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Kanu dappika “కను దప్పిక”, which when translated from Telugu literally means “the thirst of the eye”, is what my mother told me she feels for me and my sister from 8000 miles away.

As soon as she said those two words, I knew she was helping me describe the kind of aching, the wordless longing I feel for my own children when they’re away from me. And this thirst can’t be quenched by the water in our eyes, but only when I meet their eyes at the doorway.

Many a time, I’ve unleashed the power of the eye to scan doorways and crowds to fix my gaze on their messy mop of hair or lock eyes with them even for a second. That’s really all I need to quench the thirst or to settle the pulse.

Even when my arms are not outstretched, they feel achy, as if they remember what it feels like to hold. And what no one warns you about is how hard it is to live in the spaces between the eye contact.

The only upside to the long distances between us is that it distills my sense of what truly matters. I choose my words more carefully and speak only what truly matters, knowing our time together is always fleeting.

What’s this urgency I feel, I wonder. After all, according to my children I’m not a mother, I’m a smother. (Smothering them with my neediness that is LOL) And realize the audacity of my belief that only under the watchful gaze of my eyes will my children be safe. As if their lives aren’t already a giant miracle made possible by the kindness of a million strangers.

We all have wants and needs, but this is an existential one. Sometimes, I catch myself measuring the depth of my love by the weight of my worry. And is it fair to let that become a burden for my children to carry?

Still, if my kanu dappika for my parents is mutual, maybe it’s already a part of my children’s inheritance anyway.

Two Teenage Boys

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When Life Happens, You Write

When you’re a writer-at-large, you let life happen to you. That way, you let your eyes steal everything that you see, put a spin on it and spill onto paper / machine some “stream of consciousness” kinda cool stuff. And if I am a true writer-at-large, it’s only fair that I must observe, muse and write about it.