The grandchildren are the most precious and invaluable members of any family’s life. We became very lucky when our first grandchild was born in our two families namely Chakrabarti and Rotundo families on a cold morning in February of 2016.  Both families rushed to the hospital to greet the new baby in both families. When my wife and I reached the hospital, we found that Rotundo family was already waiting in the waiting room of the hospital. When both families saw each other, they congratulated each other for becoming the new grandparents. For the first time when we have seen you, your eyes were closed, you looked divine, all of us fall in love with you and felt very blessed to have you in our family. You were lying down in your mom’s lap, your eyes were closed, you looked like an angel, I picked you up from your mom’s lap and I felt that I was holding a child who was a gift from God. You looked so pretty and calm in my arms that your Mimi (grandmother) said to me – you look like a very proud grandfather.  Your Rotundo family and our family both agreed with later that was one of the best mornings of our lives when we met you for the first time. We were looking at you but you had your eyes closed, probably you felt – you were most safe in the arms of your mom. A few days later you came to your home with your mom and an enjoyable celebration took place to welcome you to your home for the first time. Both grandparents’ families attended this family-only celebration, your uncle Dan, your parents and we were so happy to see you in your home for the first time. The second wave of happiness inundated our families when our second grandchild, a girl put her feet for the first time in the world and our families were flooded with happiness to greet this angel in this world. Now, these two families were extremely thankful to God to have a boy and a girl in the family. Their parents named them according to their wish but all four of us, grandparents named them according to our wish, but these were their nicknames and these names were only for us to call them, not for everyone else.

When you both became seven months old, we celebrated your first rice ceremony when your uncle Dan offered you first solid food which is rice pudding cooked by your Mimi, your father became the conductor of the celebration, but after eating the first rice you went to sleep. Your guests came to meet you but you went to deep sleep. Some of your guests had to leave without meeting you. This party of rice ceremony was a grand success all the guests were happy to eat, drink, and be merry with food and drinks. You stepped into a new phase of your life and we were very happy to enjoy becoming a part of this grand party. Since then our lives are circling around you two only.

Little by little you started to grow up. All of us remember when you sat for the first time when you started to crawl for the first time, both of you acted similar, only difference I remember is that Dom, you were crawling much faster than your sister Vera and amazingly when both of you took the first step on your first birthday, that lead us to celebrate big on both times, and why not, that was also your birthday celebration also, as you started your journey towards growing up, we also became fellow passengers in this journey of yours’. As time started to pass by, you two started to learn new life skills almost on a daily basis, two of you would be naughty to one another, brother was taking away sister’s toy and runaway, sister would catch you up and take her toy forcibly from brother, but when sister would snatch any toy from you (brother), then you would come running to your Mimi and complain – Mimi, she took my toy, please tell her to give it back to me. By the time you have finished your complaint your sister ran away from you. At that time Mimi would catch your sister and made her return your toy. When we were taking you guys to any playground, Dom would start running fast and often say – Babi, I am super fast, you cannot catch me. Dom would continue to run and it would be really tough for me to catch him for an old man like me. In comparison to Dom, Vera was a lot easier, she would run but a lot slower than Dom. You would stay for two-three hours in the park, your Mimi and I would be very tired to take even one step but you two would still like to stay in the park. Vera and you often leap on your toes, we hardly have seen you walk in the house, leaping on toes were your habits. It looked very funny and your Mimi and I enjoyed every bit of it. Occasionally two of you would be fighting with one another and then Mimi had to stop your fight, most of the time it would be with toys, once in a while it would be with food. For Dom, food was not that important but Vera, you loved to eat, most of the time you would be the invader who would snatch food from your brother, and this was brother and sister game you were playing with one another all the times. However, in many instances, Dom, you have acted as a big brother, one example one day you were playing in our deck, you dropped your favorite toy and you started crying and guess who got that toy soon, none other than your brother tom. Vera, during those days you used to call Dom as a brother, after receiving the toy from Dom, you said – brother, thank you. And your brother hugged you and said – Vera, don’t cry, I shall bring your toy again if you drop it again. We, your grandparents, were overwhelmed by watching the love, care, and affection between brother and sister.

Every day, I used to get up early in the morning and sit on my recliner in the bedroom and open my computer and check all my emails and watch the news on television, this was my habit, and have a cup of tea. You two would be sleeping in a different room with your grandma Mimi. After you get up from your bed two of you always rushed to my bedroom, show the side of the chair and tell – Babi, I want to sit here. Before I could realize two of you jump on my chair and squeeze yourselves in my chair on my left and right side making me a sandwich and start playing with the keyboard of the computer, and compel me to stop whatever I was doing, two of you would take over my computer and start playing. Whenever you guys slept over, I used to long for this moment of the morning, those were the most enjoyable moments of my life.

Your mother’s rule – you cannot watch cartoons before 8 am in the morning, but every morning two of you would insist to watch it anyway. Children are the best negotiators in the world, their most useful argument of negotiation is crying, you were doing the same thing, you cried and signed the deal, your cartoon is on the TV immediately. One day Dom, you asked me – Babi, guess what?

I replied – what?

You started laughing and leaping and said – Chicken butt. Vera heard this joke and she came running to me and said – Babi, guess what?

Same way I replied – what?

She started laughing and said – chicken “bupp”. At that time she could not pronounce “t”. So “chicken butt” became “chicken bupp” for her. At that time all of us started to laugh. Two of you have made fun of me by using this “chicken butt/bupp” phrase for the next few weeks. Two of you were so mischievous that you were inventing a new one on a daily basis and were playing with us very joyfully. Normally when you two were in our house we were giving you a living room and foyer for your activities and I used to work in the bedroom. One of your favorite game was to put all the pillows on the floor and make a line and ask me to walk over those, I would pretend that I could not walk, then both of you hold my both hands and make me walk over the pillow and tell – Babi, this is how you walk, next time you have to walk by yourself. Okay, Babi. And smilingly I used to say – okay Dommy dada and Vera didi. Next day you would repeat this pillow line and I would miss that walk and both would be frustrated and tell – Babi, you forgot not that way and show me again, at that point your Mimi would come to rescue and ask me to do something and save from the situation. Your creativity of doing naughty stuff was amazing and both of us always enjoyed these small depravities which two of you were doing all the time. I am sure when you grow up and read about these mischiefs which two of you have done as a child must enjoy reading about this naughty stuff. Now I am going to mention one other thing which your brother and sister have done once. I was sitting on my recliner in the bedroom and working in the computer at that time two of you came and wanted to sit with me in your usual way, I said – not now, I have to finish it soon, we will sit later on, please give a little time but you guys were insisting, so, I said – okay come and sit quietly with me and let me finish it, at that time your Mimi came to ask me something, suddenly two of you got up from the chair and ran to the door and lock the room from outside, and started saying – Babi, you are locked in the room, you cannot come and catch us. By the time we opened the door and got up to you we found that two of you have opened the pantry and taken two boxes of chips and started to eat them when your Mimi wanted to catch you guys, you started to drop chips all over the living room, finally, your Mimi caught you guys and gave chips in separate bowls to you for eating. When you grow up and read about it, I hope, you would remember how naughty you two guys were. You were little naughty, were expert in doing mischiefs, it was okay, that was your age to do it, we were never angry with anyone of you, we rather enjoyed your creativity of depravity, we always prayed to god for your wellbeing. We have always loved you to our heart’s content.

Now I shall come to a different point, a point which describes the ancestry of your two brothers and sister. You have been born in a family where both parents come from a very rich and special civilization of the world. By this age, you probably have come to know that your father’s family came from Italy and your mother’s family migrated to USA from India. Since many centuries ago Italy was the pedestal of arts, literature, performing arts, music, and culture of the world, what Italy did, whole Europe wanted to follow and enrich themselves with the civilization of Italy. Roman Empire was the most famous empire which started in 27 BC and ended in 753 BC. The Roman Empire thrived to a new cultural height in the 9th century and was very dominantly reigning in culture and arts etc. Your father’s family is part of that glorious cultural history of Italy. Your mother’s family is embedded in the ancient Indian Cultural Ocean of philosophy. When your father’s and mother’s family joined together, the profound teachings of the science of Western World and the wisdom of Indian culture and philosophy mingled together to create a unique mix of two worlds in your lives, East and West, always be proud of your rich heritage and please try to carry them for your children, this way it will continue for many generations to come.

Remember, your parents are your best friends and well-wishers, they will always be there for both of you no matter what, always be truthful and sincere to them even if you make a mistake. Lying once will lead to many lies and eventually, you will be caught and you will be in more trouble, on the other hand, if you tell the truth they will understand and advise you not to make the same mistake again. During the period of your growing up, you will go to school and then to College hopefully to educate yourselves. Education is the manifestation of perfection already in humans. Education gives you knowledge and knowledge is power When you go to school and College, you nurture and shine your inner qualities which will guide you to a better path of life, this education will eventually put you to your highest potential altar of life. Education gives you knowledge and knowledge is power. This power of knowledge will always show you the right path in your life.  So, make sure that you work hard to achieve this education in yourselves. This education will definitely lead you to become a decent human being who would care for the wellbeing of others and for the society as well. Education has also another unique quality, whoever has it, nobody can take away by force, nobody can steal or rob it from anyone, once someone possesses it, it is for him forever, it is the best weapon to face any difficult situation of life, so it is not optional rather it is mandatory that you educate yourselves to the highest level of scholastic degree possible. Every human being must possess this for the benefit of his or her life. There is a saying “A king is only revered by the subjects of his Kingdom but an Educated Scholar is revered by everybody in the world.” So, Education is a must for every human being including you two. Once you achieve your education, automatically you will enrich yourself with a correct moral character. A character can be good; it can also be bad. A character can be defined as the combination of qualities like truth, honesty, sincerity, selflessness, do good to other human beings, etc., anyone who possesses all these qualities is a person of “good character”, and anyone who is devoid of any of these qualities is usually a person of a “not good character”. As a decent human being, everyone should be a person of good character. Always respect women, they are equally smart like men, in some cases, they are smarter, give them their due respect, then you will enjoy the deep love and affection of a mother, a sister, and a wife, and your life will be very easy and enjoyable. Also remember – respect begets respect, it is a two-way process.  Human beings live in a social structure, every society has its norms and socially accepted behavior, as a decent human beings all of us should follow those contemporary and prevalent accepted behaviors, only then a human being can be a person who can enrich his society, and thus makes the community a better place to live and flourish as a society.

In your life you will come across situations which will make you very upset or angry, this is part of human life, never let this situation control you, rather you control the situation, control your anger and walk away from it and forget it, and try to regain your emotional composure soon. If you walk away, it does not make you small or coward, it rather shows that you are a smart person who controls the odd situation. During the course of our living, we will face many obstacles in lives, we will get many successes in our lives, do not let these events control you rather try to take both under your control and try to be graceful and accept them as a routine part of any human life. If you ever feel that you have done anything wrong to anyone, the moment you realize, beg forgiveness immediately from the person whom you did wrong, it will not make you small, it will rather implicate the strength and courage of your character, similarly if anyone does anything wrong to you, first you let him know that you did not like it and then try to forgive him whether he begs for it or not, remember – forgiveness is divine and it shows the strength of character of a person. Real education teaches us to become humble and being humble is not a weakness, it rather makes a person just and dignified.

In the journey of your life, you will always see some of your fellow human beings are not in a good position, financially or any other way, please try to alleviate their situation, helping others is a quality which all of us should possess. In this respect, I shall depict what my father told me when I was a teenager and it was – “son, always try to share your good luck with those who do not have it, this way you will be blessed by the God, and giving never reduces your good luck, also always be satisfied whatever situation you are in, then you will never be poor, only the unsatisfied person is poor.” I made this advice of my dad as the “Mantra” of my life and tried to follow them all my life till now. We are blessed with life, life is beautiful and enjoys every moment of it, every day is beautiful, you may not get tomorrow as beautiful as today, so be happy with today and accept whatever comes tomorrow.

I wish, I could be a part of your growing up as teenagers but considering my age, I believe, probably I shall not be blessed with that opportunity but my eyes and blessings for your wellbeing will always remain on you until you become a good human being for your parents, for your families and for the society as a whole.

As grandparents, it is our dream that our grandchildren will someday become a decent and contributing member of the community, and we dream that someday you will make us proud to feel that we are part of you and we will be living in you as a family. Although our mundane lives may not the here but our souls will always be here with both of you whenever you need our advice or blessings, we will be there and you will feel it in your hearts, two of you always be our grandchildren and we shall always be your grandparents.

N.B. Names are imaginary