Good Grades

If grades are the indicators of one’s progress, I have often wondered what my report card as a parent would say about me. Left to me, I would give myself `A Plus’-es. I like to think I am very good as a parent, open, friendly, willing to hear the other side, generous – oh, the adjectives are numerous. It also makes me happy just thinking about all those words that would describe a `nice Me’. It is nice to be self indulgent at times.

Are grades given keeping in mind the preference of the person who is being graded?! Ah, that would be a lovely way to do it, though. Ask, argue and then give some leeway to what the person is saying with regard to herself. It is like telling your boss, I think I deserve an x amount of raise while he smiles benevolently, which is an indicator that his `thinking’ is not on those lines at all.

I don’t really need a report card as a parent. Nevertheless, it would be nice to know what Ponnu has to say on this matter. After all I am her parent.

One day Ponnu announced my grade unexpectedly. “You know, you are a nice parent.” It came out of nowhere, without a context. So I asked the predictable, ‘Why?’ “You have so much patience Ma. I could never be as patient as you.” I have committed that moment to memory. Perhaps, one such unexpected day I might be told I have some other enviable attribute.