Father And Mother I Love You. Take the initials of every word, you have FAMILY! There is a father, for sure there is the mother, and the child too. The question that nags is, where is love? Buried deep down into the sands of time? Maybe. Shoved away by more important matters like work, kitty parties, virtual world, peer group? That’s for you to answer. 

Joint families are now a history that to the most will be embodied on the lips of our grandparents, in  social science text books, debates, statistics, articles, maximised to a bunch of a very few joint families scattered like dots in the universe. These very joint families where there were at least twelve to fifteen members that could go up to even fifty or more where there was love pouring out of the brim, share no matter how big the platter and how meagre the food, care to wipe off even a small trickle of tear, quarrels that ushered them more closer tightening the bond, laughter that echoed across the hallway and into the kitchen where food smelled as heavenly as mud from the first rains with platters making noises terribly loud yet joyous, children shouting and playing with falls and cries in the courtyard. 

As time ticked on, families started breaking down into half of what they used to be before further breaking down into a family of just the kids and the parents where as now what we get to see is just one kid and the parents. Here is where the kid drifts away into just another world while the parents are busy planning a ‘secure future’ for their ‘only’ child. Amidst all this, all the child lacks is personal attention, personal care while love gushes out in the form of high end cell phones, laptops, PS’s, cool outfits, more-than-required pocket money, unquestioned freedom which at the end of the day leads towards nothing but doom. 

The fact remains that even today but limited to very little, we do get to see closely bonded families where the child still loves to be cuddled by daddy on his lap, where the child loves to talk endlessly to mommy about all the things that happened in school, the fights, the moments light, the teacher’s scowls while the children hooted and howled, where the child still wants to snuggle into bed with mom and dad on either sides, where television seems to have taken a quiet and isolated spot in some corner of the house flickering once in a while if daddy wants to watch some news or mommy some cookeries as the little one comes by once a while to watch ‘my’ favourite cartoon because most of the time he/she is always basking in sun playing with ‘my’ neighbour friends or doing homework. No  matter what, but always busy. If nothing, go pester mommy. Life can often be beautiful if you want to make it so, see it so, feel it so. 

Then why? Why is that the families are splitting up like molecules and atoms, why is that the child no more cares what’s happening in the world out there for it is so immersed in the virtual world that it is hard to shake it awake from its disastrous sleep, why is that in spite of having all the money and luxuries of life there seems to be no peace of mind or words kind? The answer lies within us if for a moment we are ready to steal time and peep into our own lives, ponder over it and make sense of what’s happening and where it is leading to. The spouse has no time for the other, the child has no time to even say hi to the parent, we talk to people across the globe yet do not know who lives next door, there is skype and facebook with people from school whom we tag ‘buddies’ n ‘dudes’ but walk by the same ‘virtual peer’ without a hi now isn’t that rude? But they say it’s cool. I wonder, ‘what fools’. 

As the past cherishes its good ole’ days, it sits away in a corner with lines of worries on its forehead as it imagines the near future of what it might turn into as it looks from close fractions at the present with things in such disarray muddled with artificiality from top to toe except for a few trails of realism on the sands by the beach, which, catastrophically are already fading away as soft waves of destruction peddle steadily up the shore line while it smiles at us wickedly casting its spell on the world just like cancer. As the adage goes, prevention is better than cure, I add up, this time it’s your family, do not get lured.