Thursday, March 29, 2012

Heartbreak Hotel


Grieving isn't a process. It doesn't have expiry dates, it doesn't have stages. Sure, the shock, almost-physical pain, numbness, unfamiliarity, absence becomes less striking with time. But there are other things that don't really go away. And there are some things that you don't want to go away-such as memory, routine. You play the same TV shows, you keep bringing up the person's name in conversation as if they still exist on this human plane and still enjoy the same movies and say the same inappropriate things in public and are still unabashedly vocal about their opinions on the Indian cricket team and certain cricketers in particular. As if they still exist in this man-made world with its man-made laws and institutions and games and needs and wants.


My father would have loved the article on Mariachi music that I just read in this month's Reader's Digest. I get that familiar ache over my left eyebrow that I've gotten used to in the past few months-the sign of tears about to fall. I was so used to reading him tidbits of things over the past few months-there, I'm still stuck in the six month time frame of his illness when in fact it ended over three months ago. He's out of it. But I still dream about trying to get him better. In my dreams, he's sick and I have hope that he will get better, that I somehow can make him get better. But when I wake up, he's gone and he is better. I don't know which is better.


Heartbreak isn't for lovers alone. Heartbreak is something I confused disappointment with. Heartbreak is when your emotional heart truly breaks, melts, rips, burns, what have you. It's when you know that a situation is irreversible and it hurts in the worst way-knowing that you have to live the rest of your god knows-how long life with regret, guilt, a fading memory and worst of all, the missingness. And it's strange because you welcome the feeling. It's proof that there is something there and not emptiness. You don't really want the feeling to be gone because what does a feeling weigh against this gigantic, huge void? A feeling's just a feeling. Whereas a person who was part of your life, such a major part of your life, almost your life itself is no longer there, can no longer see and hear and read the same things you do. The feeling about that reality is like an unpretty feather on top of a heavy iron-wrought ball of lead.


It gets better. What is 'it'? It is how you cope. How you deal. That does get better. And you think about the happy things. How much better it really could be out there. How we're all going to be 'out there' sooner or later. And until then, we just live it like we're supposed to.

Friday, March 9, 2012

That 5 Letter Word

My father's greatest message to me was to never lose touch with music in my life. He was a living and practising example of the power of music. Not only would he whistle and hum and sing to himself all the time but he would allow himself to be emotionally swept away by an evocative song or tune. Tears would stream down his face when he heard a beautiful old Telugu song ('Andenaa' from the film 'Pooja Phalam' http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_Eiz9cGMaAw). Eyes dancing, he would sing along with glee to Harry Belafonte's 'Man Piaba'. How many of us allow ourselves to be absolutely stripped and vulnerable before a piece of music? Why, I feel embarrassed at even my mother catching my involuntary goosebumps when I hear some unknown singer with a beautiful voice hit the high C's with perfection. Music is the utmost revealer, I feel. The litmus test to prove the existence of the human soul. Good music catches us unawares, filters through our skin to where the real stuff is and when we are open and receptive, that's when it goes beyond note meeting ear. It's where "soul meets body"(see! I managed to quote the Deathcab for Cutie song)

Music did help in bonding my father and I. We spent years scouring the internet (his room is beside the corner where my computer is) for his extremely eclectic and rare list of songs ranging from Frankie Laine to Lata Mangeshkar. And nothing too popular, mind you! Most of my father's favourites were songs from the 40's and 50's, once heard on the radio when he had been a teenager, much remembered and to my surprise, still evergreen. I'd read the songs I'd find on YouTube or on sites and he would label them "Bore" or "Don't want" until I'd chance upon the rare gem he had been seeking for 60 years "That's the one!". Finding the song would be a true Eureka! moment. Of course, there was the possibility that the song would be right but the version would be wrong, oh so wrong. Like when I found Harry Belafonte's 'The Drummer and Cook'. Nope, my father wanted the Cockney version. Thank you, YouTube.

Listening to his songs after his passing has been extremely painful-not to hear his voice singing along with mine, not to hear his accurate lyrics-spouting (his memory was the ultimate encyclopaedia). But listening has been necessary. Music lays it all bare, lays you bare and then it lifts you up. It goes beyond words and sounds and cells and fibre. It goes beyond this world, beyond the invisible curtain that separates those who are living from those who have lived. Perhaps celestial music is different from the earthly kind-a living memory of those you love that you can access again and again. More alive than a photograph. More metaphysical than a video or a letter. But till we finally hear the music of angels, of the divine, we can be content with the one created on this planet, the one that reminds us of those we love and a way for them to remind us that we are loved.

Thursday, March 1, 2012

Beginnings

This blog is dedicated to the memory of my father Dr. C. Ranga Rao-one of the most remarkable human beings to touch this planet and the most fascinating, inspiring personality that I have ever had and will ever have the privilege to know. He left this physical world on Christmas 2011 after five months of serious illness, setting on a new journey, one in which he could finally be free of the limitations of his physical body.

My father and I shared an indescribable bond- my filial love went deeper and far beyond a typical father-child relationship. The fifty year age gap between us caused less of a generation gap for me and more of an admittance into a bygone, beautiful era- a world of great music, classic films, world knowledge, and an innocence, a simplicity and a humour.

We didn't just share late night insomniacal conversations, midnight snacks and endless hours of music. His presence, ideas and ideals have shaped, whittled and expanded every aspect of my life such that I don't know where he ends and I begin. This is one of the numerous reasons his passing has left me bereft. I feel like I've lost my greatest accomplice, my twin brother and my 4 a.m. friend.

But this blog is not about regrets and sorrow (though grieving is natural). This blog is not about the invisible curtain that separates us from our loved ones whom we've lost. This blog isn't about spiritual or scientific or psychological analyses about life and death. This blog is about my father's living legacy which is meant to be shared. His passions, views and active interests in life, this world and beyond would fill his conversations and these conversations must continue.

This blog is dedicated also to all those who love life. To all those who live life despite losing a beloved one. To all of us who choose to go on, in their memory, to soak up life and living as much as possible because they would have wanted us to.