Adhi, thy name

I must have been some 12 years old when I decided my baby’s name would be Adhi. It was to be A-A-D-H-I, stressing on the ‘aa’ part. Simple. I don’t know why I came up with this name or why at that age I was thinking of my baby. I loved to play house-house game with my friends, I used to be the mom, and I wanted my baby to be Adhi.

Years passed by, I grew up but the name stuck with me. My baby would be Adhi, I dint care if it was a boy or a girl. Nah, that wouldn’t matter anyway, will it? Baby girl would mean living my dreams and seeing my childhood all over again and having a new little friend, life would be wonderful!

Baby boy would be fun, super fun, minus all the pretty dresses and dolls. It would be guns, video games, bikes and all the macho stuff at home. Life would still be wonderful and eventful.

So, for all my life, I stuck with this name. I even told RK fella that our baby would just be Adhi. There would be no discussions, no arguments and no second thoughts.
Now, this RK fella is a man with very few words and loads of thoughts. So he giving an ‘hmm’ response could mean anything from OK to lets see to NO. Anyway, I wasn’t to care about what he thought. After all, I have spent all these years on Adhi.

At my 21 weeks scan I was told that I was carrying a baby girl. Now, I was overjoyed and sad at the same time. All the frills, laces, pretty dresses, lovely curls, she would be my little princess. And sad because-what would happen to ‘Adhi’???

For the next few weeks RK fella and I hunted every website, every name base for a nice name. Nothing seemed to get a nod from both. I had very definite wants with the name.

1. The name should be in Sanskrit
2. It should have a Vedic meaning
3. It should be very unique
4. No one whom I know should have the name
5. It should begin with ‘AA’

RK fella wasn’t too happy with the name starting from A. He said it was too common and baby might be the first on the attendance register. So it was a definite NO from him.

He had very simple want-it should have his name and my name in it. Hence he came up with ‘Radha’. Now, Radha is a nice name, really nice. But dude, how happy will our Radha be when she is 21??? She might even put us up for adoption. I was totally against it. My baby won’t be called Radha- I said NO.

Then we finally agreed on Himali, after Himalayas. It was a nice name, we both agreed, easy to pronounce, easy to write, and it sounded sexy; Himali! That was it. For the next four months, she was Himali to us.

Then, one fine morning, I got a text from RK fella;

You want ‘AA’-I say ‘NA’
I want ‘Radha’-you say ‘NA’
So A-RADHA-NA!!!

Hmm, the Rajesh Khanna-Sharmila Tagore wala Aradhana??? I loved all the songs from that movie! It was a nice name no doubt; very old one, unique, started with ‘aa’, had vedic meaning, was in Sanskrit, and no one I knew had that name. But wasn’t it too long?
What’s more, we could still call her Adhi!!!

And the same morning I went into labour and our little Aradhana was born!