Master Mama…

 

And it finally happened. You are relieved from all the physical pain you’ve been enduring for years now. You left us, and went to a happy place.

We all know it must’ve been very tough for you to accept that you are not the tiger-like man that you used to be, and that you had to depend on someone else for the easiest and smallest of your activities.

And how you would cry every time you would see me come visit you. And see S talk to you in his broken Tulu. And try to converse with us in your feeble voice. And then cry again, because you knew you weren’t audible and that we would have to see you at your vulnerable worst. :(

I spent most of my summers around you, all of them my most happiest, growing up taking one Cadbury’s Eclairs from you each day(quite an expensive deal 23 years back, a story everyone in the family still talks about, about how you pampered me in  your own sweet, silent way), being paid in paisa for every grey hair we plucked (that is how you used to keep us kids occupied during those hot summer afternoons) , learning how to draw my first ever cat drawing from you(the drawing teacher that you are, you taught me the technically right way to do that), standing for hours in front of the big beautiful tilting mirror in your room and play with the cousins and run away the minute we heard your TVS come in, wearing that saree and imitating Maami talk to you and see you smile with joy at your little niece do such antics, buying you one perfume bottle every time we visited and seeing you smile like a small child…

I can never forget the happy smile in your eyes when you met S the first time, and learnt that he spoke Kannada. And then you went on to have long beautiful conversations with him, and me listening to you talk to each other in the background. That peace it gave me to know that you approve of my husband, and in fact loved talking to him… You were closest to being a grandparent to me. And today I don’t even have you.

PS: Master Mama is my Mom’s elder brother, whom passed away on 15th Nov, 2011, after years of being bed-ridden and unwell. :-(

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