Lamp of life’s dusk By Ambica Ananth

Thursday, 18 September 2014

Lamp of life’s dusk By Ambica Ananth

Lamp of life's dusk
By Ambica Ananth

"I am a little busy, I may not be able to come over. I am observing
the 'Pitrupaksha rituals," he told me over phone, canceling his
program to meet me. 'What!! You and Pitrupaksha rituals? I mumbled in
pained surprise and cut the line. This is the same man who had
made fun of his father's senile ways and detested going to the
hospital with him when he developed oral cancer. "I can't stand
the stench, I carry agarbattis in my pocket when I enter his room
and spray myself generously with a deodorant after coming out
....!" The unending complaints about his father when he was alive
or rather dying with cancer and now glorifying him in death, is it
for some 'punya' in higher world or for praises in this world ?!
Rituals performed during pitrupaksha are based on 'shraddha' i.e.,
faith and respect for our forefathers and to acknowledge their
role and blessings in making us what we are today.

Almost all parents believe that their children are great 'miracles',
but how many children once they grow up and make forays into
the wide world and feel 'Big" acknowledge the effort of parents
as "miracle workers"?

Very miniscule percent of them do and I very recently had the
fortune of meeting one son from that miniscule percent who do
something in return to parents, showing the same love and affection
they would have enjoyed from them in their childhood.

Three or four days back (incidentally during pitrupaksha) in a busy centre,
due to a traffic jam ahead, vehicles were moving at snail's pace,
bumper to bumper.

"Don't stare but observe, you may develop an eye for people
and places.." my high school teacher's advice I sincerely follow
and usually I witness something which will act like a touch stone, which
will motivate the writer in me to pen down the experience.

Looking around, I saw one young man carrying an old man astride
on his strong shoulders- and he was not hurrying, but was taking his
steps very carefully.

I observed him for some time, instinctively I asked my husband to
pull the car to the side and got down and crossed the road to his
side. "Eenappa lift beka... ? ( do you care for a lift ? ) I asked him. He
looked at me, smiling he showed his hand to the right and said that
their house was close-by in a lane. On questioning he also told me that the
old man is his father - who is a heart patient, a hypertensive man
and recently had developed boils on his legs, which opened up and
were causing lots of pain and distress to him. So, every other day,
he would carry him like this to the doctor's clinic, cause he can't afford to
engage an auto and public conveyance like bus is too cumbersome and
painful for his father. He tugged at my heart-strings by his statement.
"My father used to carry me as a child like this while climbing
Tirumala Hills, now roles have reversed..he is my child
now...eenanthiya appa..." ?! ( what do you say, appa ) he playfully
tickled his father's foot. Seeing the toothless grin of the old man, I
realized that he is one lucky father who is being looked after by
his son, 'now and here', he may not receive elaborate rituals after death
but his son is painting love colours on his life's landscape, when it
really matters.

Silently wishing them more years of mutual love and care I crossed
the road to get back into the car.

"Life's dusk brings it's lamp along" they say, yes, it shines in the
form of caring off-spring....
( published in DH ) .