God of Adversities

This is the story of my parents. This is a story about their trials and tribulations, about sharing a life together- of intermingled dreams and sacrifices , of strengths and weaknesses, of love and compromises and of companionship and lonliness. This could have also been the story of my next door neighbor who occasionally smiles at me while attending to his children, when I run into him in the corridor, of my co-worker rushing from work to pick up her children from school - the rush hour traffic unable to unnerve this daily routine of her's , of a woman at a bus stop waiting for her bus -listening to songs from her Ipod and looking forward to a harmonious evening with her lover - for this could have been a very common place story that you hear everyday- during an interaction with your co-worker, your friend or the passenger sitting next to you, with whom you share a ride, a story celebrating the lives of those who donot face an existential crisis - whose lives have evolved into a comfortable routine - when one knows exactly what is going to happen next and this prediction always brings to the person, a sense of accordance. But unlike your story or mine and like many great Shakespearean love stories, this story also has a monumental tragedy involved thus elevating it to the heights of melancholy and hence distancing it from the routine- the mundane.
The protagonist in this story is my father. In order to give depth to his character, I trace back objectively into my accounts of his interactions with the people around him, his childhood recollections and his alliances with his siblings. My narration begins with him giving his consent to get married to my mother. If the audience desires to dwelve deeper into his past to facilitate their comprehension of his character, he is the youngest child in a family of seven brothers and two sisters. His father already retired from government services during the formative years of my protagonist, most of his education has been possible due to the generosity of his older siblings, who till date form a very influential force in his decision making. At the time of this narration, he is 29 years old, had just completed his specialization in the field of Ophtalmology ( his choosing this field of speciality is because his father is an Ophtalmologist too) and has been posted as an assistant surgeon at a government hospital, in rural Andhra Pradesh. Prior to giving his consent, he along with one of his elder brother's (who has an affinity towards Carnatic music and women with big eyes and long hair) travel from Hyderabad (the state capital of Andhra Pradesh) to a nearby town Warangal, to meet my mother who at that time would be one of the prospective brides whose compatibility with my father would be estimated by his elder brother ( who till date has a penchant for judging people he interacts with and whose unquestionable ego never stops in giving unasked for advice ) in the way she dresses, walks, cooks and sings - for in those days it was believed that a woman's character is a direct outcome of how she conducts herself amidst people she isnt very familiar with.
My mother - the heroine in this tale of tragedy - at that time had just finished her Bachelor's in Medicine and Surgery and has been accepted to pursue her post graduation in the field of Gyneacology. Only daughter of a wealthy, traditional Bramhin family in a small town, she is already quite popular in the elite circles of Warangal- with her singing talents fetching her radio shows, her traditional beauty ( eyes as wide as lotus flowers , long flowing hair adorned with jasmines and her Sari Pallu only reaching her shoulder like Jaya Bhaduri in Guddi- very fashionable at those times) and her intelligence ( at that time she was among a very few women to pursue a career in Medicine at her local university) had men flocking my grand parents' house for the most part of the year (Ofcourse, the summer afternoons were excused - for there was a well documented instance when one of the admirer's was hospitalised due to a severe sun stroke after loitering in the sun for a good couple of hours to catch a glimpse or two). Her character sustained the traditional values even though she was encouraged to think progressive by her mother who herself is a post-graduate from Kakatiya University and whose friends circle involved influential poets and writers- and who one day in the future- while recuperating from a hernia, would secretly hide a magazine beneath her pillow and read about the Clinton - Monical Lewinsky and the Cigar threesome , when not bothered by visitors.For now, the focus is shifted back onto the daughter for this is her story ...maybe in the future, if this tid-bit about my grandmother evokes a figment of interest in the reader, we shall again take a deeper glimpse into her character. The daughter's strength was her patience and perseverance , her weakness - her soon to be husband.
Ohh..what do I write about the marraige? That I was a by product of it? That it ended eleven years after its creation- that neither of the bethroted had a say in its ending..for it was a ploy successfully excuted by the God of Adversities. But before I submit my petition against the God of Adversities and try to make a case out of it - in defense against the defense-less, arguing in behalf of those who have lost their assurance, please allow me to depict in a couple of sentences the beauty of this marraige -for it was a blissful marraige while it lasted. The husband- happy to cook for his wife when she was away at work , in the Emergency Room attending to patients all night or when sent to a rural location on a duty camp, the wife ... content in helping her husband realise what he needed, always standing behind his decision though it was tough to take a stand and realise that the ground was flaky, the children (both of them bespectacled..the neighbors adoring the little ones in their big eye glasses and inquiring their father "Doctorji, Is your private practice not doing good?? No new patients..so prescribing glasses for your own children huh?? Smiling away at their funny observation) ..healthy and good at their grades ( for at that age that was all that mattered), the dogs ( two of them..named Buddy and Spotty eventhough Buddy never was my friend and picked sides with my brother and everyday my count of spots on Spotty would vary) well fed and playful, the house - adorned with a garden that caught the neighbor's envy -roses (both white and pink), marigolds, jasmines, hybrid-hibiscus in magenta(procured from Bangalore when a second cousin finally found time to make a trip and inspect the new house) , a Neem tree whose leaves came in handy for the bitter New Year Pickle, a Mango tree that supplied mangoes for the summer pickles and restrooms that had western toilets, a novelty among all of the relatives.
And then -there was the accident that happened just infront of the house with my mother driving her two wheeler- hit by a drunk auto-rickshaw driver - that made her comatose for almost two weeks , after which she passed away. The marraige -over. Period.
The childrens' lives had just begun. But the father's life came to a halt. A complete standstill. Inanimate, frozen, cold - a snowstorm that would last forever. No respite. Never. Eleven years of sunshine and the rest of his life- just cold, heart wrenching cold.His mind- frozen , his thoughts distant, reality -surreal, the truth now a lie, the past still present and the future, lost in the past. Few years from now he would marry again. But his marraige would now be just another charade. Nothing when compared to his earlier marraige. Nothing ever the same again. A life of Nothings. Decisions made by not deciding. Years rolling on but still nothing changing.Noting that now nothing was once everything. Pain still remaining. Only pain remaining. Only pain and memories of a distant life once savored - so distant at times they seemed forbidden. Adversity only purloining away the frugal courage gathered in his soul - gathered in the confidence and support from his now anesthetized wife. No lessons learnt. No wisdom gathered. Only incompetency and despair. A complete surrender to the circumstances - a defeat devoid of any resistance.
Why then does the God of Adversities deliberate his mightiest plots against the misfit? Against people who shrink in the hour of crisis. When their character shrinks in pain. When their confidence becomes extinct and their self-respect, buried. When adversity teaches them nothing. And then their lives also become a nothing. Why not just let their lives fall into a routine . A life of conformance. When the future becomes the present, and the present- the future. No new challenges. No new puzzles. No new surprises. Just a satisfaction in knowing that change doesnot really change. And to keep the God of Adversities occupied there is the rest of the mankind.