Mom And Her Surprise
My graceful and elegant Mom is so full of surprises. 🙂
I was on the phone with her the other day, me in the US and she in India, where she has lived on her own since my dad passed away a decade ago.
She seemed to be in a good mood, may be because I would be seeing her on a short and sweet visit very soon?
But that was apparently not the reason. She says to me, I have a surprise for you. But you know how I can’t hold anything back, so I have to spill it now. Since she seemed pumped, I smiled and said, what?
She said, I bought a new car. Whoa! Â Just like that?
I know she loves shopping but this is a car we’re talking about! You don’t just go to the market and pick one up. I wouldn’t call that a minor decision, exactly. Especially for her.
To get the right perspective, you have to understand the journey she took the last time she bought a car for herself, Â a few years ago. She had to first decide that it was worth trading in her current vehicle. For that, she had consulted my brother and myself. Then, the whole question of which car to buy took another couple of months. She consulted a cousin who had in depth knowledge about all the cars on the road (he writes car reviews). Diesel or petrol? Which model? How big? Then, she waded through all the choices to shortlist two final car models recommended by my cousin before deciding on make, model, color. The last step was (once again!) running this decision by her two children, getting our “approval” before ultimately purchasing it.
I actually recall having many discussions with her before she finally settled on whether to buy, and then which car to buy. The entire process took three months, maybe more.
This time? Wham! She had simply decided that this what she wanted to do, consulted just one person, figured out what car she wanted, what color (very important!), checked it out, sold her current car to a friend and bought a new one before she said a word to my brother or myself.Â
I love it!Â
We joyfully celebrated a milestone birthday of hers just over a year ago. It’s also not a biased opinion that she doesn’t look anywhere close to her age (but then you can also say, who does these days?). Â What’s great is that she apparently doesn’t feel anything like it either.
More power to her. Her independent streak continues to unfold even now. And that’s what I really, really love. Love!
Is there any age where we stop learning, growing, evolving, getting more independent?  Apparently not. It’s a choice that you can decide to make.
I couldn’t resist asking her, so what did bro say??! She laughed. My loving brother can be a son to be feared – in a very good way, except that is, when someone he loves has put on the pounds – then he can be downright scary.  I know all about that. Obviously. 🙂
She chuckled again and told me that he had had just one question. He asked her, did you buy a Hyundai? Hehe, poor guy is getting hard of hearing. 🙂
She told him, no and repeated that she had bought a Honda.
This horse was out of the barn by then, but I guess he still felt he needed to give his stamp of approval so he said, well, that’s okay then. 🙂
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The Ugly Ebola Hysteria
Thanks again, CNN. It wasn’t enough that you spent several months reporting on the missing Malaysian Airlines flight with spooky tales of everything from UFOs to hijacking to terrorism.Â
Now, you’re doing the same with Ebola. Only this cacophony is much more dangerous and troubling as your noise goes a long way in misleading the public.Â
All for ratings.
More than 30,000 people die from gun violence every year (more than 70,000 survive from gun injuries).
Over 52,000 Americans died of the flu last year.
There have been three cases of Ebola identified and one death in the US.
But Ebola is so much more exotic, exciting, unfamiliar and therefore, fear inducing, is it not? Â
Between television ratings and damn politics, the unsuspecting American public has been treated to more fear mongering and scare tactics with Ebola than we have witnessed in a long time. Â Remember the early days of AIDS? And then swine flu, bird flu, H1N1…
This has been latest and one of the most irresponsible media circuses we have seen, and CNN sits at the top of this heap. It’s time for you to go away.
And let’s not even get into Chris Christie’s ridiculous quarantine policy that ends up treating health workers like criminals.
What’s ironic is that one of the more balanced reports on Ebola was recently shown on, of all places, Fox News! Who would’ve thought?
Watch it here or click the image below to watch….I highly recommend it.
Fox’s Shepard Smith Blasts Media For “Hysterical,” “Irresponsible” Ebola Coverage
And here are some Ebola facts [from the CDC], loud and clear:
Now these – these you can spread around all you want. Â
If we could simply educate ourselves on FACTSÂ and if the World Health Organization and Western governments focused on deploying badly needed resources to countries like Liberia, Guinea and Sierra Leone where there really have been Ebola outbreaks this year due to their poor conditions, the world would be so much better of.
Now can we stop with the nutty hysteria, please?
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The Yin and Yang of Life Anywhere 