My brother hates eating curd even today and we all blame it on my grandmother. A true tam brahm lady , she believed that dahi is the source of all that is pure and good – she used to threaten him /coax him and finally bribe him with chocolates till he ate his daily bowl of dairy goodness.
Why, you may ask, am I writing about curd, of all things .Valid question.
I think what Amma did to Tarun with curd is what Papa did to me and cricket. For him, cricket was a joy meant to be shared with all who were willing (and also unwilling!). For him there were two ways to ruin a match – rain stopped play and family not sitting with him and hanging on to every word/ball on TV . Come exam or birthday party – god help he ( or in most cases she ( she being me )) who did not settle quietly to watch the match and laugh about Henry Blowfields commentary on earrings or grow teary eyed over Gavaskar's 10000th test cricket runs ( in almost the 10000th viewing ) .Studying , talking to friends and other such things when there was a match on was , well , to quote, just not cricket !
Net Net as soon as I was old enough to think of good enough excuses, I stopped watching cricket and nothing since then succeeded in drawing me back.
Nothing, that is till the day I discovered Cartwheeling! (And also a minor variation in the game, called 20 – 20 cricket)
It also started with my dear husband’s obsession with the game. Watching cricket turns him into a totally deaf ( except to commentary ) and speechless (atleast to me ) person , to whom I suddenly become invisible. Experience has taught me that he STILL retains the power to detect movement – so for example , if I jump around the room and spin wildly in semi cart wheels , he wrinkles his nose and frowns.
About last week someone asked me what the score was (and what I was up to) sometime during a match. And that’s when it happened …! Almost as soon as I said cart wheeling, India ACTUALLY took a wicket …Hmmmm … I would have forgotten about it , but in the next match I figured that doing mock cartwheels and alternating them with spells of sitting still seemed to be working ( India won the match versus Pakistan )
A firm believer in the power of expelliarmus charms and invisible cloaks, I was less surprised by this and more by the fact that I had watched a full cricket match!!
Not only that – I actually watched India’s next match as well (which we lost despite cart wheeling, flying and a minor space expedition) (yes I love Calvin and Hobbes) and then (wonder of wonders!) I watched a non India cricket match without any one asking me to!!!
Curiosity about human behaviour (mine and every one else’s) almost begs for an analysis here …or hypotheses at the very least
• Was it just that this new fast paced format made the gentlemen’s game a little less elegant and much more thrilling ( action from the word go !)
• Or was it that for the first time I started watching a match of my own accord , starting with a query on a score, moving on to a casino like thrill of wondering whether my next move will be ‘lucky’
• Could it be that that entire cart wheeling with no broken neck made me feel like the Nadia I could have been (I KNEW I should have kept up the ballet and gymnastics?)
Have a strange feeling that the REAL reason is still missing . Will watch the next match and report. Watch this space!
PP ( Post post ) . This post isn't really about cartwheeling without breaking your neck , is it ? Apologies if that was why you read it !
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