Opinion How to raise a boy: Lessons on life and badminton from my son

There was a time when I was an avid building-compound cricket player, but that was the extent of my affinity for sports. As I hit my teenage years, like the other girls in my neighbourhood, I “walked” or “cycled”, shying away from any intensive bodily activity.

How I wished I had learnt at least one sport well, I said aloud. “Why don’t you do it now? Learn table tennis,” my son said. I had never considered the possibility of picking up a sport in adult life, especially one that required me to play against an opponent. To be competitive, I would require agility, speed, and strength — all of which I lacked. But the conversation with my son lingered in my mind for several weeks. He had thrown a challenge at me, and I took it. I had to represent my fellow women in the next tournament, even if I took the participation number up by only one.

At close to 40, I did the unexpected and enrolled in a table tennis coaching academy. My son was impressed. The centre was set up to inspire. It had large portraits of champions, 18 tables in neat lines, rows of kids swinging their arms to get the rhythm right, some others knocking the ball with remarkable speed. The first week at the table, I hesitated at every shot. By week two, I thought my shots were getting better, but the kids, many of whom were shorter than the table, disagreed. They rolled their eyes and groaned when the coach asked them not to spin or chop the ball at me. It was humbling to be the only adult in the children’s batch that lost every single game. But there were no older female players in the academy, and the coach was certain I would not feel comfortable in the men’s batch. So, it was just that — a roomful of kids and me. I would have given up, except that I was trying to make a point that mothers do not quit.

One evening, after the session, I asked two kids on the bench about their school and then shared that mine was in grade nine. “You have a son!” one exclaimed. “Yes, I said. He is taller than me and plays badminton,” I boasted as they peeped at my phone to look at his picture in full badminton gear. Something shifted that day. I still didn’t win a single game, but among the boys, it was like I had earned credence on the court. As a mother, I basked in the quiet awe that younger kids feel for a teenager.

“Teach me,” I pleaded with him. “You have to build reflexes,” he said. He was egging me; he knew I was lady butterfingers. To defy him, I told him matter-of-factly that reflex is an instinct every parent knows when a child is too close to the edge of the bed. I just needed to channel that. But as he suspected, I struggled on the court.

His next lesson was on temperament. “You play every shot like it is for a win,” he explained. However, there was a caveat. The aggression, celebration and disappointment of the game were to be left at the table. I quipped, “There is a powerful life lesson in there. You are telling me to start afresh each day.” He gave me a look of dismissal — stop, it’s cringe, he seemed to say.

Finally, he told me I need to have “complete commitment when you are in the game.” In the many years of my adult life, I have not engaged in an activity that has required me to shut off completely from a ticking list of home or work-related tasks. This push was liberating. Be entirely present at every moment because there is no other way to play — for this alone, I would recommend a sport to every mother out there.

These days, in the evenings, when we are both back after two hours spent at our respective courts, he leads me through stretches and laughs as I complain of stiff muscles. When summer vacation started, I worried about the endless screen time that tends to build an invisible wall between parents and children. But sport has become an avenue to keep the door open.

As adults, we often set rules and expectations for how our children should live—the dos and don’ts of daily life. I let that flip for a bit. When a teenager sees a fallible adult, they might smirk at first, before becoming profoundly involved in showing them how to do things right.

The writer researches gender and work. She is based in Bengaluru and Ahmedabad