Exactly 32.5 years ago, a short man with a fearsome moustache stood at a nursery window, tears in his eyes, pride bordering on arrogance spilling forth via his words.

“See her? The one with the huge eyes? That’s my daughter.”

The strangers standing near him congratulated him and politely made remarks about his newborn’s full head of hair and yes, her eyes, which were peering around suspiciously as if she were casing her bassinet, planning a possible escape.

“She was alert, when she was born. She didn’t cry. She…uh…she takes after me. Strong.”

He cleared his throat and complained about the dust, using his ever-present handkerchief to wipe his eyes swiftly.

“Look at the other babies…they are oblivious. They’re nothing compared to her.” He had never been so smug.

My “Grandma”, who is a Russian Orthodox woman who married an Italian, who still sends me a check every January, who told me this story, stood by him, smiling.

“Oh, cut the bullshit George! Every parent thinks their kid is a damned miracle.”

She was teasing him, she didn’t mean it. She always admitted as much when telling this tale, because the next part of it involves her elbowing the woman next to her, and asking, “Have you ever seen a baby with so much hair and such big eyes? Most kids are bald. And squinty.”

My Mom was down the hall, passed out. There was still a tiny smudge of flour on her arm; she had been making chapati when I made my abrupt entrance on a Saturday night, after less than two hours of labor.

::

Much like the adorable protagonist of “Knocked Up”, my father had purchased baby books to study.

Ever the engineer, he charted out milestones and other information. He laid awake at night, unable to sleep; his brain, which already over thought everything, was now whirring even faster. He was the precursor to today’s “helicopter” parent, though he’d scoff at such dilettantes for being OCD-freaks-come-lately.

“That’s what happens when you wait until you are 38 to have a child. You really parent”, he’d explain to me and anyone else who would listen, later.

::

“You will be a book baby,” he allegedly announced to me, the day he strapped me in to the back of one massive Cadillac Fleetwood Brougham, on the way home from the hospital. “You will do everything exactly when the books say…”

…or else. Or else, what? Who knows, I’m just lucky I did it. All that amazing early achievement would buy me some leeway when I turned out to be spectacularly mediocre, later on in life. When he heard that another young couple had given birth to their own first child a few days before, he elatedly rushed to their home, which was strangely dark and quiet. He had books in his hand, his books, which he was confident he didn’t need any more, since he had studied them so thoroughly (and made his charts and notes). Perhaps this new Father might appreciate them.

Daddy looked at the doorbell and then thought against ringing it.

“Probably, they are sleeping.”

That would explain the lack of light and absence of joyful if not ear-piercing noise. He knocked, carefully.

The door swung open, revealing a man I won’t call “Uncle”, because I have never met him. He looked haggard. My father would later tell me that the house seemed eerie and that he knew something wasn’t right.

“Hello.”

“I heard you and your wife had a baby. Congratulations!”

The man shook his head.

“Babu called and told me, I was very excited for you—“

“For what?” the man responded.

“For…your child? I just had one as well, it’s wonderful!”

The man looked startled.

“Oh, I am so sorry! We would have come to see—we thought you had a daughter, Babychayan didn’t tell us you and Mollykutty had a SON!”

“What are you talking about? I don’t have a son. I have a daughter. Anna. 8 lbs, 22 inches long and already very intelligent,” he boasted.

“So we were both unlucky, then,” he lamented. “I am sorry.” He shook his head at my father sadly. “Can I get you a drink?”

“What do you mean…unlucky?” Daddy was sputtering.

“To have daughters! I told my wife over and over, I only wanted one child and it must be a son. We prayed constantly…and this is what our prayers brought.”

“You are UNHAPPY because you have a girl? Is the child healthy?”

“I don’t know…I assume so…”

“You ASSUME?”

“Well, once they told me it was a girl, I left. I was so upset at our misfortune. All I could think of is, how will I tell my parents this?”

“What the hell is wrong with you? You haven’t even seen your own child? Are you sick?”

“I didn’t even go in to the room, I couldn’t. I don’t want to see it. I left them both there, until I decide what to do. Maybe we will send it home.”

“You are a low, ignorant asshole. If your wife and child are healthy, you should be on your knees thanking God.”

“Who are you to call me such a thing?”

“I’d break your bones, but it’s not worth my effort. You fucking asshole.”

The man shoved my father and Daddy roared. After administering one stinging backhand, he angrily made his way back to our home.

::

For years after the incident, he still ranted about it, his rage unchecked. “Can you imagine? Leaving your child in the hospital without even seeing her! And then sending your own baby away, as if it were a parcel you didn’t want? Thendi, patti kazhuda mone, if I see him again, I’ll step on him and break his bones!” Thantha illatha pottan. Pattikunnan bhuthi-illathe thendi!”

He’d carry on like that for a good twenty minutes, after which he’d pointedly remind me that he only asked my mother for one child, ONE and that he hoped it would be a girl.

“My sister was the fifth out of eleven children, and the only daughter of our family. My father often said that she had the biggest andi of us all.” He’d smile, sweetly immersed in nostalgia.

“Must you be so disgusting?” my Mother would mutter.

“Is it disgusting to respect women? To value them?”

“Is it valuing to say that your sister’s…ah…thing was bigger than all of yours…chey, I can’t even think of such words!”

“Edi, my father may have used colorful language to make his point, but the point he was making is what is important—he thought his daughter the equal of his sons and in many ways, he found her superior to them. For someone born in 1885, that is nothing short of marvelous. What do you know? Your grandmother was married at age seven. Chey!”

“Don’t you insult my family!”

“Who needs to insult, when the truth is damning enough?”

And a door would slam and my father would smirk and coo about how I looked just like his Mother, the woman I was named after.

“Ada”, he began, using the masculine form of that noun. “Chakkara-kuttan. Don’t you ever let anyone tell you that you are less than a man, you hear me? My appan was right about my pengala—she was better than any man, she still is. You know, she thought raising children was boring, so she told me to make myself useful and look after them.” He chuckled.

“That is how I know how to braid hair. Asha’s hair was just like yours.”

“Did you also carve lines in to her scalp like you do mine?” I mumbled darkly. My father didn’t do anything gently. My partition line was more of a furrow. Stupid unbreakable black comb.

It didn’t matter, he was blissfully marinating in his reverie.

“I used to make sure that Geetha, Asha and Subash were awake and then I would get them ready before taking them to school. At first, I thought, what 18-year old has such annoying responsibilities? Then I realized how satisfying children can be. That was when I started to wonder if I should still become a priest. My desire to one day be a father myself left me thinking otherwise…then of course your Grandfather objected to that vocation, too. He thought engineering best, which is certainly hard to argue with…but Ammamma…she went to law school, just like you will. And now she is a Judge, just like you will be. But instead of Kottayam, you will be on the Supreme Court…the first Asian woman…”

And then he snapped out of it all so fast, I was shocked he didn’t have whiplash.

“Don’t you do drugs, you hear me? They will ask you all types of things when they consider you-— you think about that before you do something stupid now, which results in shame later. What does Daddy always say? You live in a world of idiots. They will underestimate you because you are a girl. So! What do you do? You score 200% and then tell them po oombe. You are better than a son. Someone asked me, ‘but what about your name, Thampy? Who will carry it on for you?’ And I said, ‘Maire, what makes you think my daughter will change hers?’ And he said, ‘her husband won’t appreciate that’. And I said-“

“You said, I don’t need to get married. I know, Daddy. I know.” I was rolling my eyes, disrespectful because I had no idea how extraordinary all of this was. Silly, sullen teen.

“I didn’t raise you to cook or clean things, you know. If a man wants a maid and a housekeeper, he can hire them. If he wants an equal partner, he can ask for you. Maybe.”

He closed by hissing, “ Asshole!” at his future son-in-law and then he waved me off. As I started up the stairs, on my way to my room, he shouted at my backside…

“Whose name are you going to have?”

“Yours, daddy.”

“No, stupid girl, YOURS. My name IS your name. Don’t you take that bastard’s name. He didn’t put up with you like I have. You put our name on your law degree, you hear me? There is nothing wrong with that! Nothing! ARE YOU LISTENING TO ME? Oh! What a miserable existence, to have a daughter so dense, she might as well have testicles…”