Just Jerry
I was planning on playing carom with some of my students on Sunday. As I went near the carom board, I saw a mouse biting at the nets of the board. EEEEKKKKK … I ran out to bring a broom or something to shoo it away. As I was searching for the broom to chase away that ugly rodent, I hear Rayyan shout, “ooohhhhh Maaaaa please come fast”. I rush in with broom in hand to see what else that pest had damaged and see a gleeful smiling face that is overjoyed. Yeah that face belonged to Rayyan. “Look Maa, Jerry is here”. The mouse who had hidden behind the carom board when it saw me had come out and was looking at Rayyan without fear. He even managed to click few pictures of it as well. Once he called it Jerry, somehow that tiny animal did not look ugly or evil to me. I am not sure what kind of psychology was working there. It could either be Rayyan planning to win me over by calling it Jerry or I may be have fallen under pressure to not come out as a villain in front of my son. The broom was not used to shoo away the mouse but we gave it few bread crumbs and later cleaned up after the mouse with the broom.
Rayyan doesn’t show much affection to animals and never tries to keep them as pets, but he subtly develops a connection with them. It was the same with this mouse. It started coming in to our room often, but was not troublesome. I had to keep this a secret from others so that they would not laugh at me or assume Rayyan was crazy.
In fact I started to ignore it completely so that I would never be summoned in to acknowledge that I was a part of this drama as well.
After a few months we had to leave for USA. We secured our room before leaving. When we came back, to my horror I found that Jerry had nibbled through the defence and entered our room. Not finding his usual companions the bored Jerry had nibbled a lot of things among which was our computer as well. No computer, no internet! I was very upset with Rayyan because if I had shooed away the mouse back on the day, I did not have to face this problem. Repairing computer in the village was very difficult.
Rayyan was calm his usual way. Not scared of being bonked on head, nor frantic that he cannot get online immediately. “Maa a mouse did what he does naturally. So, why are we so upset with it? It would not do it if it knew that we humans would suffer the consequences of its nibbling. It is not like people cutting trees and destroying earth despite knowing the consequences. Let us forgive it Maa”.
I don’t usually argue on such issues with Rayyan, because somehow I realized when he was tiny 4-5 year old that I cannot win arguments with him. The reason could be, he feels what he speaks of and it is not a knowledge based debate. Also, he has been one of the rare person who can shut me up. That doesn’t mean I am not angry or agree with him completely, though sometimes much later what he said makes sense to me.
Thankfully Jerry was not shameless like Rayyan and did not justify what he did. He never showed me his face ever again!
But the drama, “oooohhhhhh maa please come fast” goes on even now. It could be a beautiful butterfly, an ugly bug, rain, clouds, moon, spider, squirrel, a flower which I have seen hundred times, a wiggly worm, ant, or anything which really becomes an important character for Rayyan.
Rayyan doesn’t show much affection to animals and never tries to keep them as pets, but he subtly develops a connection with them. It was the same with this mouse. It started coming in to our room often, but was not troublesome. I had to keep this a secret from others so that they would not laugh at me or assume Rayyan was crazy.
In fact I started to ignore it completely so that I would never be summoned in to acknowledge that I was a part of this drama as well.
After a few months we had to leave for USA. We secured our room before leaving. When we came back, to my horror I found that Jerry had nibbled through the defence and entered our room. Not finding his usual companions the bored Jerry had nibbled a lot of things among which was our computer as well. No computer, no internet! I was very upset with Rayyan because if I had shooed away the mouse back on the day, I did not have to face this problem. Repairing computer in the village was very difficult.
Rayyan was calm his usual way. Not scared of being bonked on head, nor frantic that he cannot get online immediately. “Maa a mouse did what he does naturally. So, why are we so upset with it? It would not do it if it knew that we humans would suffer the consequences of its nibbling. It is not like people cutting trees and destroying earth despite knowing the consequences. Let us forgive it Maa”.
I don’t usually argue on such issues with Rayyan, because somehow I realized when he was tiny 4-5 year old that I cannot win arguments with him. The reason could be, he feels what he speaks of and it is not a knowledge based debate. Also, he has been one of the rare person who can shut me up. That doesn’t mean I am not angry or agree with him completely, though sometimes much later what he said makes sense to me.
Thankfully Jerry was not shameless like Rayyan and did not justify what he did. He never showed me his face ever again!
But the drama, “oooohhhhhh maa please come fast” goes on even now. It could be a beautiful butterfly, an ugly bug, rain, clouds, moon, spider, squirrel, a flower which I have seen hundred times, a wiggly worm, ant, or anything which really becomes an important character for Rayyan.
Tomorrow you will hear about another story with another mouse……
Below Pics of what I have rushed to see and Jerry who left Tom behind.
Below Pics of what I have rushed to see and Jerry who left Tom behind.
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