can still start my own religion.

And I have money power too. I am reminded through a widget on my blog that it has been valued at $ 23,710.68 even in these days of hopeless recession. Now that is some consolation. How they evaluate blogs is beyond my humble understanding. But I am happy, and for now that’s all that matters. With elections approaching fast , maybe I can, with muscle power (I have ample on my person) use some money power too and in the true blue Indian political style, combine my babe-dom with politics. But then this would be too ambitious for a single blogpost.

Meantime, everyone’s welcome to join the fold.

NewPinch

Rasan has updated her blog. She had been asking me for long to put up a post. She had given me a handwritten page which I had misplaced somewhere. Today I found it among my papers, slaved for her, typed it out and put it up on her blog. It has only very minor editing and a couple of spellings corrected by me. I had to put it up because she had been accusing me of "making her lose her 'readers'." I was amused and loved to see her so concerned. After checking out that I was genuinely typing it out, she was assured that her post would go to her blog and then she slept peacefully. Now, I request all my friends-to go to her blog and give her some comment, even if it is a brief one. She would be delighted and it would make my day to see that gleam in her eyes.

Don't leave any comment here. It was just to inform you all.

:)

My Joy Knows No Bounds

Some get one,

Some get two

I got three, nay four.

Yipeeeeeee.

What do you do when three of your fellow bloggers, all better than you, and the ones with a wider perspective covered in their blogs, consider you worthy of the Brilliante Award 2008? You feel overwhelmed, teary eyed and touched. Yes, I am all three. To a cynic, awards like these might not seem as significant as they sound, but to a person like me who is being endorsed and being read by bloggers with greater styles of their own, it means a lot. It means that I was remembered when these fellow bloggers were making their list of the blogs that they thought could qualify for the award. And it is a lovely feeling. Inexplicably discreetly invited me to her blog to show me the award, Abha asked me if she could(yeh bhi koi poochne ki baat hai ji?), and Mandira simply added me to the list of her awardees. Reliable sources have reported that Roop was also considering me for the award but she decided she won't award me if I had already been awarded that. However, in my bout of lack of humility, I count the "award not given" but "considered-given" from her too. The height of humility, self awardation. (Is there a word like that?)


Thank you all four of you.

After accepting the award, I would read the rules of the award ceremony.

This award is for blogs whose content and design are brilliant as well as creative. (my design is horrible, I am sure, but I think my benign friends conveniently ignored that)
The purpose of the prize is to promote as many blogs as possible in the blogosphere.
1. When you receive the prize you must write a post showing it, together with the name of who has given it to you, and link them back.
2. Choose a minimum of 7 blogs (or even more) that you find brilliant in their content or design.
3. Show their names and links and leave them a comment informing they were prized with ‘Brilliante Weblog.’
4. Show a picture of those who awarded you and those you give the prize (optional).
5. And then we pass it on!

All Checked...

I share the list of the blogs that I feel are a quality read and worth spending my time on:
And the awards go to (in no particular order of hierarchy):

Pinku-For bringing out the innermost turmoils of human soul, for offering a myriad view of all that she witnesses around her.

SidhuSaheb-For being a sensible user of his blogspace.

Majaz-For her simplicity, for the fire inside her that is wrapped up in tradition and yet is so effective.

HowDoWeKnow-For the honesty, the contemporariness in her blogposts.

Sujata-For adding colour through her camera, for awakening my own wandering spirit through her travel accounts.

ThoughtSafari-For being so unique, for sharing the journey of thoughts with us.

Phatichar-For scaring me with his brilliant stories.

Roop-For jolting us from the complacency about many issues through her banalities blog and Unchaahi blog. For being so passionate about her cause. I add her here, because I really really admire the way she puts up the problems and their resolutions and her rage in between.

ManInPainting- For the mesmerising sculpting that he does with his words.

Devaki-Her style always leaves me wondering about the top quality content she presents-in a very organised and balanced fashion.

and

Imp's Mom-For being a strong mom and sharing herself through her blog.

Well, I know I am well past the 7 blogs limit, I wish I had added more. But they all remain linked in my blogroll and honor my blog with their presence.
For me, all the blogs I visit are really enchanting. I am always impressed with the subjects you all choose, and the way you all present them. I guess everybody who is expressing herself/himself here through words deserves this award. Thank you all for spreading cheer and hope.

Maujaa'n Ee Maujaa'n

I put a brake to the car. Rasan wants to rush to the school gate saying a hurried bye. I wipe the extra baby cream off her face and kiss her nose. She kisses her brother a warm bye (thankfully he has no school that day; he doesn’t have any 'paper discussion') and runs off to meet her friends before the school prayer. I reverse the car, slowly wiggle my way out of the maddening rush and come back home.

She has a paper discussion at school. Till now, there only used to be a Parent Teacher Meet in which we examined their examined papers, calculated results, signed the report card, said good things to the teacher, and came back home. It was, and still is a gala day for the kids who dress up in their finest “home dresses” - a welcome change from the school uniform they get to wear everyday. However, in addition to that, now Rasan has a paper discussion day too (in school uniform of course) two days prior to the PTM and they are told their marks and other stuff about the question paper, for example how to attempt and more importantly, how not to attempt the paper. So, more or less it is a regular school day sans the school bag.

She comes back from school at 1:30 – all red with the sun and heat outside and excitement inside. As usual, she is hyper about telling about her day, “Yeieiei....Mama, I am first in English…”

“Wow, that’s great. How many marks?”

“Too bad, I don’t know how many, but I topped.” Yes, she forgets to ask her marks from the teacher, but she knows she topped. My Funny baby - I can expect this of her.

And I laugh…

As I help remove her tie and belt to ease her under the fan, I am all ears.

“Well Mama, I am not first in all the subjects though.”

“That’s ok beta. Doesn’t matter. I would have liked if you had gotten highest in all subjects. But no problems. So how was your day?”

I must admit I was a bit disappointed but I knew that she had problems with her Punjabi and Hindi papers, and that’s where she might have been hit the most. So I prefer to keep the discussion off those things.

She freshens up and takes up her tennis racket to play with. We stand outside in the lobby. She says as she hits the ball, “Mama, you know what? In the school today, we were all talking about how everybody’s parents are going to react to their marks.”
Here is what I get to understand.

AP : My father would hit me if he found that I had bungled in marks. AP is a girl.

AD: My father won’t allow me to enter the house if he found out I didn’t score well. AD is a boy.

ABJ: MY father would tell me to sleep out on the road if he found that I had gotten less marks than what he expected. ABJ is a boy who shares her birthday too.

And then one of them asked, “Okay R how would your parents react?”

R: Well, Papa would not ask about my position. If at all I tell him that I am second or third or fifth or tenth in the class, he would say, “Wow, that’s nice.”

ABJ: and your mom? Because all her friends know I am a Chota Mota Hitler in my own right.

R: Well, when she finds out that I didn’t score that well, she would say, “That’s bad but its okay. What is gone is gone. Now start working harder on the next unit/term.”

While reporting this, she is grinning from ear to ear.

AP+AD+ABJ say – Yar teriaa’n ta mauja hi mauja.

Then R+AP+AD+ABJ+together sing – MAUJAA’N EE MAUJAA’N……

A Teacher's Faith

First I just took it as one of those mushy mushy stories that keep getting circulated on the internet. Hungry as I was for something to cry on, I went on to read it, and loved it so much that I wanted to post it here-for all of us to read and learn the lessons life has to teach through those small gestures.

. . .

As she stood in front of her 5th grade class on the very first day of school, she told the children an untruth. Like most teachers, she looked at her students and said that she loved them all the same. However, that was impossible, because there in the front row, slumped in his seat, was a little boy named Teddy Stoddard.Mrs. Thompson had watched Teddy the year before and noticed that he did not play well with the other children, that his clothes were messy and that he constantly needed a bath. In addition, Teddy could be unpleasant. It got to the point where Mrs. Thompson would actually take delight in marking his papers with a broad red pen, making bold X’s and then putting a big “F” at the top of his papers. At the school where Mrs. Thompson taught, she was required to review each child's past records and she put Teddy's off until last.

However, when she reviewed his file, she was in for a surprise. Teddy's first grade teacher wrote, “Teddy is a bright child with a ready laugh. He does his work neatly and has good manners.... he is a joy to be around...”

His second grade teacher wrote, “Teddy is an excellent student, well liked by his classmates, but he is troubled because his mother has a terminal illness and life at home must be a struggle.”

His third grade teacher wrote, “His mother's death has been hard on him. He tries to do his best, but his father doesn't show much interest and his home life will soon affect him if some steps aren't taken.”

Teddy's fourth grade teacher wrote, “Teddy is withdrawn and doesn't show much interest in school. He doesn't have many friends and he sometimes sleeps in class.”

By now, Mrs. Thompson realised the problem and she was ashamed of herself. She felt even worse when her students brought her Christmas presents, wrapped in beautiful ribbons and bright paper, except for Teddy's. His present was clumsily wrapped in the heavy, brown paper that he got from a grocery bag. Mrs. Thompson took pains to open it in the middle of the other presents. Some of the children started to laugh when she found a rhinestone bracelet with some of the stones missing, and a bottle that was one-quarter full of perfume... But she stifled the children's laughter when she exclaimed how pretty the bracelet was, putting it on, and dabbing some of the perfume on her wrist. Teddy Stoddard stayed after school that day just long enough to say, “Mrs. Thompson, today you smelled just like my Mom used to.” After the children left, she cried for at least an hour.

On that very day, she quit teaching reading, writing and arithmetic. Instead, she began to teach children. Mrs. Thompson paid particular attention to Teddy. As she worked with him, his mind seemed to come alive. The more she encouraged him, the faster he responded. By the end of the year, Teddy had become one of the smartest children in the class and, despite her lie that she would love all the children the same, Teddy became one of her “teacher's pets.”

A year later, she found a note under her door, from Teddy, telling her that she was still the best teacher he ever had in his whole life. Six years went by before she got another notefrom Teddy. He then wrote that he had finished high school, third in his class, and she was still the best teacher he ever had in life.

Four years after that, she got another letter, saying that while things had been tough at times, he'd stayed in school, had stuck with it, and would soon graduate from college with the highest of honors. He assured Mrs. Thompson that she was still the best and favorite teacher he had ever had in his whole life.

Then four more years passed and yet another letter came. This time he explained that after he got his bachelor's degree, he decided to go a little further. The letter explained that she was still the best and favourite teacher he ever had. But now his name was a little longer.

...The letter was signed,

Theodore F. Stoddard, MD.

The story does not end there. You see, there was yet another letter that spring. Teddy said he had met this girl and was going to be married. He explained that his father had died a couple of years ago and he was wondering if Mrs. Thompson might agree to sit at the wedding in the place that was usually reserved for the mother of the groom. Of course, Mrs. Thompson did.

And guess what? She wore that bracelet, the one with several rhinestones missing. Moreover, she made sure she was wearing the perfume that Teddy remembered his mother wearing on their last Christmas together.They hugged each other, and Dr. Stoddard whispered in Mrs. Thompson’s ear, “Thank you Mrs. Thompson for believing in me. Thank you so much for making me feel important and showing me that I could make a difference.”Mrs. Thompson, with tears in her eyes, whispered back. She said, “Teddy, you have it all wrong. You were the one who taught me that I could make a difference. I didn't know how to teach until I met you! "

. . .

Well, I guess the story about his founding the Stoddard Cancer Ward is not so authentic, but the idea behind the story sure is !!

As teachers, we all got a duty towards every single child that comes to us with a faith, a gleam in his/her eyes. We got no right to diminish it, we got no right to demean it. Our students are our teachers. Lets learn from them!