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A Little 'Getting Used To'

Nobody has been paying rents and dues since 2 months. And being someone who depends on rental income, it’s a huge pain in the ass to talk to tenants and hear their financial constraints for the 100th time, although deep down you know that they’re pretty well off enough to pay. But my mom, being the kind woman she is, decided to meet our tenants to discuss partial rent waiving. And so we went to see him. But honestly, all tenants would comfortably wish their owners disappear so that they don’t have to talk about rent at all. When we sat down with him, he spoke in the audible frequency of a snake. And not even a “healthy, mildly enthusiastic about life, harry potter kind of snake”. This was a snake too haughty to care about being audible. We couldn’t hear a single thing he said without leaning in. God knows we tried to maintain a 6 feet distance. But on a safer note, we wore our green home-stitched masks that wrinkled like raisins because it has been washed too many times, and he had his stiff N95 on.


My mom starts off with a strong voice, like she has already rehearsed this conversation in her head over a hundred times. I think she actually has. She’s a strong woman, my mom. She doesn’t hesitate and calls him out on how he wasn’t being receptive at all. And the snake started being a little less 'shh-sy' And as we were moving towards a mutual decision, all of a sudden she starts doubting it. You could sense her discomfort that came with knowing that she was nearing the end and she had to make a decision. And she asked me what I thought about it. Whoa. I was surprised at even being talked to, honestly. I am more of a silent watcher in most of these meetings and being addressed is an all new level of triumph. Being treated as an adult needs a ‘getting used to’. I tell her I think it’s a good idea, and EEK I had the audible frequency of a rabbit! But I could explain it away with my inexperience with adulting. 


She then, calls my sister to ask for her opinion, and that’s when I suddenly realized how unsure my mom really was to make decisions by herself. She has been doing it for almost 10 years now, since dad left, and she still hasn’t gotten used to it. Every self growth theory feels inadequate in explaining how my mom has grown so much over the years and yet her natural instinct to doubt herself more and to trust an outside source for confirmation has never changed. She has a lot of ‘getting used to’ to do too. Even after these 10 years.



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Location: Banjara Hills, Hyderabad, Telangana, India

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