I think tonight was one of the best episodes of the show in this season. Perhaps across both seasons combined.
I say this because I love how subtle and yet powerful the theme of parenthood was in this episode and how it was central to the whole episode without being loud, in your face, OTT dramatic and most importantly preachy.
Tonight as Tulsi Mihir spoke, even as Tulsi called him out for being a negligent father, she didn’t do so in a condescending manner or in a way that would be called disrespectful or derogatory despite their current circumstances in any manner. Her concerns were genuine, her questions valid, her tone soft, firm and yet authoritative without being hurtful, resentful and judgmental.
Too often mothers are blamed for the bad decisions/behaviour of their children; but don’t fathers have any accountability? Are they only meant to be providers? Should they forget parenting responsibilities require that sometimes one needs to be a bad cop for the good of the child too and that role can’t be played by the mother always.
A child needs a balanced approach in parenting and that means that both parents are required to do their duty and sometimes that can mean they deny their child something, they stop them from making certain decisions rather than reinforcing them or worse, intentionally going against the decision of your spouse just to seem like the favourite parent.
Fathers certainly shouldn’t think that they should make up for lost time by letting their kids demand anything and making sure their demands are fulfilled no matter what.
Parenting is a terrifying process as it is right off the bat no matter how experienced you are because each child is a different story, an unpredictable and unique experience unto themselves every single day, even if you literally have twins/triplets/whatever. What works for one doesn’t necessarily matter to the other be it even simple things like preferences in food, colour, music etc.
Parenting is an exhausting and thankless job for the most part… but it becomes tedious, tiring and terrible when you have an uncooperative partner at a job that’s meant to be done as team work from the first day.
The worst thing you can do to your partner and your child is … not be a team.
Tulsi didn’t thunder at Mihir tonight… but the fact that Pari finally felt safe with Tulsi tonight was not an ode just to mothers and motherhood… but also the perfect acknowledgment that sometimes it’s the people we assume to be terrible are the ones who love and protect us the most. They would rather do the right thing even if it means being unpopular and never getting thanked… but they mean well the most.
Mihir spoiled Pari always… and ironically, he was so blinded in his love once for her that he didn’t even notice and remained blind to the fact that she had spoiled her life… while she was right in front of him all along.
His pampering and coddling didn’t matter, what mattered was the mother who was hated once but who would now notice without even being told, approached or asked to help. Pari finally felt safe with the one parent she had always treated the worst.
It’s also via Pari’s scene with Tulsi and a sleeping Garima today that we all saw that example, that saying playing out live that is a staple in most Indian perhaps even Asian households. You can’t have an Asian family and parenting unless you hear from your parents, mostly your mother, how we would understand something one day when we get to be in her shoes, when we become parents ourselves… no matter what topic it is.
I’m sure most of us grow up hearing it, get annoyed and roll our eyes and even imitate our moms exactly beat for beat, word for word after a point because those words and expressions become so ingrained in our minds that we can enact them anywhere, any time even if we are half asleep.
Today Pari was living that example.
She now knows what it’s like to love as a mother, to have this boundless, beautiful and all encompassing love that you only feel for your child. The love that’s terrifying and exhilarating, exhausting and heartbreaking, capable of making you do things you never knew you could… good or bad.
Pari now knows what her mother felt all those years ago. She understands and is ashamed as a daughter now… as she is now a mother herself. Some part of her loathes herself now all because she now knows what it must feel like to be on the receiving end of a behaviour like she had towards her mother … and she’s only just imagining it. She hasn’t really lived through it at all.
Tulsi called Pari, her Garima today… because Tulsi could clearly see it in her daughter’s eyes, her sunken shoulders, her tears that Pari’s imagined herself as Tulsi.
Pari understood finally the depth of her mother’s love… since she’s a mom herself now… it made sense that Tulsi could get through to her and explain to her how she must learn to get over this guilt by bringing in Pari’s love for Garima into the conversation. By making her understand that just as she’s incapable of hating Garu, so is Tulsi incapable of hating her despite the hurt she’s caused because that’s what being a mother is about. It’s about loving another human being so fiercely that you would rip apart the world for them if needed, take on a bullet without a second thought, kill somebody if needed in a heartbeat…while also being capable of such tender love and affection that you would forgive this person for literally stomping on your heart and setting it on fire too if they shed a single tear filled with genuine remorse… because you have never known how to love someone else so deeply, so powerfully, so selflessly nor will you ever.
Garu of course had to fall asleep so easily, so deeply there…even though it was a new place for her, even though there were no comfortable mattresses and ACs like at home… because there was her mom… and her mom’s mom in that room for her. An innocent future can rest comfortably when it’s supported by a strong present and carried on the shoulders of a stronger foundation of the past. One scene with 3 generations delivered a lesson on parenthood in a nutshell.
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