I visit my grandmother every day for a few hours -- she is almost unconscious -- effects of the all the medications -- rendering her drowsy -- almost unaware of the surroundings, unaware of the time of the day or date, she does not see well at all. She opens are eyes a few times -- says my name with difficulty -- then she asks where I have been staying -- and tells me to go see my mother. It has been heart breaking every day -- she sleeps and I look over her sleeping face -- for a while -- I cannot believe that I cannot connect with her with our daily chats about politics, old times, her life in Barishal, her life during freedom struggle, my grandfather being imprisoned by the British, her father transferring from Kalighat to Ballygunj to Guma, to various railway stations during the pre-independence Bengal railways -- her stories about the childhood of my mother and aunts and my uncle. It is so heart wrenching a sight to see her sleeping for hours with little expression on her face, me being there not perturbing her as before -- she is in a world of her own -- somewhere in some internal world that does not have a lot of place for me, or any of us. It saddens me to the depth of my core -- inexpressible grief strikes my mind and my soul -- I cannot imagine her this way. It feels like some experience from Murakamis novels -- where the subconscious of a loved one partitions from the rest of our subconscious with impenetrable walls that I cannot scale. In exactly one week she would be entering the 99th year of her life on earth, and unlike last year, this year I am not sure, she will remember the special day -- we will gather around her -- first time in 22 years I will be physically with her during her birthday -- but she wont be there to enjoy it with her mental presence -- perhaps she will -- when she sees so many of us there around her -- who knows what goes on inside her mind. This was a mind that was very clear until last year -- even 6 months ago -- she was thinking sharp and clear, reading the news paper top to bottom, watching Television, and conversing over phone every evening with me about this and that. Now I have no access to her mind -- I feel like being locked out and trying to make my way into her consciousness -- but she has lost us from the inside of that it seems. Once in a while, she says she needs to go to the vathroom, or she wants someone to move her hand as it pains being in the same position, but mostly she is quiet -- as if in that quiet oblivion we do not exist.
Posted on: Mon, 10 Mar 2014 04:52:32 +0000
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