There is some good in this world that is worth fighting for!

Frodo: I can't do this, Sam.

Sam: I know. It's all wrong. By rights we shouldn't even be here. But we are. It's like in the great stories, Mr. Frodo. The ones that really mattered. Full of darkness and danger, they were. And sometimes you didn't want to know the end. Because how could the end be happy? How could the world go back to the way it was when so much bad had happened? But in the end, it's only a passing thing, this shadow. Even darkness must pass. A new day will come. And when the sun shines it will shine out the clearer. Those were the stories that stayed with you. That meant something, even if you were too small to understand why. But I think, Mr. Frodo, I do understand. I know now. Folk in those stories had lots of chances of turning back, only they didn't. They kept going. Because they were holding on to something.

Frodo: What are we holding onto, Sam?

Sam: That there's some good in this world, Mr. Frodo... and it's worth fighting for.

(Lord of the Rings: The two towers)

That's my favourite movie dialogue ever! I keep remembering it when I despair looking at all the horrible things that we keep reading about and seeing around us, and this year had its sizeable quota too! I am particularly pained by the horrible acts of violence on children and women. And at this time of the year when one reflects on what went by, I am fighting the temptation to give up hope and accept things but to take courage and fight in whatever ways we can!

Fight by giving our precious time to support a cause that takes the evil head-on even if everybody else says it is doomed  to fail. Fight by standing for what we believe is just in whatever ways we can. Fight by practising what we want the world to be at our own home. Fight by bringing up our children to be the change makers. Fight by not accepting 'What can I do? Because YOU and ME make the world and we can together make a change! And we need to, because 'There's some good in this world and it's worth fighting for'!

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year!

Are our kids reading too quickly and too early?

I know this sound silly or even outrageous but my answer to the above question is an uncomfortable ‘yes’. 

Don’t get me wrong.  I am a big advocate of early reading and I am always looking out for interesting books, new genres / authors to introduce to my daughters. Some of these suggestions go down well (many don’t and I have learnt to not push) but what works best is what the rest of the class is reading or the teacher is talking about.  But, I am also witness to instances where the child picks a book the whole class ‘says’ has read and recommended, and diligently attempts to read it.  And confesses at a candid moment that it is not to her liking!  I also sense a slight disappointment in the child at these times of not being ‘a part of the crowd’ by not liking or not completing the book.  My own reaction during these times is to discourage the child from trying too hard, put the book aside and go back to what she is comfortable for the moment.

Times like this, I am concerned that some peer pressure and even parents (unconsciously) are depriving a child the pleasure of discovering a book and pushing her towards the ‘trendy / trending at the moment’ choice!  

This process of discovering a book (which is more than just reading!)  is a magical process - one reads a book first time, unravels the plot, goes back to certain chapters to read between the lines, thinks of possibilities the author missed, goes back to the back and so on and so forth. Some of the pleasures of my growing up days were the times I have curled up in our verandah with either a stupendous tamil book like ‘Ponniyin selvan’; or ‘The adventures of Tam Sawyer’ – being an obedient child, I was awestruck at the ingenuity and the audacity of the characters!  A recent déjà vu experience was when I read Janaki Lenin’s ‘’My husband and other animals’’ where she describes about his pet python! Many a days I have spent day dreaming of things I read in books which I would probably never do in real life.  And as I grow, I find myself attempting some of them or even secretly hoping my child would pull off something like that!!

So, I worry if the fast paced life discourages this process of slow discovery and ‘’growing into a book and author’’ not just in kids but adults also?  And are we subconsciously encouraging a ‘skimming habit’ by taking the habit of reading books to another level, almost to the level of a social snob!  And I worry that many classics go into an ‘also read’ list for youngsters without so much an impact, without a chance to plunge into the musical comedy that Wodehouse talks about! 

Such is the joy of getting lost in this world that makes me want to tell the kids to go slow at times and take their time in living the lives of those characters that they read about. In imagining possibilities. In doing things in their minds even if the world will never get to see them. In giving a chance to the book / author to impress the reader and not ‘help the reader to impress the world’!