Shooting the neighbours, again.
This week's mother and child.
A thing of amusement and mystery, and often annoyance, to me, is this: in all the neighbourhoods we have ever lived, all the little kids immediately take a great deal of liking to my folks, and kind of adopt them as foster parents. It is not really the other way round, although the ol' woman and man really love kids. We have moved around a bit over the years, and there were always a small gang of kids in their ambit as far as I can recall. (The most mischievous of them, round-cheeked round-eyed Dilia, all of four, wanted to marry me when I come back after finishing college. Another fragment of memory: Dilia and Immanuel crying out to the lass washing clothes on the other shore of the river: "Kavutha chechi, Kavutha chechi, Kavutha chechinte kundi!")
Me, I mostly despised all the little sources of various annoyances. Once my father emptied my backpack and put the (then) little Unnikkuttan inside it. He gave us a joyous grin and happily peed inside the bag by the litre. This guy also used to climb upon my lap (pray for world peace if you disallow him from doing that) while I'd be working on the computer, and do tap-tap-tap on the keyboard (with both hands going up-and-down, up-and-down, as if the keyboard is a toy drum), thus discovering mysterious Emacs and vi shortcuts.
(Unnikkuttan and his parents eventually moved elsewhere. They visited us last Vishu. He's now a big smart guy of age five. He of course would never admit that such things ever happened. Heck, he even barely knows me!)
Now that sister and myself live far away from home, I think kids' presence is a huge relief. The current generation of them foster kids are Akhil aka Appunni, and Aparna, who's yet to have a similarly cute nickname. Mother tells me Appunni pays a visit every other hour. While Aparna can't crawl up all the way, she brings her mother into being the transporter.
Last Vishu, I got them to model for me. Even in the nude.
Well?
Mmm photo.
Oh my God, she's giving that look.
Appunni is a real freedom fighter that hatessss clothes! Foreign or otherwise.
I hope the supply of kids in the neighbourhood stay constant for a long time to come. Or pressure would be upon me to get married and get into the business of making babies sooner. The latter kinda sounds acceptable, but I'm still doubtful about the former.