Me, My dad, and Tetris

Music …. There’s something about it that tugs at the heart strings and jogs the cerebral cortex unlike anything else. Memories, buried deep underneath layers laid upon by time passed, burst forth all of a sudden – euphoria, pain, loss, gain …. Upon hearing a particular song or tune. A moment of triumph, crushing loss, the first time you fell in love, heartbreak – a shuffling of emotions … all due to the shuffle in your playlist, really.

One of my fondest recollections from childhood is hours spent playing video games, especially the music accompanying them. Not today’s electronic overload, but the simple 8 bit chip tunes (to indiscernible Japanese characters on screen). The pulse racing theme of Contra, that made you feel like Rambo, to the gentle albeit peppy tune of Super Mario, to the thumping beats of Street Fighter, making you (almost) believe you could bash up the class bully the next day. So I was on YouTube, listening to the tones of my childhood, when I chanced upon the theme of the game ‘Tetris’, as it appeared on the handheld console Gameboy from Nintendo. As the digitized version of the Russian folk song ‘Korobeiniki’ rang out, wafting along with the notes came a plethora of emotions that swept me up and took me back in time. A time when life was simpler, a time when I was a child, pure, innocent, thoroughly adoring of my mom and, patently terrified of my dad. My dad, Appa - The strapping young man with flowing hair falling down his forehead; a thick, bushy moustache and a fearsome temper. The guy whose return from office in the evening would fill me with a sense of foreboding. I was mostly a good kid growing up, not getting into much trouble, and yet even the remote thought that I had committed an infraction would make me shudder and beg mom – “amma, don’t tell appa, please!”  And yet – the memory of Dad that came to me at that moment wasn’t of the guy with the imposing manner that I was scared of. It was of a version of my dad that I didn’t experience much during my formative years, a version that I desperately wished had been there more often during my adolescence, a version that would manifest itself years later – on a wonderful evening in an alien setting (ironically, a place where I would be referred to as an ‘alien’, but more on that later) – my dad, the friend.

I waited with bated breath as my dad opened his suitcase. Appa had just returned from a business trip to America! What gifts had he brought for me? Out came a white remote controlled car (Yay!), a set of plastic cars (No wonder, upon me joining the automotive industry years later as a young man out of grad school, one of my aunts remarked, “Oh … You were always meant to end up there !”) and a brick like grey colored box with pink buttons on it with a little slot in the back for a cassette. I quickly lost interest in the box, and spent the next few days happily terrorizing my mom by operating the RC car all around the kitchen floor. Soon enough though, along with the battery, my interest in the car ran out as well. My desperate curiosity piqued, I turned my attention to the grey box. I had seen my dad fiddle around with it early in the morning with some funny yet catchy sounding music emanating from it. Now, I noticed the words Nintendo GameBoy on it. Game? Now that sounds like fun! Why didn’t I look into this before? My dad saw me fiddling around with it and excitedly came over and showed me how to play “Tetris” – a game in which blocks of varying shapes fall from top and your job is to arrange them in a way in which ‘rows’ get formed and therefore vanish, reducing the height of the stack of blocks, thereby freeing up space on the screen and increasing your points. The goal of the game was to make sure the screen didn’t fill up, thereby ending the game. With every 10 lines cleared, the level would increase and so would the speed at which the blocks came down. Simple enough. At first it seemed rather tough and not so exciting but gradually as I got better at it, the game started to extend a certain obsessive grip around me. The driving force was two pronged – a desire to better my own score and also to beat appa’s score. Gradually, from dreading appa’s return home from office, I started looking forward to him coming home, setting down his office bag and beaming at me saying” Alright Abbu (my dad’s nickname for me), what score did you reach today? Gimme that console now!” We were friends in competition, spurring each other on to outdo the other, and yet secretly wishing that we would win. And this went on for days and months on end, father and son competing at a game of Tetris. Till time passed, we both grew out of it, life happened and we gradually fell back into the more formal nature of our father-son relationship. And my dad remained just that – appa. The guy who enquired about my studies, my plans for life and supported me through it all, as a father would his son. Not the friend who would put his arm around my shoulder to check on how I was dealing with the vagaries of growing up, the troubles of adolescence, the worries of young adulthood. Sure – over the years, there were the odd moments that transcended our formal relationship; Like the day I got home from successfully clearing my first job interview, when I put out my hand to shake his hand(yes – that’s how formal we are) and he actually gave me a hug or when just before I walked into the airport terminal before flying off to the states for the first ever time, when he caught up with me just out of earshot of mom and said “You re on your own now, son. Just live your life! (Wink-wink).” I suppose he did have it in him, he just didn’t know how to express it often enough.

It went on that way, through high school, college, grad school and ultimately till I became my own man (so to speak) and settled down into a routine 9-5 life of my own in the US. While my family as a whole visited me on 2-3 occasions, just once, he came over to the US on yet another official visit and we got to spend a whole weekend together exploring Chicago. Just father and son, talking about random things, walking along the waterways through downtown Chicago, and bonding over a glass of …. Let’s just say – good stuff ;)  And having downed it with the panache of a seasoned campaigner, my dad leaned over conspiratorially and said “Abbu … don’t tell amma !” J  I looked at him - the flowing hair long since thinned and receded, the moustache grey and the demeanor, while still fiery at times, largely mellowed with age, and just smiled and shook my head. The child had become a man and the man had become almost child-like. And yet – it was those childhood days all over again. Here was the friend I had longed for  and missed for years. I wished for time to stand still then and there.

In today’s hectic life, with us being on opposite sides of the world, I and appa hardly get to interact. There is no real excuse for it; that’s just how we ve always been. Dad has never been a man of many words. It’s usually mom that monopolizes my interaction with home, relating every single little happening of the day, just to make me feel like I am still there with them and not missing out. But every now and then, Appa does go beyond the cursory “Hope you re doing ok. I ll give the phone to amma”, enquiring about my cricket matches or some post I put on Facebook, or sharing pics of a rocket launch that he captured from the beach in Chennai. But typically after a couple of minutes, we both relapse into awkward silence, not quite knowing what else to say. I guess that’s just how we will always be.

When I look back over all those years, I can perceive the influence my dad has had on me in so many ways – some tangible, many intangible. From the walking style to his ‘classy’ bearing to being there selflessly for the family, putting our needs and happiness over his, and equanimity in joy and sorrow, struggle and success; I would say – if I could be one-hundredth the man my dad is, I would consider myself accomplished.

 Inspiration, guide, living example …. He’s been everything a good father can be. The everyday life I lead today is testament to that. And yet – whenever I listen to the GameBoy version of the ‘Tetris’ theme, I will always remember, with a certain wistfulness, that version of my dad that was, is and will always be my favorite – Appa, my friend. 

TopGun