In another month and a few days, it will be four years since Amma’s demise.
In this gap, I have changed a fair bit both internally and externally.
My own brush with an illness and a close oncological scare later, I am still trying to process what happened. With the support of friends, medical insurance through the employer, and some personal savings, I have sailed through. At the back of my mind, there is this constant dread that something extremely bad is going to happen, and I am going to end up a wreck physically and emotionally. It is just a nagging fear that seems to have found a permanent place in the head.
Coming to terms with my mother’s loss is an ongoing process. Grief never ends. It ebbs and flows. There are days when one questions the very premise for living. There are nights when one is pained by the decisions taken in the past. One is only able to remember the painful memories. There are days when one remembers the happy memories with great fondness and love.
When I walk and look at elderly ladies, I am reminded of my mother in them. When I visit the temples in the vicinity and see the elderly ladies offering prayers for their loved ones, I see a bit of my mother in them.
I got married last year and I thought I found a mother in my wife’s mother. But sometimes what we think is uni-dimensional and our thoughts are not reciprocated. No anger or malice, one just moves on, trying to find inner peace. It is foolish to expect an individual to change for the sake of another. Similarly, no one should expect you to change for their own sake.
In this journey of life and death, I have cremated, buried, and bid farewell to my share of loved ones. Somewhere, someday, I know, I will get the dreaded call, that my father is no more, and again I will have to perform the last rites. The process of overcoming grief at the end of the day is just futile. Somedays, we laugh, most days, we cry, we wear a mask, and try to go on with our lives.
I have decided to now stop explaining myself to people. Be it a loved one, family, or friend, what is the point? I have already been judged through the lens of their heart and mind. A preconceived notion has been set deep into their minds, and I can’t persuade them to change it. Forgive, forget, and move on, hopefully at some point grief too finds a way to break into smaller portions in the heart. Perhaps, someday, when I am no more, someone, somewhere, will sit, think, perhaps shed a tear, and write about me. Who knows…what is the measure of this life that has been lived? Did I do anything worthy? Who knows….
Nellikkai or the Indian Gooseberry is a popular fruit with a tangy and mildly astringent taste, which is available almost throughout the year in Tamil Nadu. When Amma was alive, she used to regularly make different varieties of pickles with nellikkai. Given below is a simple recipe that is modified from my mother’s original recipe.
Ingredients:
About 300 grams of nellikkai – A mix of small and medium sized berries.
Two spoons of mustard seeds.
Two spoons of fenugreek seeds.
One spoon of turmeric powder.
Five dried red chillies.
Two table spoons of salt.
Half a spoon of asafoetida.
Four spoons of sesame oil.
Two tablespoons of red chilly powder.
Two tablespoons of Kashmiri red chilly powder.
Process
Wash and dry the gooseberries properly. No moisture should remain on the berries. Slice the berries into small portions and discard the core with the seeds. This how it looks after you slice it.
Sliced gooseberries
Place a small pan on the stove, turn the stove on, and dry roast the mustard seeds, fenugreek seeds, and dried red chillies. After the mixture cools down pulse it into a powder in your electric mixer. Alternatively, use a mortar and pestle or stone grinder to make a fine powder.
Powdered spices
Place a medium-sized saucepan on the stove. Turn the stove on add a spoon of sesame oil to it. Now add the gooseberries and allow the berries to be gently cooked in them. Do not fry over-cook the berries. A few minutes of stirring the berries as they absorb the oil should be fine. You will get the aroma of the berries absorbing the oil. Turn off the stove.
Gooseberries being sauteed in sesame oil
Now in a mixing bowl add a tablespoon of sesame oil, the salt, turmeric powder, asafoetida, the red chilly powder, and Kashmiri chilly powder. Add a portion of the berries and mix it thoroughly with the spice mix. Now add the rest of the berries, another tablespoon of sesame oil and mix the berries thoroughly so that the spice-mix is evenly coated throughout the berries. The Kashmiri chilly powder adds colour to the pickle and enhances the taste.
Aachi Kashmiri Chilly powder.
Gooseberry Pickle
Ideally, you should let the berries mix thoroughly with the oil and spices and absorb the flavours for a couple of days and then start eating the pickle. But, you can also start eating them right away. Goes, wonderfully well with rice or rotis.
Please note that it is advised that gooseberries are not to be eaten at night. I don’t know the exact reasons for this. But, the elders in the family always said that do not eat gooseberries after sunset. There should be some reason for it. I don’t know what it is!
Do try out the recipe and share your thoughts.
A note – I know that living in the past or writing about the past will only bring more pain to the heart and the mind. So, I will take a conscious decision to move away from the past and celebrate my mother’s life through the recipes that she passed down to me and document them here.
Every single moment, You are in my thoughts. The mind’s eyes, They keep replaying, Every single moment, From the fateful day, That you fell down, The multiple visits to the hospital, The final journey back home, When you were in a coma, The last few moments, When the last breath, Escaped your nostrils.
The journey to the crematorium, Receiving your ashes in a pot, Going to the seashore, Offering prayers after lighting camphor, Then watching the mighty waves, Taking your ashes away in one mighty sweep, Standing there looking at the ocean, Wondering where life will take me. It has been 21 months now, But still every moment is imprinted in my mind. All the pain that you went through. I hope now you are free from all suffering.
Please tell me a way to overcome this grief. I am seeking to escape from this overpowering- Cloak of darkness that engulfs my soul. But I find no light or redemption. There are days when I just feel like sitting, Doing nothing. And staring at your photograph. Sleep evades me at night. Like a zombie I sit through the day, And coax my hands to type, And get some work done, So that the bills are paid on time.
Please show me a path, Out of this darkness. I know my battle is only mine. I can’t thrust the burden of my sorrow, Onto others and make them suffer as well. This is my grief, this is my pain. I have to find a way out of this maze, All on my own. How? I don’t know. I am trying to make sense, Of all the chaos within. Hopefully I can find some answers soon.
Last April – I commenced yet another A to Z Blogging Challenge. Amma fell down on the first Saturday, life went haywire – in a month she was no more. I will never know, how the doctors failed to diagnose something really critical with her kidneys, as I took her for a routine check up just three days before she went into a deep diabetic stupor. I lost her on May 6th forever. Her ashes immersed in the oceans. Have been dutifully performing the monthly rituals. March month we could not do the same because of Corona lockdown measures. Now as the lockdown continues and the future remains uncertain with most people agreeing that this lockdown will continue for some more days to come, the Varshabdeegham ceremonies – the annual rites are likely to get postponed. The vadhyar has recommended a wait and watch measure. No relatives are going to come with all these lockdown measures in place. If the vadhyar does manage to make it and we are able to complete the rituals peacefully, it will be a great burden off my chest.
I timed my break from regular work at the most catastrophic of times. My plan was to visit some pilgrimage centers after Amma’s annual rites and then return to active work sometime in May. Now with all recruitment frozen and my applications stuck everywhere, no travel possible, all I do is sit and stare at Amma’s portrait. Some small editing tasks come and I try my best to complete them to the best of my abilities. I am looking for work. I have written to one of my earlier employers as well. The lockdown puts everything on hold and we wait for the government to announce next steps. I was hoping once Amma’s rituals are done, I would be able to return to Thiruvallur. I would save 8,000 on rent. Now with no clarity – that’s also put on hold.
The unpredictable nature of things, the uncertainty, and the fear of failure on every side of things makes one lose sleep. On top of it am spitting blood and this is something that’s happening from last December and despite undergoing a CT-scan and an endoscopy nothing concrete has been diagnosed by the doctors. As I remain without a plan, without any future, I just stick with some memories of the past. When Amma would make pickles and vadams. I will no longer be able to relish the flavours of the dishes that she would make. All I have are some memories. How long I will live with these memories? I don’t know. Is my role here over? I don’t have answers for that either. But I know that I can’t leave before I offer my prayers at Kashi. So till we meet again, let’s hope for the best. Let’s stay positive. #OmShanti #OmNamahShivaya.
How swiftly time has flown by. It just seems like yesterday when I completed the cremation ceremony at the local crematorium. Acceptance that you are now a star in the heavens. Looking at the sky in the evenings trying to spot you among the millions of stars. Wondering if you are the star glimmering with a bit of greenish light or the one that has a bit of a pinkish glow. Staring at your portrait every morning and evening. Giving you an update of the day’s events before going to sleep.
Waking up in the middle of the night. Breaking into spurts of tears. Lamenting at a juncture. Also being comforted in the fact that you were in a deep coma not knowing pain or suffering and that the end was swift.
Don’t know where life shall take me from here. Just another fortnight here and then for the first time in many years, I will be without a job. April-end shall see the last rites being performed. I want to go on a long pilgrimage. To visit the temples you wanted to see. I want to culminate the pilgrimage in Kashi.
From there – where?
Will I merge into the river uttering your name and rise as a different person?
Nights are the most painful. For I am at home. The room where Amma breathed her last. The bed where she lost her will to live. There are memories associated with each artefact that’s carefully stored. When sleep chooses to evade me. I just get up and dig out some photographs, brief videos that I shot of Amma for Diwali and Pongal. I look at them – there are small snippets of her speaking. Inevitably I cry. How long has it been since I slept peacefully now? Several years to be honest. As long as she was alive, I used to worry, when will Amma regain stability and be normal. Now she is no more, I wonder if I will ever find a semblance of normalcy. Like a pre-programmed robot, I carry out my tasks, reporting to work, carrying out my duties, returning home, cooking, eating, washing clothes, showing my face at some functions or social meets. Try as much as I can, the last few painful months of Amma’s struggle remain deeply entrenched in my mind. Returning to the house, I make it a point to stand outside and remove my shoes. We used to argue. Amma used to scold me when I would wear shoes and enter the living room. She used to tell me – “Yen da shoes a kazhittu potutu va yaen da.” How many times have I had silly arguments with Amma – that would snowball into shouting matches. She wanted me to get a diwan made and put all my books inside it. To-date, I have not made the diwan. She wanted me to apply for a fresh ration card. She wanted me to get a new sofa-set. There’s a list of things that she wanted, I felt these were superfluous expenses and we could be without them. Her wish for an aquarium and coloured fish – that was something I accepted and in the last few months she would sit and look at them play in the water. She continues to look at the fish now – but now she is a framed photograph.
There are times when anxiety grips me, there is an intense throbbing pain in the chest, I feel my heart will burst and I sit down if I am at home or stop walking if I am outside and breathe deeply – exhaling and inhaling till the pain leaves me. I cross Ramachandra Hospital everyday twice – that’s my route to work and back. There’s intense anger, there’s pain, sorrow, a sense of doomed failure, that I let her down. If only, I had not gone to work on that fateful Saturday – would things have been any different? This guilt will keep haunting me. I am not able to forgive myself! Sleep cycles have gone for a toss. I don’t know when the tears dry and when the eyes shut and there’s some frantic sleep. I don’t know when I awaken and begin the battle afresh every day.
I have spoken to my employers and requested to be relieved. They have been kind and supportive. In another three months, this tenure shall end. April is when Amma’s first annual rites are scheduled. Perhaps after that there will be some solace? I do not know where I am headed? I don’t know what I am going to do? There are debts and loans to be repaid. Without any assurance of another job or pay-check. I have taken a foolhardy decision,may be I will regret this, may be this is a necessary decision. I don’t know – perhaps time will offer answers.
Kashi is where the answers lie. Once the annual rites are done, perhaps I would wander like a nomad. Not necessarily donning a saffron robe. The robe is just an outward manifestation. It is what lies inside. Perhaps within the crowds, I will merge. Away from the trappings of what society or family expects me to do. An identity that an aghori had blessed my mother with when she was carrying me as a seed in her womb.
Hinduism is not just a religion – it is a way of life. What makes it unique is it that it gives the believer the freedom to worship any god or goddess of his / her choice. There are no restrictions. Ceremonies and rituals are laid out to help the believer find the divinity within themselves. As Swami Vivekananda famously said – “Religion is the manifestation of the divinity already present in man.” The moon plays a significant role in ceremonies associated with the Hindu pantheon of gods. Both Amavasai and Pournami have specific rituals and poojas associated with Shiva, Vishnu, and various manifestations of Shakti -the mother goddess.
The Mahalaya Amavasai is considered to be extremely important as it marks the day when one makes offerings to our ‘pitrus’ (forefathers / ancestors). Our elders are venerated and we make offerings in their memory seeking their blessings. The ceremony known as ‘tharpanam’ is performed under the guidance of a priest. Essentially one offers water, rice, and black sesame seeds with the darba grass reciting slokas recounting the names of three generations of ones ancestors.
Mahalaya Amavasai is also an important date in the festive calendar as it marks the arrival of Durga Puja and the Navarathri, celebrated with great pomp and fervour in Hindu families.
Gratitude is an emotion that should be ingrained in each one of us. We should be thankful for where we are and what we do. The world over there are millions who are in pain, suffering, or dying; but we remain alive and we should be grateful for it.
Mahalaya Amavasai gives us the chance to thank our elders, show our gratitude to them, and seek their guidance in our actions.
This year – Amma left me – this Mahalaya Amavasai I will seek to find her blessings as the priest guides me with the slokas.
Tomorrow will mark two months to the day when you finally breathed your last. Everything seems like a blur. Last December, a week before your birthday, one night you spoke for a long time. I was getting worried as you recounted about the serials that you watched on TV and the neighbours and the children playing in the corridor. The next morning, you gestured saying, you were no longer able to speak. I took you to the hospital, test after test and recuperation and after all the experts visited, they said there was a phonatory gap and you needed speech therapy. I brought you home on your birthday Amma, do you remember. Like raising a child, teaching you the alphabets, bit-by-bit I coaxed you to speak. By the time January ended, you seemed to be back to normal in terms of speaking. But you lost your sense of hearing completely. Still, we managed. The renal functions were growing weaker, the heart to becoming weaker. As your legs would swell up suddenly, Lasix injection would come to the rescue. We had to cut down on liquid intake to 750 ml a day. I still felt you were growing stronger and would be fine.
Then on that fateful Saturday – the first Saturday of April, you fell down. We had to summon the support staff to climb into the verandah and open the door. I wonder now, if on that fateful day I had worked from home or if I would have been on leave, would you have not fallen down. Would you be resting in the bedroom when I would make the evening tea and bring it to you? I don’t know Amma. I have lost you forever. You are now relegated to a photograph framed and placed in the front room.
Taking you to the hospital again – surgery for the hand that broke. Bringing you back home, the doctors failing to diagnose any major issues in the review, returning back home and you slipping into a deep slumber. The blood tests done with you in slumber at home. The insane spike in sodium, potassium, and creatinine values. Again taking you to the hospital with your head on my lap, I knew I had lost you. The Emergency doctor saying – either admit her to the ICU or take her back home. The decision to give one last try despite knowing the inevitable. Dialysis after dialysis followed. For one brief window of five minutes you were conscious. You said the back was hurting. the nurse said medicated pad had been placed for bed sores. Amma said “Take me home”. Those were your last words.
With the doctors being clear that the situation would remain the same and barring a miracle you would remain in this vegetative slumber, we brought you home. Do you remember Amma? Somewhere as a spirit, as a star, wherever you exist, in any other dimension or astral plane, I want you to know I tried my best, whatever I could, I tried. I still could not save you. You gave up on life, you gave up on me, you gave up on Akka, you lost your will to live this time around. We brought you home on Sunday afternoon. The home nurse was hired to start service on Monday. She arrived on Monday. We gave you food in liquid form through the nasal tube. At 3:15 in the afternoon, you breathed your last with a massive sigh. I could not cry, I have still not cried to my heart’s content. I don’t know when the dam within will burst and I will be able to cry till all the tears dry up.
The cremation was done on the same evening. The next fortnight saw all the associated rituals being done. I hope you have found peace Amma. I hope you are finally free of all the physical pains that afflicted you in this mortal world. I hope you are smiling as you do from the picture that’s framed and stares at me. Try as much as I can – the emptiness is vast, never-ending like a chasm that does not end, or like a tunnel that keeps going deeper into the bowels of the earth. I speak to you looking at the photograph. Wishing you good morning and good night. I wish you when I leave home, I wish you when I return. It is almost like you have never left. Just that I don’t hear any replies from you or I don’t get to eat anything that you have made. No, I do. The last batch of pickles that you made still remains. I am tempted to preserve them / but then again, everything comes with an expiry date – like life itself. So I have to savour the pickles before they turn bad.
People ask me – when I will get married. they say – now that you have gone, there will be no restrictions and I will find a bride soon. But what is the purpose of another relationship? Of creating a life of love and longing and then to lose them again on some day and then suffering through the cycle of loss and grief all over again. There is a sequence in the animated classic “UP” where the old man Carl remembers all the beautiful memories of Ellie – the girl whom he loved and married and eventually lost to illness. He decides to fly away to Paradise Falls with balloons linked to his house, away from all the madness of the big city.
Where do I run away? Wherever I reach, the pain and grief within will not end.
Office – home – office – this has been the loop. I have not managed to get the patience to go to a theatre and watch a movie. The spare time that I have – I try to read books that remain at home. Attention deficit is becoming a big problem and the mind deviates with some memory or the other popping up. Focusing at work is a challenge that I have somehow managed to keep in control as the debts that need to be repaid loom large and scare me into submission. I honestly don’t know Amma what I am going to do? You have gone, left me, all alone here. Relatives console, support, pray, and help but to what avail? The emptiness that remains in the soul, how will I ever fill up the limitless void. I don’t have any answers Amma. Sending you lots of love and light and hope you are in a safe and better place now.
Amma departed her physical form in this life on May 6th. It was a long battle. The past three years being the most painful as she was hospitalized again and again with persistent cardiac and renal complaints. I am trying my best to come to terms with her absence, but try as much as I can the last ten days when she was alive – reduced to a deep slumber/vegetative state just do not leave my mind. The one brief moment when she was awake, she said “Take me home.” – Those were her last words. We brought her home in an ambulance, we made the last journey as comfortable as possible. Till 3PM I kept rubbing her feet. At 3:20 PM she breathed her last. We managed to give the holy Ganga theertham as per tradition and I cremated her the same evening.
The following morning, I received her as an earthen pot full of ashes. It was a long drive to the ocean, we went to a secluded portion of the Thiruvanmiyur Beach and the ocean took her in one massive wave. Her physical form reduced to ashes now one with the elements. The next few days – ceremony after ceremony with rituals laid down by the scriptures. Money being spent like water. Family is the lifeline that keeps us sane. Sister, brother-in-law, mama, and mami everyone was there to help and guide. It is exactly 21 days today. On May 6th at this time, I was putting a fistful of rice into my mother’s mouth as we prepared to cremate her. With her passing, the strongest anchor that kept me sane for all these years has departed.
What does the future hold?
Family-members say, I will be married within a year, that’s how the blessings of the dear departed work.
At work, I still hold a job, thanks to an extremely supportive organization and team. I am trying my best to immerse myself in work. There are moments when a memory flashes, and one tries bravely to not let the tears show. Or go to the men’s room and lock oneself up in the toilet, cry for a while, and then come out, and try to focus on the long-pending editorial calendar that needs to be completed.
I don’t know, having been a loner, practically all my life, with friends in single digits, I am not sure where this journey will take me. For the next one year, there are monthly rituals to be performed and again ‘daanam’ and ‘dakshina’ to the priests. So will I continue to be here in this house for a year? Or will I just pack all my belongings and leave one fine day to find purpose in life? My sister has warned me to be normal 🙂 She as well as my brother-in-law are scared that I will pull a ‘Jason Bourne’ and go missing 🙂
Jokes apart. I intend to introspect seriously, on what I wish to do. I really can’t run as EMIs for multiple loans taken for Amma’s treatment and the house in the village need to be repaid. Perhaps an academic program, or a new skill to learn, not really good at languages, or perhaps finally learn to play the violin.
Who am I trying to run from? Where am I running to? Does a new place bring peace? The brain remains the same, The memories that haunt me now, Will continue to haunt me tomorrow, Where does one find a balm, To soothe the anguish within? No answers, only questions, Till I see you again, Farewell friends.
Teerthadanam 