Fancy Dress Competition

As I climb up the stairs, feeling fatigue grip at every muscle of my body, I hear my daughter’s voice, “Papa is coming home! Papa is coming home!”. I start grinning; it is strange how little things can turn your mood around. I reach the door and ring the bell. “Mamma, see! I told you papa is coming,” after 4 thuds on the door (my five year old kid’s unsuccessful attempts at opening the door by jumping as high as she can to unhinge the bolt on top), the door finally opens. I see her eyes gleam with happiness, “papa,” she screams and hugs me tight. My wife, unmindful of all the noise at home, calmly declares,

“Why do we need a dog at home when we have Dolly? All that she does since evening is guard the door waiting for your arrival”. Dolly has a sheepish grin on her face. I pull her close, give a peck on her cheek and whisper, “You know mamma is just jealous right?” Within seconds, she is back to her usual happy self. Dolly, being the drama-queen that she is, climbs on the sofa and announces that she has a fancy dress competition at school. My wife gives her “the look” to get her off the sofa and then we start discussing the potential options she has, since at 9 in the night we don’t have enough time to go for something very elaborate. “Miss India? Miss Universe? Princess?” my wife asks her. She sticks out her tongue, complaining that every second girl in the class was planning on it. She wants to be something important.

“What about being a politician, beta?” I ask. She nods in disapproval. We bombard her with choices like actress, police woman, singer, dancer, teacher, news reporter. She has a single answer to all of it, “It’s not important enough.” While we are having dinner, Dolly suddenly comes up with what she wants to be.

“Shantabai!” she shrieks, almost like she has hit jackpot (Shantabai is our local grocer). My wife shoots me a puzzled look. Unable to think of any other option, we decide to go ahead with it and my wife takes up the costume designing in her expert hands. The next morning while I am reading the newspaper, my daughter calls out for me, her voice almost a squeak. I push aside the newspaper to find her peeking through the door.

“Come on in,” I say, but she doesn’t budge. She hides behind the door and continues giggling. My wife nudges her to go forward and then I see her, dressed up in a little red sari with a hint of lipstick, a bindi on her forehead and a huge smile on her face, a string of pearls on her neck and half a dozen bangles. She carries a tokri filled with spinach on which rests her mobile phone and purse. At this instant, I don’t care if she wins. I am thankful that she didn’t go with the crowd and be a princess, though she looks like the princess of grocers. What matters is that she did what she felt was right and is happy with her decision and I  always want her to be this way.