Honoring those we love

Today’s post is unabashedly dedicated to the one hero in my life who I do not recognize enough. My husband. And I say this not because I love him to death but because through the years I have seen him to show the kind of moral courage that many of us do not have.

Sure he has all his guy things- will not remember to reply to e-mails and will not “learn to love my parents” like I love his, but what he has is far more precious than any of this. It is in the small and some of the big things he does in his life.

When we were getting engaged the one thing that absolutely won my grand-ma over this NRI was that he did not “drink or eat non-veg”. Not that she considered any of this an evil. But to her this symbolized the courage of someone to stand up to his convictions under what must have been tremendous amount of peer pressure.

Similarly at work I have always seen him stand up for stuff he really believes in. And this includes talking to bosses and colleagues openly about their attitudes or actions. And I know that this is the reason that people at work take to him quickly and give him their trust so easily.

But one incident will always stay in my mind as the one act of bravery which may be I let pass to easily. One night on our way to Hard Rock café in Parel for a dinner, we saw a guy in a cab being beaten up by a bunch of goons. And Manish decided to do what very few would do. He decided to go challenge all these guys alone. And I did what I should not have done. I screamed and cried and refused to let him go. I admit I was scared like I had never bee scared in my life. And fear makes us selfish. I did not want to lose him and be left alone. Why for a stranger, I asked him? And told him that I didn’t care if he thought that I had no guts. I just wanted my husband to be safe. I wanted my world to be unharmed. But Manish was neither selfish nor scared. He knew that he believed in standing up for someone who was helpless and he did so.

So today when there is a call for nominations for bravery awards by Godfrey Phillips company on TV, I would like to tell him in the most honest way that I can- that I will always be proud of his courage, his conviction and compassion for strangers. I don’t know if I will ever be brave enough to do what you did, and I don’t if I won’t panic, but then you must stand up to that pressure as well. Love you.