Sunday, May 13, 2018

My mother's newspaper habit

Most mornings, we have our tea together. I am invariably busy on my laptop or mobile phone, often unmindful of the tea that is getting cold. She gets restless, without the newspaper, tries to finish her tea fast and check why the newspaper is delayed.  

“The newspaper is never delivered on time. I don’t know of what use it is when people get it after leaving their home for work…” she complains. “Can’t you be little patient, I know people in our apartment hardly care for newspaper, so nobody bothers when it comes” I reason it out for her reminding her of how things have changed with our digital and online lives.

I tell her not to make such a fuss for a mundane thing like a newspaper but she gets more irritated if the ‘paper’ is still not at the doorstep by 8.00AM. She calls the security at the gate to check if the newspaper boy has come and apparently missed dropping a copy at our door or if there’s any other issue. Depending on the response, she calls the newspaper agent to find out want went wrong and gives him a piece of her mind to be regular.

For my soon-to-be-eighty- homemaker mother, newspaper is not just a morning ritual; it’s a real window to the world.  She scans through all the pages patiently, often commenting on the happenings and sympathizing or condemning or feeling happy as per the news. She doesn’t watch news on TV, nor do I – for that’s not a practice at our home. Rarely, if we really need to watch any important news it has to be on Doordarshan. 

For her newspaper is not just a paper; I have often seen her telling the delivery boy why he should not throw it in the corridor disrespectfully and how it is equal to education and learning. She finds it amusing that I get to know about many things even before  she reads about them in the morning, thanks to the alerts and updates on my phone. 

The newspaper habit


While I feel happy she is religiously continuing the ‘newspaper habit’ that my father used to tell us all to develop; I hardly ‘find time’ to flip through it unlike the growing up years where we used to pull out pages of our interest and literally wait for the Sunday Edition. While I remain indifferent, she continues the habit – quickly giving me updates on some important things. 

It could be anything on earth: the curious case of an overgrown pumpkin or a fruit that looks like lord Ganesha, the plight of people in Syria, the death of a film star or cricket match results or the drying lakes in the city or some titbits about food and travel. Politics doesn’t interest her, often she wonders why everyone has to fight so much and why can’t there be amicable ties between politicians, as she voices many such naïve thoughts. 

Her first priority is to get weather updates and prepare for the day as it were - temperature, likelihood of rain etc. When there’s an interesting story connected with a festival or something rare and interesting,  she never forgets to share it with our help, Bujjamma. It’s fun to watch them both discuss the event; sometimes Bujjamma adds more life to it telling us how it was reported in local news channels on TV. 

Food is another topic my mother loves to read and talk about.  It could be the jackfruit dishes that are trending or some new vegetables and fruits that she gets to learn about.  But her excitement doesn’t last long for she knows, it is beyond her fitness level to try new dishes now, and she quickly tells me to do it if I have some free time.

What amazes me is her way of reading the news. She is not constrained by her limited knowledge of English. Sometimes she quickly asks me when she doesn’t understand a word or gets confused with acronyms like PTI. I might have laughed when she asked me if PTI is a typo for PTO (Page Turn Over) but I admire her keen sense of observation that can challenge even a seasoned editor. Over the years, she has developed a knack of not missing any relevant news. She has her own way of remembering the headings and columns and getting all the minute details.

I may have access to the latest news through mobile alerts and other digital sources and I may choose to read or ignore.  I have given up my newspaper habit ages ago for want of positive news. But, for my mother, the newspaper remains much more than just a hard copy or a print version of what I get to browse. It helps her connect and engage with life and things beyond the confines of her home.

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