🌍 Confession: I skipped the nightly video call with my parents for the first time in six years

Not proud of this one, but last night I let the phone ring twice and then declined the call. I told myself I would call back in ten minutes, and then it was suddenly past midnight. For six years I have called my parents in Hyderabad every night at 9:30 my time, no exceptions. My mother notices when I am quiet, so I did not want her to see how tired I looked. Work has been brutal since September, with a project that keeps changing its deadline every Thursday. I leave the office at 8, reach the room at 9, and eat standing up in the kitchen. The call used to be the best part of the day, and last night it felt like another task. That sentence sounds terrible when I read it back, but it is exactly how it felt. This morning there were four messages from my father, which is unusual because he types with one finger. The first said only all ok and the next three were photos of the mango tree outside our house. He did not ask why I skipped, he just sent me the tree. I replied with a thumbs up and then sat at my desk feeling like the worst son in Dubai. Tonight I called at 9:30 sharp and my mother answered before the first ring finished. She asked what I ate, and I lied and said rice and curry when it was biscuits and tea. We talked for eleven minutes, the shortest call we have had in years, and nobody complained about it. Afterwards I sat on the bed and realised I had been dreading something that cost me eleven minutes. I think the call is not the problem, the tiredness is, and I have no fix for that yet. Maybe I will move the long chat to the weekend and keep weekday calls short. My mother said on the phone that eleven minutes of me is still better than none. Anyway, tomorrow's call is at 9:30 and I plan to be there with a cup of tea.

Six years every single night without a miss is more than most of us manage, one skip is nothing. The biscuits and tea lie made me laugh though, I've told my mother I had a proper lunch so many times. She probably knows anyway. Mothers always know when you've eaten standing up in a kitchen. Did your dad send any more tree photos after the call or was that a one time thing?

I'd be careful moving the long chat to weekends, we tried that and it slowly became no chat at all.

The mango tree photos got me, because my dad does the exact same thing with his rose plants. I skipped a few calls during my first year in Riyadh and he never once asked why. Next morning there'd just be a blurry photo of a flower and a message saying water given. Took me ages to work out that was his way of saying he missed me, no fuss.