Can I believe this!

It seems just yesterday that this 8 year old would make miniatures of chapatis and line them all around the griddle, sometimes a double line, not leaving me enough space to cook the substantial one someone could feed on! Those evening walks with him, talking about fighter planes and Air Force! Ah all that excitement...and the irritation when he quietly slipped off the hair-tie from my plait, yet another time!

...hiking up the slopes from Katra to Vaishno Devi, humming aloud (at full volume, actually!) the Top Gun Anthem as the twosome (us--this 10 year old, a 19 year old by now, and I) hiked up, not bothered that there were people all around, or we were on a religious 'yatra,!' Oh Geez! he slips off my hair tie again...and again, ending up loosening its elastic!

Yes, I'm smiling, as I always do, when I think of all this!

...at NDA, for his Passing Out Parade (POP), showing us pictures of him at the ball, (pride writ large on his face--he being the cadet with the prettiest partner), eager to know how I liked the girl...Geez! he's growing up fast! Though he still can't stop stealing my hair tie from my plait! He loves doing this!

...flying at 90kmph on a Pulsar, the next day, on Pune streets, in the middle of the afternoon...he's too excited to have fared among the best at the POP! Too excited to heed any chiding or warning to go slow!

...this AFA trainee visiting me...so relieved to be away from the rigorous training, for a day! Handing me the tip I'd left in the tray for the waiter, after we come out of the restaurant, with a "we underwent the labour of eating if he laboured serving, scores equalled!" Geez! he's growi...is he?!

...those endless conversations about 'the passion' flying a plane is all about, and of clicking pictures from up there in the sky, during another hike uphill, to Vaishno Devi...he's tried several times to slip off my hair tie ('tried' coz he's not as good anymore--out of practice!) returns it with a "I'm bad at it now...you come to know whenever I try to take it! I've got to practice"...oh! this kiddo!

Geez! he's getting married shortly! this kiddo! I'm so very happy about this...but oh! can I believe this!

How time flies!