What's Normal Anyway?

What’s a normal life, really?

Maybe you should ask those who have never lived a “normal” life - at least by others’ standards.

When you visit a home where the host brings out a grand tray full of snacks, you smile politely, even though, in your own home, there’s no such ritual.

When someone visits you, you simply make tea and fry some pakoras or maybe just order samosas.

Now, what does that mean to the aunties of the world?

One might call you kanjus, and another might label the other, lazy.

But to me, it’s none of that. It’s just, cultural difference.

When you visit someone’s home, you might see their walls filled with family photographs, smiling faces from every milestone.

But in your own house, there are no such pictures, just paintings, maybe of nature, art, or abstraction.

Does that mean you love your family any less?

Or that they are less artistic?

Again, I’d say — it’s just cultural difference.

And then, there are homes where the kids run around, making a mess — toys everywhere — and their parents don’t seem to mind.

But in your home, you can’t stand that. You tidy up, and eventually your child learns to do the same.

So who’s right? Are they raising messy kids, or are you being too strict?

If you ask me it’s neither.

It’s just about priorities and upbringing.

We all raise our children in our own ways, the way our parents raised us, with the values they believed in.

Maybe there’s no such thing as a normal life, only different ways of living it.