In an attempt to beat the rest of the contenders yesterday morning for a free parking spot in order to save $ 3.75/ hour, I parked my car in one of the very few free spots available at least nine minutes before the “free time in effect” regulation 🙂 I remained in my car with my seat belt on and emergency lights blinking relentlessly 🙂 Not to much of my surprise a law enforcement officer happened to be around the vicinity already focused and ready to take action had I stepped out of my car before the allowed hours towards free parking in that designated “ten spots only” small lot by a community park few steps away my place of appointment.

Little did he know that this single parent might be penny wise but never a dollar foolish 🙂 🙂 Thanks to my Indian genes and my clean as a whistle bank account:) 🙂

In my head I got busy marginalizing his capacity as an officer, “Why is he here first thing in the morning? He should have been at a coffee joint for this early in the morning. May be the surveillance cameras are not working so he doesn’t have much of a choice,” my mind was racing of course.

Sure enough I remained in the car and waited for those longest nine minutes to be over… thinking things like my salad bowl that I forgot on the kitchen table that morning, which movie to watch with Jasmine Mehar on the weekend…Some ludicrous Bollywood mish-mash or another marvellous (Marvel) like a Dr. Strange, also looking over once in a while the place of my appointment…the magnificent glossy wonder of RCC and glass thinking of the 1,000 or more parking spots under the giant size building available to one’s convenience at the cost of $ 3.75/ hour, I also tried to conceptualize the revenue these spots manage to generate on a daily basis… but got distracted easily because such a supposition was too much and I always failed in math anyways 🙂

Tick-tock-tick-tock…I still had more time to wait so I surfed through my contacts on my phone to make sure that I have this co-worker’s phone number still saved who religiously buys lottery tickets for a group of ten at my work every Friday. Every Saturday morning I anticipate for his “breaking news” kind of a phone call that yes Anoop K Babra, all ten of us are bloody runaway millionaires and we can all quit our jobs at the same time at last. My not so vacant mind also contemplated if I’d still continue to save coupons like I normally do or not anymore once I become a ruthless & undeserving millionaire (in the eyes of some:) 🙂

For a split second I caught the officer watching me interestingly as I looked up in the rear view mirror to fix my smudged eyeliner with a rather used facial tissue but sure enough he looked away instantly when I mischievously dug back deep in his eyes. He was on duty after all so the poor fella had to leave it at that only I suppose. He was actually good looking, in fact my heart did flutter for fraction of a second but then some guilt sunk in and I sheepishly contained and consoled myself…what if some mad scientist is watching over and taps into my mind and discovers that I still have some feelings and emotions and a mild scope of romance left in this otherwise sexually hopeless life. What if the mad scientist finds out that my biological clock is still ticking fine and is far away from dying down, what if he senses flames of loneliness sometimes roar rages inside me… what if this mad scientist posts everything about me on social media and these viral videos of my inside-out make him famous overnight. I fought away quickly from the creepiness of such thoughts.

I also made up my mind to go home and sit Jasmine Mehar down this evening and correct her for the last time that her respected homeroom teacher’s name is Ms. Haqque and not Ms. Hawk. I mean seriously, this girl keeps forgetting that her mother is a diehard brown who grew up in a small town in India and how dare this child of mine not have a natural potential or deep rooted flair for proper pronunciation of brown last names. Of course, I was in denial and this brown little soul of mine was hurt beyond comprehension. Whereas her mother still suffers from a heavy duty British twang which is a reminiscent of an era of slavery long bygone, Jasmine Mehar is all well tuned with this rapidly transcending and ever so transparent universe at the hands of social media, Netflix and middle school Canadian slang and codes. Last time I talked to her she advised, “mom don’t you know that proper nouns can be pronounced any which way, besides Ms. Hawk has not got an issue with that then why would you”? However, I am hell bent to bring it up again this evening:) 🙂 Even though in our world of two we never refer to anyone by their colour or creed however, her taste buds might never understand the difference between Canadian green, yellow, red peppers and my capsicums from back home. She will have to understand though that there is much more to her Indian roots than butter chicken, 24 carrot gold, lavish weddings, big bungalows and a controlling man in a woman’s life just like there is much more to her Canadian roots than branded gifts under some Christmas tree, expensive junk food over a fierce game of ice hockey, medium double double coffee on the go all the time or a pumpkin spiced latte with the fall of the first leaf eh! Her culture has to reflect in her eyes, in her winning smile, her patience to listen is her culture; her compassionate heart has to speak better than her words. She has to constantly stay afloat the trivialness of life. Emotional independence is her culture, being useful to community is her culture, keeping in touch with her cousins and friends is her culture, not ever addressing a grown up person by their first name is my daughter’s culture, maintaining her peace of mind and self respect is her culture. My mind span like a monostatic radar.

Oh well now, with these thoughts and some more those nine minutes have flown by. I have finally locked my car behind and stepped up ambitiously on the pedestrian walkway. Passing by the officer I smiled naturally as he gently said, “have a nice day Miss”. I wished him the same and paced up towards the giant sized building.

May be in his mind he actually wished for me to keep on saving money on parking tickets and deal with unnecessary mid life crisis. Just like in my mind I shouted loud and clear, “Good luck with your quota of cutting out parking violation tickets today, the last dash board you would ever think of to plaster one with would be mine”.

Human mind surfs from one thought to other in no time. It dutifully deciphers manifestation of God’s biggest token to each one of us… some call it Karma! The rhythm of life is in perfect symphony with His divine design. However, an average person like myself not always stands beneath an immense cascading waterfall of this divine light. An average mind like mine never fails to cling on to surfboard of “what ifs”. No matter how dark, heavy, clear or opaque my thoughts; they are the points of attraction I always come back to. Life may not just yet be moving in the directions I would like it to but in my mind I drift easily from discontentment to appreciation in no time. My journey from pain to solace is one blink away unlike in my realities. In my mind I am able to surf smooth and focus beyond this whole game of law of attraction and accept distraction with a grain of salt.

Mine is a simple life, just as simple as my complex mind. I just saved myself another $3.75/hour.

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