A 20 something person asked, can i ask you a personal question ?
& i was so confident to say yes.
Cause max whats that asked is about partners etc. I dont fear those questions anymore.
But she asked.
Have you attended funerals ? i said, yes 4 in total. I wanted to tell her about the near death experience too. But I didnt. It didnt fit the context.
She : how did you manage ? Does it hurt ? what do you do so that it does not hurt ?
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She is preparing for her grandparents demise that has not yet happened.
I told her I lost my mother 17 years ago. & it still hurts. My memory of what we did has faded. But the feeling, that experience has stayed. For some reason, i hugged my mom only twice. Well, hugs were not trending then.
I remember her walking away from the exhibition last. In her tussar silk kantha dress. She loved embroidery, delicate weaves & got all that she could afford. This tussar dress was her last. i have retained it. I have tried to keep all that i could. I dont know if that suffices as a memory. as her being around.
I see her in my dreams whenever i am going through a lot. or something that I cannot fathom. I go through her memories. Sometimes, i fight with her in the dreams. She was a person whom i could fight with. She was a strict parent to me. She despised me enough because i looked my grandmother and not her. She had as many flaws. I do too. everyone does. I never dared to say no to her. i did all that she told me to. It was also because i wanted her to like me so badly. I wanted her to look at me. to be with me.
& that longing has stayed. I feel like i want to share my sarees with her. Take her with me for my car rides. If at all, she should know that i have done ok good in my life all because of her efforts.
There is so much hurt that she left when she was 49. For a very long time, i could not remember the word ventilator because she was on it for the last four days. like always she had been admitted to the hospital, this time to not come back.
Its all so fresh. Its 17 years. I remember going for her last birthday & making what she loved. with so much love. She and her sister laughed over me. on all that i did. i took it on happily. She had worn that kantha yellow saree, that i wear when i want her here. that hurt does not go.
one should just cry it out loud. it s really impossible to forget the last time you ve seen a person. on the death bed. My sister had got her favourite flowers. they were laid on her. & she just went to the electrocution from the hospital. baba decided there was no point going home. She never went home.
Not only death but there are so many such distances / such seperation that somehow never get ok.
They hurt too. & that hurt never heals. It almost like an unhealed lesion opening up any time you want to cry over it.
but then, yes. i did counsel the person that its ok to cry when you are hurt and one lives with it.
eventually one gets better at acting like nothing happened, or acting like all s fine.
how else!
