In Search of a Resolute Resolution

The conversation with the son was trying to wind itself down. And failing. Partly it was him. Trying to be nice to his ageing, needy mum. Partly it was me. How do you tell the product of years of your sweat and toil, ‘Sorry, but my toast is getting cold.’

There was also the small matter of whom he’d spent New Year’s Eve with. Me baiting, him slipping off the hook. That could be the only reason why, apropos of nothing, came the question, ‘Any new year resolutions, Ma?’

‘No, not really.’

‘Why?’ Several suggestions hung expectantly in the air. Up the exercise ante. Stop wearing nighties all day. Stop fishing for information on my sex life. Stop writing ridiculous stuff about Dad and me. Sadly, none of them appealed. Not to me at least.

I cast around for buying time options. ‘I don’t know. New year resolutions have never really appealed. I have a really bad track record…’

Well, in my defence, I do. The first resolution I remember was in 1980. It was Board exam year and I resolved to give the study books my best shot. No radio. No fiction. Only Maths, Physics and Chemistry. Ugh! And what happened? The Board moved the exam to February 1981. I still maintain that it’s easier to give something your best shot when the event in question is happening this year, not next.

Fast forward some eight years. Newly married, hormones sated for the time being, I resolved to concentrate on my career. God had other ideas. He gave me a new set of hormones. The pregnancy ones.

That’s been the cycle thus far. After years of no resolutions, last year, I looked at my hips and shook my head sadly. ‘You have to go,’ I told them. And joined a gym. In February. We all know how that played out.

So, no new year resolutions for me. But the son is more of an optimist. And more like a dog with a ball. Won’t let go. I stalled for time, knowing it would come back to head-butt me.

Two days later, I checked – as I frequently do, what you gonna do? – the list of Bollywood films released in 2020. And how many of them I’d watched. I was horrified. Only twenty-five? That was just two films a month! In a good year, I average more than one a week.

‘I’ve made a new year resolution,’ I told the son brightly the next time he called. ‘I’m going to watch all the films that were released in 2020. And I’m already thirty down. Another sixty-eight to go. It’s working this time.’

I could hear the thwack of the facepalm some eight hundred miles away. But the son is my son. Just the teeniest pause later came the retort, ‘When will you watch the films of 2021?’