The children of Peshawar!

For as long as I can remember, the news of new life, be it sandwiched between messages on my voice mail, be it hurriedly yelled out while waiting in line at the grocery store or be it announced with banners in the yard, simply makes me happy. Something about the fresh sprig of life has always made me take pause and participate in this universal joy with families I barely know, congratulating random grandmothers limping slowly on walkers or smiling at new mothers while I simply pass them by.

Years back I had taken an interest in reading historical fiction. Reading a book about Chengiz Khan, I still remember, I had to stop! The narrative was too disturbing! It plainly stated how his army felt nothing when they came before the women and children of their enemies, raping and killing the women, being merciless towards the aged and simply abandoning the infants in the severe cold of the plains. There was nothing civil about it and the fact that it happened centuries before did not relieve me of my felt sadness. I could not comprehend such hatred. I could not see how hateful anger extended its hood to envelope even the most innocent.

Any mother in any part of this world can affirm the immeasurable love that one feels towards children, especially young ones in that. The time and energy invested in each child is the unspoken given in most parenting. Patiently nurturing them, tending to the subtle quirks in their personality, making note of their favorite foods, protecting them infinitely, tolerating their vices and enabling them to be the very best they can, humans all over the world want nothing more than happiness and well-being for their children.

It is heart wrenching, when our greatest cruelty is unleashed upon the most vulnerable. It is especially numbing to see these beautiful children that hold the light of the future and make all our hardships worthwhile, simply put out like dust in dark corners. Who are these men, who have never known the warmth of a smiling child, who do not hesitate to squash life everywhere they see it, who squander and pulverize years of patient tending?  A shame indeed that the world has to be infested once again with such heartless warriors!

Is this all that we are capable of - raising a precious child and reducing it to ruin, like those of the many children in Peshawar? Years back, when I had read the book about the savage killings, I had hoped that it was a trait of the war hardy men alone, that a mother of those brutal killers might perhaps wipe the tears of an abandoned infant with simple kindness. It has to start somewhere! Simple kindness!