Eternal Love Of Grandparents

What came to your mind when you saw the title “Eternal love of grandparents” ?I try to remember the last time I took to pen to write about my feelings. You see we have become so used to technology that the old fashioned write ups have ceased to exist. Our worlds have started to revolve around technology and AI. 

But last year was tough. Everytime I started to type about my feelings on my notepad, something blocked the flow of emotions. Being in the creative profession, writing is what I do. But the past six months have passed in a haze. I try to recall the events of the past few months so that I can piece together a series of events and try to understand it all in a better way, only to fail repeatedly. 

Last few months, I was on autopilot mode, trying to brush away my feelings, trying to hide myself from it. When I say “myself” here, I refer to the little girl who lost the two most precious individuals in her life. That little girl suddenly felt like she was pushed in the whirlpool of life, trying to catch a hold of something to keep floating, trying to get out of the web of life and death, trying to just exist. She wasn’t able to process the hurt that fell down on her like a grenade. These past few months have passed in a certain numbness that exists for a few seconds after the bomb blast. 

You know, I look back at it, and I am still not quite able to understand how and why it happened. Sure, you can give me all the logical and medical explanations in the world, but the heart knows no logic or follows the laws of medicine. Death is like that. It can make you question everything; the working of the world, the way you live life, the way you love, the way you accept hurt and the way you process grief. Everything!

And since then I have been trying to muster the courage to go back to those moments after the blast, the moments that in reality last for only a few seconds or minutes, but for me, they lasted for several days, months. The other day I talked about it with a friend and he said ,”You’ve got to stop. You have to process and the only way you know how to do it is write. You need to write about it. And I don’t mean TYPE, use your PEN.” So today, taking his advice, I put my pen to paper after what feels like eons.

I mean I had to do it. That unprocessed grief was killing me on the inside. I knew that for a fact because numbness was taking a new form of loneliness and emptiness. Hence, what I am writing here, is just a way to remember those two gems and a way to create a path for my grief to flow out from the triple cage of my heart, body and soul, where I have held it hostage. It’s just an attempt to put some weight down, an attempt to allow my heart to finally grieve and feel the hurt that it is feeling after the loss of my grandparents.

It was one cold night in November when we got the news of Grandpa passing away. My father was home on leave, which was just a coincidence. He was home after one whole year and he was supposed to go meet grandpa soon. 

When I try to go back to the days I remember him from, I can only remember that last conversation with him. To quote him verbatim, he had said, “It’s so pleasant here. I will always stay here.” 

You see, it was a whole sentence he had said, and it was the first time he had spoken to me in whole meaningful sentences since Alzheimer’s had started to eat away from his mind. 

The more I try to recollect and organize my memories of him, the more it seems to slip away. As if Alzheimer’s was stealing not only from his memories but also mine!

In my recollection, he is a tall and slim individual who walks with a certain poise and speaks rather clumsily. My earliest recollection of him is riding piggyback on his shoulders. I still remember that day as clear as the sky itself. His serene white kurta pajama contrasting against the vast stretch of green for as far as the eyes can see. 

I can still hear his deep husky voice calling out my name saying, “I brought Cadamba and Pomelo for you. You like it no?” 

I want you to know grandpa, I have never tasted anything more juicy and just the right amount of tangy as those fruits you got me.

Fast forward a few years, and there he is, teaching me a very valuable life skill “Kneading  a dough”. He is sitting in the verandah, his hands meticulously moving to slowly mix the water with the flour. He said, “Remember to put the right amount of water the first time. It is extremely important in order to obtain a soft, supple and smooth dough. Not too much, not too little.”

Then I remember him in our backyard, teaching me how to chew on a sugarcane and take out ice apples from its shell. His storytime sessions in the mango orchard had their own charm. He would peel some for me while telling how the tree gives you exactly what you give them, along with all the neighborhood stories. 

And suddenly, it all goes blank and I am brought back to the time when Alzheimer’s had made its home amongst your memories and I am filled with a certain longing for your recognition.

Oh! How I wish to hear your voice call out my name for one last time, for one last time for you to hug me like I was your own flesh and blood, for one last time to piece sugarcane for me as I couldn’t chew on them.

Your loss, the news brought down a heavy hammer on our chests. And that hammer sat so snuggly on grandma’s chest that it stopped her heart only a few months later.

To talk about her is something I couldn’t bring myself to do. I’m sorry grandma I couldn’t share what I felt earlier. I didn’t know how to. I couldn’t decipher how I was feeling. I still don’t think I have processed it. If losing grandpa wounded my heart, your loss blemished my soul. I didn’t instantly cry – as I thought I would if I lost someone I deeply love – and that weird and new feeling shocked me. It scared me. I started to question the bond we shared, that parental, ancestral love.

You see, your demise came as a shock. We were waiting for your arrival,we had prepared for it. I had this whole thing planned in my head that how will it be when you would come to stay with us. I had anticipated her befriending Sher and instantly becoming his favorite hooman on the entire planet. I had anticipated her walking around the streets and market places of Chandigarh and slowly falling in love with the city and learning to hum the same tune that the city plays. Just like I had when I first came here.

Her death taught me that the universe works in mysterious ways. I saw a dream, a vivid lucid dream comprising the death of a dog I was taking care of. I thought this dream signifies that he(the dog) wouldn’t be able to make it. But an hour later, my uncle called to give us the news. I told my mum about this dream and she said, “She loved you more than anyone else. See, she made her way back to you at her last moment.”

And I still can’t wrap my head around the fact that it was her that came to me through that dream. She took her last breath around the same time. And that makes me question, could I have saved her? Had I acted promptly, or had I known could I have saved her? And that question has been the source my numbness drew upon to make space for emptiness. 

What’s more strange is the fact that the dog I dreamt about survived another month but then he died exactly the same way as he did in my dream. This incident is as eerie as it is spiritual and it makes me question the working of this universe.

To think about her – my grandma – she was a powerful and strong willed lady. She did things on her own terms and was revered by the entire family. With her charismatic persona, she would convince people to act on her command. I remember her standing tall and erect. Age hadn’t touched her, except for her snow white hair. 

Human mind is a fascinating organ, with the ability to both assist and deceive. Her memories have arranged themselves in a beautiful mosaic inside my brain. Whenever I venture into the nooks and crannies, I am welcomed by her big wide laugh. Her loving eyes followed me through the tiny window in this maze. 

I am the first born in my family. So naturally I was loved the most. I had the most undivided and truest form of love, care and attention of everyone in the family. She would hoist me in the arm and she would take me around to meet people since I was 10 days old. She would massage my frail limbs 4x a day. Being born with pneumonia, I had her unfaltering attention and exceptional care since day one.

No matter how young my youngest cousin was, when it came to bedtime – and this is from all the summer vacations I have spent with her – I would be the one to sleep closest to her, hugging her while she told us stories. Even then I wouldn’t want to let go of her. Sometimes she created those stories and at others she would narrate one from her own memories as a child. I don’t remember when I used to fall asleep, listening and recreating those stories in the stars above. This is by far the fondest memories of my childhood.

Another incident that I remember as fresh as dew is from the time I started menstruating. My mother wasn’t around and I came back from school with a drenched skirt. Mind you, not stained, but drenched. White skirt all drenched in blood. As soon as she noticed, she hugged me and said, “Everything will be fine. You will be okay. I will wash and clean it.” as if she was saying she would wipe the traumatic experience of walking home from school in a blood soaked skirt.

She couldn’t quite wipe the trauma but she rubbed that skirt till it was free of every trace of blood and with that was able to blur the sharp pointy edges of that trauma. 

Another beautiful memory I have of her is her protecting us kids from the wrath of my mother. She’d always say to my mother, “Don’t push the child too far away with your wrath.” One thing my mother has failed at miserably. Her anger is contagious and it pushes people so far away at times that it gets difficult to find a way back.

During one of those summer vacations, I taught her how to write her name. Being married off at the age of thirteen, she did not have the opportunity to go to school, or study. But her eyes, oh my god those eyes! I cannot forget when the official pushed towards her a thumb stamp and she looked at me and said, “Give me a pen. I will sign. I don’t need to stamp my thumb anymore.” Her face was shining with resolve. 

The official looked up at her from his work dumbfounded and followed her gaze to meet mine. I nodded slowly at him with tearfilled eyes. It took her a good five minutes to write her full name “Rajkumari Devi” in hindi. But a profound ecstasy danced in her eyes and pride covered her face which was overshadowed with a childlike and vulnerable innocence which she had while writing those two precious words. My gran never used a thumb stamp ever after that day.

Woof! I cannot stop, can I? When it comes to her, there’s just so much. A lifetime of memories, an ocean of love and a sky full of lessons. She was a vivacious lady, the life of the party kind but what consumed her these last few months was grief. She lost her old vivacity and charm.

Grandpa left behind a void in her heart and she was not able to fill it. Slowly, it grew from there until it swallowed her whole. Sometimes I think it wasn’t grief but love that consumed her. What is this, if not love? It’s love that made her reject a world without grandpa. From a distance, it’s a perfect love story. And that’s how I’d like to remember them, strong, courageous and in love, till their last breath.

I am able to write about all this only after some time. It took me some time to shed that weird heavy grief and ingrain that piercing pain of both your losses into my being. It took me some time to allow it to become my chrysalis, my conch. I know, with time, it’ll ossify and both their absence will become more permanent in my eyes. Till then, I’ll hold a little tightly onto these debilitated memories to nurse that enervated child inside me.

Life has its limits and it always has an edgy frontier. It never feels like it, like the edge of a cliff until you’ve fallen off it. I want to keep our memories alive. 

I know, it’s not always possible to remember everything. Gradually you forget the things you never thought you could. Time swallows the past, life folds over it. Eventually. Seamlessly. 

But right now, I am not ready to forget, for time to swallow their memories, for life to fold over it. I am not ready. Not just yet.

Also Read: Resilience Of Rescue

life love loss

Last modified: November 13, 2023