Memories are forever

July 12th, 2008 | by Vijayaraghav |

 

 

Memories are forever

 

The sun surfaced on the horizon, leaving a golden glare over the hills. I stood on the sidewalk of the hotel watching that beautiful scene. A cold breeze caressed me with the fragrance of morning freshness. 

 

I took my car into the tiny city of Palghat and stopped for a bouquet at a flower shop.  I came to visit my aunt.  I owed a visit every year during her birthday.  I bought her favorite flowers and drove back.  

 

I parked the car in front of her house and walked into the courtyard. There were no other visitors. All I heard were the whistling of the wind in the pine trees that guarded her.  I stood in front of the place where she was cremated and slowly put the bouquet on that. My body cast a shadow over the place.  

 

When I was a toddler my aunt was like a friend to me. I was like an escort to her wherever she goes.  I spend most of the time in her house rather than mine.  As my parents were strict vegetarians I had to struggle to get homemade non-vegetarian food most of the times.  In one of those days when I was having food at my friend’s house she came unexpectedly.  As my friend’s mother and my aunt were childhood friends they used to visit each other whenever they have time.  When I visited her the same day, she took me to the kitchen and said “when you want to have non-vegetarian food, just tell me, I will make it for you.  Don’t go to others to eat it”. Then onwards she started preparing fish and chicken especially for me with her fantastic hands. I still feel the aroma.  She used to tell others by fondling my face that “What is there if I have not conceived him, he is my son”.  I used to have goose bumps when she says that. She used to kiss me, with full of love during those rare moments. 

 

During one of those smoggy evenings, she told me a story as to how she had measles when she was pregnant with her son. Her doctors believed that there is every likelihood of her son getting serious birth defects, and they advised her to have an abortion. But she didn’t hear that because she was in a dream about her beautiful child. She refused and told them that she knew her child would be beautiful, healthy and someone who would make her world with immense of bliss.  Though her son escaped having serious birth defects by god’s grace, he couldn’t escape his fate of becoming an epileptic.  It took her toll and made her so sad.   

 

We often spent our time in doctor’s clinic due to the sickness of her son.   He used to fall sick in regular intervals by putting us in turmoil.  We took him to so many specialists and they couldn’t help in curing the disease, which sometimes struck as a storm.  We even visited so many temples and prayed for him thinking that it may help in curing the disease.  But we had to live with hope for a long time.   

 

When I was fresh from my studies, I used to work as an apprentice clerk in a co-operative bank.  After I started going there, my aunt missed my company.  We used to go for movies more often on Fridays because there was always a new release on Fridays.  During one of those Fridays I got a call from her. She asked me “leave early, let’s go for a movie.” I became restless.  I was doing journal entries that time and my concentration went to docks.  The secretary of the bank who has the habit of pocking the nose unnecessarily noticed that.  He asked me whether I am ok. I got a chance and told him that I am not feeling well.  He allowed me to leave early and asked me to take rest.  I left the bank and went to the bus stop where my aunt was waiting for me.  We rushed to the theater and stood at the queue.  There was a big queue.  After a while, I heard someone calling my name.  To my surprise I saw my uncle standing in the same queue.  It seemed that he also bunked office to watch the movie.  I went to him and asked to take two more tickets. He asked me jokingly “Is that for your girlfriend” I told “No it’s for auntie!” He got surprised. When I showed the place where she was standing, he got a scare. I still enjoy in recapitulating the expression he fielded on his face that time, which was really funny.     

 

Ultimately when the time had come to rejoice, she fell sick.  It took me years to understand and appreciate how difficult her life had been. She was suffering from rheumatoid arthritis, which she was hiding from all of us. 

   

One day she fell in the bathroom.  She took it lightly but from the next day onwards she felt difficulty in moving the right portion of her body.  We took her to doctor.  After a detailed examination, he said she has paralysis.  Her right hand got paralyzed completely and made her bedridden for some days.  After one week she got up and faced the reality of strolling with the help of a walking stick.  We missed her delicious preparations and it was as if I lost my right hand.  She regained her lost courage and became more committed to life than earlier.  But god has prepared some different agenda for her.  She often got troubled with the ups and downs of sickness and rarely got up from bed. 

 

 

Last year when her son was cleaning her room, he found a diary packed in blue velvet cloth earmarked for me. When the dairy came, I was in a meeting.  During the break when I came back to my seat, I saw a packet lying on my table. I peeled off the blue velvet cloth and saw a diary with full of life.   

 

I flipped through the vaguely scribbled pages.  In most of the pages her elegant handwriting, which I had known from childhood, was missing.  While turning the pages I came across an entry. It was written in red ink, as if she felt something bad happening with her life. It said: “I am fed up with my life.”  

 

The kind of tenderness that, in her later years, would resurface only rarely due to her sickness, reminded me of what we had lost.

 

 

My eyes became wet and I looked at the wide blue horizon to feel her presence.