“Smile,” she said.
“Smile,” he
responded with a grin.
Now emaciated
and frail, he is hardly able to take two steps without help. At eighty five
plus, I wonder what goes on in the cloudy brain of his.
I remember
the first time I met him, almost thirty three years back. He had presumably
come to meet his old classmate (my dad), but I knew that he had come to meet me,
to see whether I would fit into their family as a daughter-in-law!
As a young
adult I had no desire to get married. I wanted to study further, maybe make a
mark in this world.
My nerves
untangled and relaxed when I first met him. He spoke to me as if I were his daughter.
It took me some time to break barriers and mind blocks and to agree to be a
part of his family.
As the years
passed and I saw him transition from being my “father-in-law” to being a
grandpa to my children and still later I saw him play his role to the next
daughter in law of the house and form a new relationship.
I knew that
first and foremost to him I was a daughter. He confided in me, he asked advice
and gave advice, and many a time stood up for me when I was being criticized.
The best thing was when I was thirty five, he gave my age as twenty five to the
travel agent to make tickets!
He is by
nature a very quiet man who adores his wife and family. I had heard from the
others, that as a young father he had been a terror about discipline. I never
saw that side of him. He never forbade me about doing anything, nor did he
reprimand me when I did certain things he disapproved of, but in his own inimitable
way, he let it be communicated to me.
He was
especially good with numbers. You could ask him any tabulation with vast
numbers, he would always come off with the right answers.
He first
noticed that he was having trouble walking with a steady gait when he was
seventy two. After consulting with some of the country’s best neurologists, we
came to the conclusion that he has slow nerve degeneration which cannot be
treated aggressively. Some tablets, exercise and physiotherapy were the only
way to delay the inevitable. I never took it seriously- a little unsteady or faltering steps did not handicap a person!
The change in
him was slow too…. He was more careful while putting out his feet, he got up
slowly and waited before moving (he already had a few falls!). The house was
now lined with handlebars for his safety.
We celebrated
his seventy fifth in Alexandria, Egypt. A quaint city on the Mediterranean sea where
we were posted then. He improved dramatically, he went for walks by the sea, the
Lord and Master (his elder son) took him to the hookah parlour, and he did the usual
touristy stuff without a murmur. We thought the tide had turned!
Was it
insecurity? Was it the little cobwebs that grew around his neurons? Or was it
just fate? He grew into a different person. He formed attachments which we could
not understand. He criticized many people. There was always some kind of fear at
the back of his eyes.
We all
noticed these changes, but as it is with all nuclear families, we were busy
with our own challenges and did not notice the cliff looming ahead of us.
We never
noticed that his conversation with us was getting limited to “Good,” “OK” and “God
bless you.” We did not want to acknowledge that the pair of eyes had an eternal
faraway look, as if he was not with us but in some other realm. We went on
thinking that he would get out of this stupor and say, “lets go out for dinner.”
Maybe it was all for the best, we lived on in hope and did not suffer the angst
of losing his essence.
Now, ten
years later, his recognition of most people has disappeared. Though he still recognizes his own family. Some of his past memories are crystal clear, yet he
forgets to say hello. His handshake is still firm and the smile when he crosses
the veil sometimes, is genuine. Even now, if you asked him what is 747
multiplied by 29, the answer would come pat with 21663! I would still be trying
to open the calculator app.
Soon he
needed help with everything. A series of attendants came and went. He formed
attachments and broke them with each passing relationship. There were some who
took exceptional care, who made an effort to talk to him to refresh is memory ,
try and brush away the cobwebs with the conversation duster and then there were
some who only did their duty and disappeared.
I met him
after a gap of one year. A year that took away my mother and dragged me in and
out of hospitals. I did not expect that he would remember me.
“Who is this?”
his wife asked
“Binny,” he
said without meeting my eyes.
“Who is Binny?”
she asked.
“My daughter,”
he looked at me shyly and smiled.
