#so why is it hard to believe that some schools didnt properly teach children?
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My father was not a hero and yet I looked upto him
I never thought I would pen down this and I had almost quit blogging (Even tumblr said my account was non existent and my previous blogs were not visible. I had to retrieve the password and re-activate the account). And here I am, writing this in the most truthful manner possible, baring and sharing some memories.
I lost my 77 year old father very recently and a lot of things have been running on my mind since then. I felt writing and sharing this with my close family and friends might give some peace to me. I really dont know.
My father was not a hero and yet I looked upto him in almost all walks of my life - unknowingly, unwillingly in most places and admirably in few places may be. Infact, my wife keeps telling me that I’m a lot like my father ( and I always thought I was like my mother). My father was a completely self made man. He lost his parents very early in his life and pretty much became a doctor on his own. He sold cigarettes, pens, notebooks and other small student essentials in his medical college hostel to meet his tuition fees and daily expenses. Every penny he spent on himself and what he has left for us now was earned by him. I cannot even imagine how he could do that.
Me and my sister, while growing up, always thought money was always there with us. My father was very miserly and always looked for ‘sasta and tikaoo’ items when he took us for shopping school essentials like shoes, school bags, notebooks etc. and more often than not we ended up getting cheap, barely decent, but strong items. We always wondered why he was like that and very obvious to that age, deprived feelings started accumulating within, which years later, came out in the form of extreme anger. Now, if I look back, I think a part of that was probably justified. But I’m still not convinced he did the right things. Even today, I spend very wisely ( still always looking at price tags first and product later!). Blood is thicker than water for a reason and not just like that.
Contrary to many families, my father introduced me to Hindi movies. Back then when I was in middle and high school, there was only 1 TV channel - DD1 at my home. DD1 used to broadcast 1 Hindi movie each on Friday night and Saturday night every week at 9.30pm. I have watched every single Amitabh Bachchan angry young man classic movie with my dad. How amazing is that! Amar Akbar Anthony, Muqqaddar ka sikandar, Parwana, Suhaag, Roti,Kapda Aur Makaan, Don, Namak Halaal, Namak Haram, Mard, Coolie, Kaala Pathhar, Deewar, Khuda Gawah, Naseeb, the timeless classic Sholay - we have watched almost everything together. Much to the dismay of others, we have even watched Bobby, Satyam Shivam Sundaram and Aradhana together. Even till date, a lot of friends and colleagues wonder how I can converse in Hindi so fluently inspite of being a South Indian. Some of them attribute that to my studying days in Pilani, Rajasthan. However, only I know that it is all because of the countless Hindi movies I have watched with my dad. And yet he didnt’t watch a single movie in theatre in 35 years.
With my father, it was always either his way or highway. There was no midway. This was applicable to any stranger or his own wife or son or brothers ( I’m intentionally leaving out daughter from this list as I have my doubts there as he always had a special soft spot for her) in exactly the same manner. He was a really stubborn man. It was always a digital relationship status with him either 1 or 0. By nature, he was a very limited conversationalist and even in that he would talk only to people he liked and never said a hi or hello to the people he didn’t like. It used to be very frustrating and irritating for all of us in the immediate family. But 1 thing about this also was that he never talked ill of the people he disliked at their back. He never had a double faced personality. I have always criticized this side of him. But of late, in last 2-3 years, I started realising how difficult a trait it was, to follow what you stand for, under any circumstances. Easier said than followed. But he was what he was and always stood his ground, right or wrong. I may not be proud of a lot of his actions because of this, but I’m definitely super proud of his rock solid firm attitude. I would want to develop that firm attitude some day.
Like any other father-son relationship, even ours was a very complex one, filled with more fights than normal conversations. My father was a rebel and never listened to his father. I am a born rebel and hence I never listened to my father. Conflicts were bound to occur. ( Now that, I have a son, my wife keeps telling me what goes around comes back. I hope not). Back in 2002, he wanted me to pursue a career in medicine while I wanted to study engineering. This led to a major faceoff in the house and we didnt talk to each other for quite sometime. And then later after I completed my engineering, he wanted to me go to the US or Europe for pursuing higher studies. This time around again I backed off and decided to stay back in India and disappointed him again. He never wanted any of his children to stay back in India ( a wish his daughter is fulfilling now). As destiny would have it, I was in the US for a very short 2 week trip when my father fell critically ill for the last time.
My father was a liberal and conservative both. For some reason known only to him, he firmly believed that every individual should be financially independent, especially every woman in every single household. All along in my entire life till now, I have not seen any other husband encourage his wife's career and put her career over his, more than my father. Back in 1992, when my parents decided to pursue post graduation in medicine, they got seats only for D.Ortho and D.G.O ( both diploma seats). This meant that they would never be on par with MD doctors and they would never be professors if at all they decided to join any medical college. Having understood this quickly, my father bargained hard with the college management for an arrangement wherein he would forego his D.Ortho seat in return for a MD (OBG) seat for my mother, which didn't happen. This truly showed how much he cared for my mother's career at the cost of his own career. Very recently, after my wife gave birth to my son and after my sister gave birth to my nephew, he was very keen on both of them joining back to work although he never said a single word to either of them. When both of them joined back to work, he rejoiced in his own characteristic silent manner without showing anything to either of them.
As I mentioned in the previous paragraph, my parents started their post graduation in 1992 and finished that in 1994. So, my father was 50 and my mother was 40 when they started their post graduation. No big deal! Just that most people would start planning their retirement at the age of 52 while my father was planning a new career. Right now, I'm 35 years old and I get so frustrated and scared when people around me talk about switching to a new verification methodology or changing the work domain. When he planned his career move, his teaching staff and professors were younger than him and made fun of his big pot belly and age in front of others. ( I got to know this first hand from one of his professors, much younger to him, visited our home much later in 2000 or so). My mother never wanted to pursue post graduation as she lacked confidence at the age of 40. Today, my mother is a reasonably successful gynaecologist in Shimoga. She credits a large part of her little success to my father. Had he not pushed her, she would have been a general practitioner even now.
While growing up, I always used to wonder why would any patient come to get treated from a gutka betel leaf chewing, curtly speaking insensitive doctor who gave injections in such painful manner.( I never took injections from him except for once and I got treated by a different orthopaedic doctor when I broke my left hand once). And his handwriting was horrific. ( He himself struggled to read he wrote). I found answer to this question years later when I understood what medical profession involved. There are 2 aspects to medical treatment for any ailment - Diagnosis and Appropriate treatment. While most of us patients are really interested in getting the treatment and moving on with life, we fail to understand that if the ailment is not diagnosed properly, it cannot be treated. Bingo!! My father's expertise was diagnosis and not treatment. I have heard so many stories over the years about his dead accurate diagnosis now. People used to just come to him and show the reports and wait for him to speak. He would probably say 1 or 2 sentences in a very straightforward manner without mincing words and they accepted that gladly.
I have way too many memories which are coming to me now. But I neither have the sufficient skillset to write a book nor the time to do so. I will keep those for myself. In a nutshell, he was a very simple, hard working, short tempered, stubborn man who pretty much kept to himself and stayed in that special room in our home where breathed his last, watching political news on TV almost all the time while he was at home.
People who know me know that I'm a very big fan of Leander Paes. Lately, I started finding a lot of similarities between my father's and Leander Paes - both had their share of near death experiences and both fought through them and emerged as winners on more than one occassion, both eccentric, both with "dont give a fuck" attitude to the world.( Ofcourse my father didn't have many privileges which Paes enjoyed). If anyone is following Paes lately, he is urging his fans to support him in his "One Last Roar" campaign in 2020, at the end of which he will retire. My father last ate food on 22nd January 2020. He could not consume food for last 22 days of his life which has eaten me since his death. He didn't get his chance for "One Last Roar" and he passed away silently in his sleep on my parents 40th wedding anniversary on February 13th 2020.
Given a chance and choice, I would like to be reborn to same parents 100 times again with everything unchanged. I would like to grow up with my father, have the same fights all over again, probably in a more fierceful manner. However, next time around, I would want him to enjoy his life more.
As much as I would like to write as per norm "Rest in peace Appaji", I will not do that.
I sign off with this note " Keep roaring wherever you are in that other world Appaji", because I always liked seeing you that way.
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Facade
Why is it we feel more intimacy to things then we do to people?
‘No-one has ever properly understood me, I have never fully understood anyone; and no-one understands anyone else.’
Uttered by one of history's greatest writers, and highly accomplishe Goethe as he laid on his death bed.
This is what great works of art accomplish - they take us deep into the minds of people we are intimidated by in order to show the more average, relatable experience and reassurance in that others minds much work in much the same way ours do. filled with uncertainty and anxiety.
The history of art is delievered by people who couldn;t find anyone in the vicinitu to talk to. Classic works trancend space in time and we can take up the coded of words of intimacy say in a Roman poest and a renaissance paintings or lyrics of a singer who describes our blues in a rock song from 1986.
mutual incomprehension is what we should expect from life from the very start - and we should teach how the idea for it to be something to show where life has gone wong is wrong
once we understand loneliness we can sing, write produce poetry, fully understanding that poeple may never understand us,
A good Example would be deeply misunderstood and mentally ill Van Gogh who only sold 1 painting while alive. A starry night was painted while he stayed in a mental asylum, some believe it was his view, others relegious meaning counting the stars int he sky and relating to bible verses. His critics said his brush strokes were childish lookign for realism and proved the man was clearly insane, but we when we look at the painting we see an overarching theme, hope. Light of the night projecting down onto roof tops and lighting the way into a dreamy star gazed night.
My moms bedside table was the product of the same msiunderstanding.
On it a picture of my dad in a golden frame with a poem attached on the back, a bear called Minky’ he had given made from Mink fur, a white crystal and a buddha who belly had been worn from rubbing. Much later on the table would
Meaning from which all had to her, and no one else ould understand.
She had kept a lot of the furniture my father and accured before he died, They lived on a farm together called ‘The ferny glen farm’ but this was no country bumpkin farm. It had a white picket fence surround 60 hectres of mountain side, it had it’s on beautiful lake and bridge you'd have to drive up to get too.
The furniture inside the house was oak, and had the smell of being freshly cut and varnished. This was the furniture that would adorn our house while I grew up and would slowly be destroyed. Included was a priceless painting said to be a Tom Roberts, which would later end up in my hands after she died and then in the dump (but that’s a story for later)
My mom had a Job at the Art Centre, and I grew up in the backstage of theatre, preforming in the plays, learning how to sing and play piano but being more interested in the Backstage costume and props department. I loved the Props/costume room. When I was little I was convinced that that room was what heaven looked like.
She had put my sister and I through a catholic primary school, and managed to buy a house beachside. I think this was the most accomplished my mom had ever been in her life. Though this was short lived and after a good facade for normalcy
She kept everything of my dads. A brief case still locked, boxes of clipped newspaper articles. Clothes, letters, reciepts. it was if my father hadn’t died or was coming back home at a later date. but there she slept in a large empty for poster bed with nothing but his photo next to it. Desperately trying to be understood again, after his death.
Expensive paintings soon filled our house, & furniture I wasn’t allowed to touch. Even my room was decorated a like a spoiled white kid though I hated the color. She swapped out my favorite bed sheets that were the ocean on one side and the sand on the other, for ugly striped butter cup sheets and buttercup color walls. and the picnic table curtains.
Our house looked like a magazine, a falsely represented upper middle-class family. Although at the heart of it completely broken.
This house is the prominent memory for me and still haunts me today as the lifestyle was a facade.
My mother had borrowed all the money to make this work. She had loaned thousands of her Mother, hundred thousands in credit card debt and thousands more to put me through private school when I would've done just as well in public. She was keeping up an image. Which I only realised after I grew up. Sitting in a bank with her death certificate being asked to sign a joint account to her 100k+ debt with this bank and 3 others. THANK GOD I was under 18. Because if I had been an adult when she died, I would still be in her debt today.
Though when I rebelled at as a teenager this became even more apparent that she was living a dream no longer accessible to her, while simultanously blaming external influences.
But this is what we do in addiction. When we aren’t satidifed with what we have or who we are internally. We keep everything and fight to keep our delusions running. Because the realit of it all will have us kill ouselves in that moment. because sometimes 5 minutes of illusion to someone who believes they have nothing left is enough bliss to keep them living in it. Like a shot of herion or a intensity of a good orgasm, escaping into delusion is just the same.
s when my mom ran through the door drunk a late afternoon, saying to tell me that the police were going to knock on the door and to say she had been home for 2 hrs.
She ran into the guest room and hid and left me to confron the officers who as she had fortold were knocking on the door. Being young - Police officer were good and allowed in the house. I answered the door and they ask me where my mom was and i happily showed them where she was in the guest room.
I watched her sheepishly try to explain why her engine was hot and that she had been drinking red wine since she got home 2hrs ago... which wwas a blantant lie. Because the police didnt catch her dricing or couldnt prove it.. they left but what insued was me being verbally abused for 2hrs about how I didnt listen to her and having water thrown at me.
Unfortunatley the verbal abuse stayed after my oma left back to america. Behind closed doors and after school when my mom was home. I would learnt hat she didn’t like me very much.
Had the police shown up to a lower class suburb when my mom had been called in for dangerous dricing drunk while 6 year old me was in the back of the car, child services would have stepped in before things got really out of control.
But Because we’re taught to keep opposites separated, as most paradoxes make us feel ambivalent and uncertain, not only in life metaphors but basic math. We think of shapes such as curves and lines as separate and distinct. We know this because we’re taught to know things in relation and in opposition to each other. - Similar to the poor man must be poor because of bad choices, or the shady neighbor must be a pervert.
No one believed that something could be entirely wrong because how could a single mom working hard to put her children through school be neglectful.
how could a painting that looks so beautiful on the outside be so misunderstood. How could I late throw out a priceless painting?
Stong woman, single mom, who triumphed widowhoodcouldnt be related to the normalcy of childhood abuse, neglecta nd addicticion and
at the heart of it a widow so desperatly trying to be understood through a photo and a poem on her bedside table.
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