Not On

It can be discomfiting when a child corrects the parent for use of improper language.

Sometimes I have a difficulty in placing names to faces and then resort to what I remember – either an incident or a conversation connected to the person – when I am talking about this `lost’ person to another.

Ponnu had a classmate who was in her class in school for some years. I remember him as a boy who had an embarrassing moment in class during his first year at school. There were a couple of boys all with the same sounding name in Ponnu’s class. Whenever Ponnu spoke of her classmates, I’d go, “This is the guy who had that embarrassing moment?” She’d tell me his name again and we would resume the conversation.

Ponnu soon realized that the `embarrassing moment' was my way of remembering her classmate. So she decided to set matters right. The next time I said those words again, she said, “Ma, please don’t refer to my friend like that. I have often told you his name.” I said it was alright for me to say it for after all it was only between us. She insisted it was still `not on’. I have never forgotten that boy’s name since, though he left school to join another and was not mentioned much at home. Ponnu had a point there, I concede.