How motivating is it to spring out of bed, and dish out garma garam nashta (piping hot breakfast) by 6.45am every morning only to be served with a daily payment of getting called ‘MEAN’ at least 5000 times?

You got that too? Oh we are on the same boat then. I am on seat 45G (where G = gone girl, gossip girl, guilty girl, etc.)

For starters, I am rethinking my decision of sending kids to a school in a foreign country. Now, if only you asked me the meaning of foreign 30 years ago, it would mean USA and UK. But the last 3 decades have taught me it could well mean Pakistan, Bangladesh or Sri Lanka too.

Making a quick ‘U-Turn’ from my usual habit of digression, the definition of foreign is a place away from home aka India where the existence of my girls is wrapped in a neatly manicured English-speaking environment. They eat, breathe and even sleep in English. I am sure pretty much like their fights, even their first world dreams happen in English. Their school compos, aka essays never have any Indian names. I have noticed Helly, Bella, Tracy, Leila as opposed to Priya, Lata, Damayanti. And boys, well, contrary to names in Math problems where girls hardly make an appearance, my kids tend to avoid the gender from Mars unless they are forced to. In that case, the only name used is Ram. Digressing again, my only solace with the name is, it refers to God. There can be nothing bad coming from that.

Their entertainment apart from social media comes largely from American series. You can tell where all Desi kids get their fake American accents that sound unbelievably native. And Bollywood is meant only for poking fun at lame jokes and day dreaming actors chasing true love. Leaving my Bollywood pride aside for a second, what good is this English language that has forced my girls to utter the word ‘MEAN’ for every single act I perform?

For starters, the almost 12-yo keeps banging into walls, doors, table corners or even tripping over air. Blame it on her Dad’s genes. At least, his genes got him me (feel free to imagine my jumping eyebrows and cheeky smile at this moment). My girls on the other hand, are getting lucky only with scratches. However, each time this incident occurs, which is at least 100 times a day, instead of being shocked, sad, concerned and asking her, ‘are you okay darling?’ my rather nasty instinct sends me into a fit of laughter over her tomfoolery or at best forces me to ignore her groans. To her though, this is simply unacceptable behaviour for a mother. Period.

In my defense, my basic personality type came to life wired with a dominant flaw – that of enjoying anybody who cannot maintain safe distance from walls, sharp edges and such. However, The Code of Conduct for Loving Mothers, a book authored and improvised annually by imaginary mothers with unreasonably high maternal hormones has been my Bible for the past 15 years. Having spent light years, not fitting in even in the good mothers category, I pledge not guilty this time, given my evolution – going from rolling on the floor laughing or shooting a video of my daughters trapped in such hurtfully compromising situations or simply guffawing out loud, I have turned to subtler reactions like 2-syllable giggles that could sound like a cough; laughing out hysterically only in my head or when nobody’s watching and showing effort at trying to get off the sofa or whatever other comfortable piece of furniture my butts are using for cushion in order to comfort the not-so-little child in distress.

I mean, I was never cut for success as a human that perpetually croons aahs and oohs or even awws over silly situations in life. Parents who perpetually churn out Bless You’s are such market spoilers I tell you. My first reaction to any sneeze is to check if there was a tissue involved in order to stop the spread of germ-filled saliva droplets or simply frown if adults called spouses were involved, thanks to super high volumes that are directly proportional to ageing. Changing that innate nature would mean becoming another human being and robbing this world the gift of lady Sheldon Cooper. To cut the chase, I get called MEAN over and over again for being my authentic self.

For someone who has the privilege of live entertainment, I laugh out loud when I see something funny. For instance, while my bottom chooses to lounge on the sofa with no gadgets in the vicinity, my eyes choose to follow the girls around.  A typical case of a walk in my palatial home occurs when I happen to demand a glass of water, a cup of tea or announce we need a search party to find my missing glasses or age old mobile phone.

Falling in love is what happens each time the girls walk across the dining table. Their gait changes remarkably, their necks rotate their adorable faces involuntarily at 90 degrees to their left while their bodies drift towards the kitchen. And with a hint of narcissism in their eyes, a tete-a-tete with the ginormous mirror on the wall happens, albeit without words, ‘Mirror mirror on the wall…’.

We all know the words that follow. Damn this oversized mirror in my living room. Isn’t there more useful Feng Shui for homes with teens?

To my innocent brain, the scene is inviting enough to poke a reaction of involuntary giggles from my vocal chords. But that changes the weather of the room in an instant. From self-love to feigning a frown in under 60 milliseconds, what flows out from their mouths is, ‘YOU ARE MEAN!’

The list of my saga is unending. If I support one child and reprimand the other, I get called MEAN for taking sides. If I make fun of ‘Swifties’ in the house, I get called MEAN for making fun of an entire generation that looks up to a certain Taylor in reverie. If I laugh at some comical old videos of my kids falling, I get labeled MEAN once again. If I smile at the sisters fighting, I am definitely the QUEEN OF MEAN. 

Upset that my children use such a limited edition vocabulary, I decide to lookup Merriam Webster to support their cause with a wider variety of words that can flatter my ego with a plethora of adjectives. At least, I can enjoy the dignity of hijacking 30 seconds of the real estate of their active minds otherwise engulfed in base-less banter, silly social feeds or mindless music.

So I show them the two sets of synonyms I enjoy the most :

Negative bunch: Unkind, nasty, spiteful, foul, malicious, malevolent, despicable, obnoxious, contemptible, vicious, beastly, bitchy…

And the other set that actually means very skillful or excellent. Eg: He is a mean cook, that actually means he is great at his job. Pretty much like all American series where teens use, ‘this is sick bro’.

Positive bunch: Excellent, marvellous, magnificent, superb, fine, wonderful, outstanding…

In my mind, I already decide, I shall replace every negative adjective with a positive one. I smile at my genius and present the first set to the girls. The younger one arches her brow, as though asking “Really, this?”, a classic Monu.

Then the older one gives me one of her ‘time for gyan’ smiles.

“We are not stupid enough to fall for this Mom. Who on Earth can get away after calling their mother these names? I cannot risk my tiffin. The vegetarian food in the canteen sucks. MEAN is just fine. It is a harmless word.”

My jaw drops. So it isn’t their limited vocab but my unlimited stupidity, ignorance and foolhardy being that makes me think I know it all. When did they master the tricks to play my mind?

Looks like the father’s genes have scored a point here too.

The response from my teen sends me straight into my childhood. Calling names was never fancy. But stating the obvious was a norm. A fat person was called fat, thin was a compliment, black, white and brown were colours that belonged to humans too. People with disabilities coexisted and children in the ADHD spectrum were not addressed as special. The world seemed very matter-of-fact place. Did that mean people did not feel offended? Or were never supported?

Absolutely not. However, the past two decades have seen the human line of conduct undergo sweeping changes. Social media and marketing have made sure that not only do you need to watch your mouth, but also make sure you have assessed your words before the keyboard can hit Enter!

Because here is a piece of warning – If you now address someone as thin or fat, you could be trolled for body shaming. Much worse, you could risk getting cancelled (refer to my next blog on lingo to communicate with Gen Z). If you call people black, white or brown, you are being racist. You could even risk losing your job because you don’t embrace diversity and are not inclusive. If you so much as consider somebody as only a man or a woman, dude are you a computer that cannot go beyond binary?  

No matter what series you watch, the issue of diversity and inclusion is milked – no series is now allowed to be aired unless it contains a quorum of at least one Indian, one Chinese, some African and some Europeans in addition to the main cast. And no, these races cannot be just the pawns. Cherry on the cake – portraying same sex romance and bisexual individuals. Plain vanilla romance between two straight people doesn’t seem to sell anymore.

With the snowballing of media and social media as major influences, there is no moral mafia that can put a finger on content. If you think I went too far with my monologue, here is the silver lining. We have learned to be mindful of people who are different from the masses. Had my girls called me by those adjectives I curated for them, would that not be really MEAN?

So I have decided to make peace by calling myself a MEAN cook. Because guess what, no one else will. As I hang my face in self-awareness of the MEAN – oops, meticulous and mindful brains they possess, I am secretly happy they don’t challenge my volatile ego with words like obnoxious, spiteful or bitchy. Because that would lead to a war.. and a no-tiffin policy for sure.

P.S. Looking back, it makes me realise, facts may be facts but hurt is real. And taking offence and supporting the minority may actually be good for people at large, not just for large people.

With great power comes great responsibility – Uncle Ben from Spiderman.

And words have the greatest power. Now don’t make me get into cliches and ask you to use them wisely. I mean…