‘Riddhi’ or ‘Riddhie’

“Now this post shall clearly establish me as eccentric, but nonetheless I shall bring this story to the fore, as I know Riddhie would definitely ask us how we picked this name for her and why did I chose to spell it with a trailing ‘e’.”

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Dear Riddhie,

I would begin by quoting Shakespeare here “What’s in a name? That which we call a rose by any other name would smell as sweet” and now I would want to argue it :) 

I guess names are important. They are essential as they build the first impression about people just by sheer sound. You can quote uncle Shakespeare, right only for inanimate objects maybe. Who cares what a sweet smelling red flower is called? Call it a rose or call it cauliflower, it would still smell and feel the same. But with people I guess the rules change. We couldn’t have called you “Ganga Devi” or “Phool Kumari” for a million dollars (with no offense meant for people with these names). It doesn’t portray the right picture does it?

Let me then tell you the story about how we finalized your name & how it became “Riddhie” from “Riddhi”.

Like almost all first time parents we did buy a CD for baby names and looked up another thousand names on various websites. We listed down the ones we liked and included the suggestions made by friends and family (“Anjika”, “Aadya”, “Kaashvi”, “Katyayini” amongst others) yet we couldn’t actually finalize a name for you.

Though we were aware of the expected date of delivery and hence your sun sign, I was opposed to the idea of getting some ‘pandit’ or an astrologer to suggest a name for you. Your grandparents did ask our family ‘purohit’ for suggesting a letter and quite funnily he came up with “टे”. The case got nipped in the bud as no one could come up with a reasonable name beginning with the same. My method of filtering the probable names was to see if a matching domain name was available to give you your personal website and this wasn’t easy either as most of the names that we liked were unavailable.

When you were born, your Dadi was there with me in the hospital waiting for you to arrive. The nurse brought you to me after your first sponge and I clicked a couple of pictures and let your Dadi hold you in her arms. You were crying at the top of your voice and we were still trying to have an eyeful and marveling at the little wonder you were.

As I held you for the first time with, you seemed featherlike and extremely fragile and I was actually afraid of holding you too tight or too light lest you slipped from my arms. You fell asleep in my hands and me and your Dadi exclaimed that you looked just like your Mom. “Vidhi ki Riddhi aa gayi” was what she said and this kind of clicked.

I looked up the availability of a domain and found that only riddhie.com was up for grabs. In days to follow, the domain riddhie.com was registered and Riddhi got changed to Riddhie, the email ID riddhie.tandon@gmail.com was signed in for, your birth certificate with the same name was received and this blog was conceived. It took me a while thereafter to finalize the template and make initial few entries but I guess it was worth every minute spent.

When you grow up, step out into this world and make a mark for yourself I don’t know if I would be around to celebrate your success every time. Perhaps then, when people would call out your name to felicitate you and shower accolades on you, I shall take pride with every such name call.

Wish and pray that your name ‘Riddhie’ becomes as celebrated in whatever field that you choose to work in as it is for me and your family now.

 

Love,

Dad