I don't remember much of my childhood, but there are flashes that surge to me every now and then. Recurrent nightmare. Playing a street game, the rules of which I wonder who created. My brother hitting a boundary and a sixer when we needed 10 off 2. Learning tennis rules on a video game. Fascinating Myths and Legends, and many superstitions.
Now, for a child like me, who couldn't read between the lines, there were no myths, legends or superstitions - just hard truths. Even when I dared to question them in my head every once in a while, the diligent child in me shut it down because it wasn’t right to question what the elders said. So, it became part of my system, so much so that I still think twice before cutting my nails after sunset, though I bite them any time of the day or night. It was only three years ago that I found out Undertaker and Kane were not brothers. I am about to turn 38!
One such superstition was about having a Black tongue. Kaali Zubaan. If you had black spots on your tongue, everything you said would come true, especially the negative ones. My mother, who I call Ammi, was one of those, and quite well-known among family and friends for predicting the future.
There were. rules of course; it doesn’t work when emotion was involved. To my dismay, cricket was not one of the things Ammi was emotional about. Naturally, I hated having her around during a cricket match, going about her motherly business, passing by, keeping an eye on the score, stopping to watch a couple of deliveries when Sachin was in the 90s, blurting out - ‘aw, he's gonna get out’ - with genuine sympathy before moving on to do whatever she was doing.
Sachin was dismissed in the nervous nineties 28 times in his career; my mother was responsible for at least 50% of those. There would have been more if not for my proactive action in asking her to not come anywhere near when he’s in the nineties, and, if she had to, she could not speak. She obliged most of the time, and when she watched the tense situations with me, she would cover her mouth with a cloth or the palm of her hand, just to stop herself from saying anything.
Here's another 'fact' about this superstition:
Kaali Zubaan is a gift.
Kaali Zubaan is a curse.
You have no control over what it says.
The most powerful of her predictions unfolded in the first-ever T20 World Cup final in 2007, with India playing Pakistan. Down and out, Misbah was in the zone, bringing Pakistan within touching distance when the last over started.
13 runs to win. 6 balls remaining. One wicket in hand.
Misbah on strike. Joginder Sharma comes on to bowl. Now Misbah is a Pakistani cricketing great, and Joginder Sharma played all his T20 internationals between the 19th and 24th of September 2007. This was the 24th of September 2007.
19.1 - Wide. 12 from 6.
It was 54 from 24 not long ago, so by this point, it was just a formality. Ammi walks into the room. Her eyes dart back and forth between a resigned me and the scorecard. I have no energy to ask her not to say anything.
19.1 - Dot. 12 from 5.
Misbah isn’t fazed - knows he can finish it in two balls. He has 5.
19.2 - Six. 6 needed from 4.
I'm paralysed. Ammi is on the move, only to stop next to me for a second. She doesn’t do hugs, but her presence is always comforting. ‘Don’t worry,’ she says, ‘he’ll go for another sixer and get caught.’
She wants to make me feel better. Emotion at play. I know the rules well, so obviously I don't buy in. She’s already out of the room.
It felt like a lifetime, but probably was 30 seconds later that I’m jumping, running out to the balcony, screaming at the traffic, hugging and kissing Ammi, saying she did it. I'm high on adrenaline. She’s disgusted at the hugging and kissing. But she has that smile, the one that blooms on when she sees me happy.
“There was no emotion. I knew," she says.
She knew.
Fast forward 18 years, I am writing about my strengths as someone on the spectrum. This is to counter the negative impacts I listed as justification for receiving flexible working arrangements. It is a disability, but also a super power?
“...ability to connect the dots…. provide insights that others might overlook...”
“…exceptional pattern recognition and attention to detail…”
“…thorough risk assessment…”
“…a simplistic, logical, and systematic approach to decision-making…”
"...accurately forecasting..."
I get flashes of 24th September 2007 - like they're trying to help me connect some dots, and recognise a pattern?
Kaali Zubaan. Super power. Is she?
Yeah, nah, couldn’t be.
The thought doesn't leave me. I let those flashes get through.
So, Ammi, who only ever followed cricket in glimpses, noticed that Misbah didn’t take a single because the other batsman couldn’t really bat. Connecting the dots... exceptional pattern recognition... gaining insights.
He had to hit a six, because the field was set to stop boundaries, and in a small ground, you can’t really run two without risking a run-out. Attention to detail... thorough risk assessment.
It was a Final, so the coolest of minds lose their cool. Simplistic and logical.
“Don’t worry, he’ll go for another sixer and get caught”. Superstitious prediction... A systematic approach to decision-making providing an accurate forecast.
Yeah, nah. Ammi isn’t that smart. She is naive, uncomfortably truthful, anxious, nervous, stressed, sleep deprived, always in pain, emotional, yada, yada, yada.
But then, every time she is in a safe space, she owns it with her wit, charm, intelligence, warmth, and an ability to predict the future best attributed to a superstition.
There’s a running joke in the family that I am Ammi’s favourite child.
We have similar personalities; we look alike; I am the youngest; Ammi didn't want to have me, so there's the guilt. We're rebels. We're everyone's favourite. We have both been called various things: Gifted. Idiot. Genius. Stupid. Personable. Aloof. Talented. Wasted.
And there is this one standout feature we share... something about a curse and a gift.
Of course, I am her favourite!
PS: My 12-year-old niece read my blog and asked her mother why I hadn't been writing much lately. My sister then relayed the question to me. "I get these random thoughts," I told her, "but if I don't capture them right away, they vanish into thin air." The very next time one popped into my head, I was determined to hold onto it. My niece is the spark that inspired this post.
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