From the vortex of grief: The calm before the storm

 After listening to me for a while, my therapist told me: It sounds like you're struggling to accept what happened. The sooner you accept, the easier it will get. And she was right. Even though it's exactly a month now, I continue to struggle with what happened, and how suddenly it happened. Every morning I wake up, and there are a moments before I remember, and those moments are peaceful.  After that, memory hits me and I feel waves of disbelief, followed by pain and sorrow. The memory of the months before, weeks before, the days before, assail me. After wrestling with trying to forget these days (which is impossible), I have decided to go the opposite way and write about them. So here goes.

2020 has been a generally difficult year, and my parents have been no exception. I saw my dad sink more and more into isolation, and his silences haunted me. Because of all the restrictions and lockdowns, even though I was in the same city, I could not meet them. I tried to call, but my Dad would lapse back into silence after a few sentences. I worried about him constantly. Finally, in the latter part of 2020, I moved to an apartment closer to where my parents stayed. I felt really happy, because this meant I'd see them more often. My dad would come by every now and then, and even though he wouldn't stay for more than a few minutes, I'd love that I could see him so often. 

When 2021 came by, I was hoping for the same trend to continue. But in Feb, my Dad was diagnosed with a blood clot in his heart, and it left him shaken. He retreated further into his shell, and I couldn't reach him, even when I met him. But we were told that it could be medically managed and he was prescribed blood thinners. Soon after, the second wave of the pandemic hit, and everything came to a standstill. Life resumed in June, and by then, this blood clot seemed less threatening. He went about all his chores and didn't have any issues other than an increasing tiredness, which we attributed to his age. He visited the cardiologist every few months, and he was told that everything is fine.

Months rolled by, and it was October. One day, he heard this his brother who lived in the US had a major heart surgery. If he was shaken before, this left him shattered. I worried more than ever about him. I invited my parents and in-laws to my apartment that same weekend, in the hope that this would cheer him up a little. They all met, and that was one of the happiest days of this year for me. To have so many people I loved be under the same roof. 

I usually visited my parents once a month. My own health was shaky in October, and I had a back pain that rendered me immobile for a week. Sometimes I missed my daily call home during this period, and my dad would promptly text me Why didn't you call today? I'm worried. everything okay? Despite all this, in October, somehow, I visited my parents almost every weekend. I felt like it, and I didn't question it. In the first weekend of November, I again felt like going. I told my Mom, I couldn't come home for Deepavali. Can you make some sakkare pongal and thayir vade this Sunday? I will come for lunch.

She obliged, as she always did, and I went home on November 7th. I had a couple of watches that needed the strap to be loosened by adding more links, and is my way with all the chores that I can't do online, I handed it to my Dad. Can you please get this fixed?

He headed out in the morning, and came back around noon with the watches fixed. He had walked almost 4 km that day just to do this for me. I felt a little guilty when I looked at how tired he was, but he didn't begrudge me the effort. I told myself that I would return the favor in other ways, and moved on. I had lunch, and decided to leave. Just as I got into the car, I saw both my parents standing at the gate to wave goodbye, a hint of a warm smile on their faces. It was a beautiful moment, and I quickly took a photo. I will never understand why I took this photo. I rarely take candid snaps, and this was the first one of them I had taken in more than a year.

Two days later, on November 9th, I had a normal day. In the middle of a meeting, I got a call from my parents, which I promptly ignored. I called them back an hour later. My dad picked up, and said they had some trouble figuring out an online payment, but it was done now. The call lasted barely two minutes. At 7pm, my Dad sent me a message giving me some stock advice regarding a particular company. I replied that I didn't own any, and he said fine. At 10pm, my Mom told me he collapsed, and life as I had known it came to an end.

During that interminable night, I couldn't sleep a wink. My Mom sat in the corridor and cried incessantly. My tears were frozen in disbelief. I kept going back and looking at this photo. How could this have happened? Was it not two days ago that I met him, and he smiled at me? Just today that I spoke to him? A few hours ago when he texted me? How can he be lying there battling for life? Is this even real? I knew that he had a blood clot, but he has had cardiac issues since 30 years, diabetes and hypertension for more than 20, and nothing happened. Why now? He used to walk so much everyday, and barely ate outside. Why him? I'm only 27, and I feel so unprepared for this. Why me? My mom has had enough trauma for ten lifetimes. Deaths of a sibling, a parent, another sibling, and now this. Why her?

It has been a month now. Even now, the same questions come to me. I wake up in the middle of the night, in the wee hours of the morning, with the anguished pain of a wounded animal. How could this have happened? I touch the watch that I am wearing, the one he got repaired. I hear the seconds ticking away, the answer in that sound equally reassuring and disconcerting. This is life, and life goes on.