The insecurities
Akhil loves storytelling time. He imagines a multitude and wants to convey a million things. It's fascinating how blissfully he con construct something totally random and make sense of it. There is a Neato cleaning robot at home which Akhil is super scared of and so we have carefully hidden it. Every bedtime ritual involves something about this robot. Appa, tell me Neato stoiee (story). First, it went along the lines of, "Akhil pressed the Neato button. The Neato went near Akhil's kaal (feet), Akhil got scared and so Appa pressed the button, and the Neato went back to the charging station." After some time, who pressed the Neato button was a game by itself. Sometimes, it was a dinosaur; sometimes, it was his friend, Mukund. Sometimes, Akhil was the savior in comforting everyone who was scared of the Neato. Storytelling has evolved over time. It used to be me leading him on a story. I used to frame whatever imagination I had in con...