Death be Told!

Well I have been meaning to write since a very long time but life interrupted me yet again. I mean I did really make a separate word doc for all the topics that  I really do want to share my views on. So today I choose Death.  As a topic not that I choose death…well some people choose death anyways (Hey that’s another topic)..

Right so my Nanu (daddy is what we all used to call him) passed away on 15^th of Jan this year. He was about to turn 88. Was fairly fit except a few knee pains. In times of today we are so busy and we keep postponing a lot of things and take the family for granted. I was at work super busy with an event when I got the news. I couldn’t go that day. The next day and the next day, missed his cremation because the prime minister was launching the book I was working on. I did not see him one last time. I was so much in control of my emotions so as to keep my clarity at work that I did not cry. No one knew this happened at work. This is what we have become – strong or robotic I really don’t know. Life has not been very kind to me, I’ve faced some tough situations all by myself. I look back and realize how did I even manage them. My dad got a brain stroke once, his left side paralyzed; mom was out of town due to return the next day. I was a slave to my job then to. He called while I was on my way back and I hurried, drove rash and reached home only to find his hand peeping out the door. I rushed in to see him in that state and called the ambulance dragged him up to a sitting position because he was too heavy for me to do anything else. Took him to the hospital, managed the MRI, formalities all at the age of 24. My great grand dad, nearly 98 wanted me to stay back once for two more days but I had some work or something. His news came the next week.  

I’ve had a brief stint working at the hospital. I could not do more, not because of the erratic hours but the sadness that surrounds that place. You become strong yes but that happens much later. I remember doing my rounds in a cancer ward once and a patient who was not eating anything was my third patient of the day as the shifts changed. He looked at me and smiled, his frail body but that glorious smile I still remember. He said I looked his daughter who lived abroad. He said looking at me he was at peace that he atleast saw her. On my day off, he kept asking for me and the nurses assured him that I will be back tomorrow. He passed away in the middle of the night. I cried for two days. Then there was this Afghani kid in the pediatric ICU who was here all alone for his heart surgery as the parents could not afford to come. He could not speak English or Hindi and was begging to go back home. On my shift, I saw him he was out of his bed and I took his hand. The shocked look and the smile he gave me I’ll never forget. I used to extend hours and sit with him. Just read him books. He was sent back because of lack of funds to complete his surgery. I don’t know what happened to him.

Sickness makes a person so vulnerable, makes them realize the importance of relations and all this while I’ve realized that I prioritize other things over them. We watch all the end of the world movies and I get so scared that if tomorrow the world ends, there is so much I want to say to the people I love. I want to be close to them. I want them to be the last sight I see. We sisters are in three different continents, what if I die tomorrow. There will be so much I want to say. Those words will die with me anyway.