Pujit Aggarwal Redivivus - Proverbs and Platitudes

 

My mother was more particular about my moral code and conduct than my performance in the periodic exams held by the school. If I got good grades, she would pat me on the back, if I under performed, she would just beam a smile and encourage me to study methodically and pay more attention to subjects in which I was weak. She would assure me that I had enormous potential as a learner, and I should never ever consider the exam results to be the last judgment. She was never paranoid about the downside of my schooling.

My school friends envied me for being blessed with a mother who was never obsessed with grades. They reported hours of third-degree interrogation at home, demanding answers and justification as to why their score was so pathetic despite a posse of private tutors coaching them over the weekends and during holidays. The anxiety of the stigma of chronic mediocrity staining their children sometimes pushed them over the edge, impelling them to a round of counselors and experts dealing in IQ, EQ, and other quotients that might contribute to their cognitive prowess.

Mom was easy. She would give me a quote either in the vernacular or in English every week or twice a week and ask me to ponder its meaning or message and share it with her before the week was out. Was the thesis of the quote valid and practicable? I was free to say yes or no with or without a caveat.

I adjudged ‘Might is right’ to be invalid, unfair, and inadvisable in practice. She asked me a few short questions to ascertain the rationale behind my conclusion before rewarding me with a bar of chocolate. How about ‘Time is money’? Easy-peasy, Mom. The proverb is valid. Its thesis should be followed in every walk of life.

My promptitude was greeted by a scowl. You’ve got half a week to mull over it before you submit your response. Apply the logical apparatus. Visualize the pros and cons of the assertion. Listen to your heart. This still small voice, when you have grown up, will reappear in your life as the voice of your conscience. Listen to it. Weigh it with sensitivity, without compromising sensibility. Then you can blare it to the world through a megaphone.

This idiosyncratic brand of moral acculturation enabled me to grow by leaps and bounds. Follow the mainstream because everybody else is doing it. But from time to time, examine the primal fountain in the blue mountains from where the mighty river originates. Consider the tributaries, the effluents, that enrich or impoverish the stream as it rushes down to meet the sea. Consider the distributaries that branch off to assert their individuality, and risk even desiccation and death.

Goodness like God does not inhere in one religion. It permeates the whole creation. By the time she gave me the last quote to ponder, I had already established myself as a Harvard-educated entrepreneur. Since free time was scarce, she would catch me on a Sunday and give me a quote or two to discuss with her the following Sunday.

“It is time to bring me up now, son,” Mom reminded me light-heartedly before giving me the last pithy quotation. She added that it was from James Oppenheimer, a Jew, who supervised the production and explosion of the first atomic bomb. When he witnessed the spiraling ball of fire, he quoted a verse from the Bhagavad Gita.

“The foolish person seeks happiness in the distance, the wise person grows it under his feet.” --- James Oppenheimer (1904-1967)


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