While standing at the granite porch of the venerated Sai temple in Janakpuri, our hands moved mechanically, serving home cooked Semolina (Suji) Halwa to the devotees and mendicants alike, the minds of mother and I, drifted into another dimension altogether.
They say time heals, but, memories it creates leaves unerasable scars etched into the subconscious. On this day three years ago, one of the three reasons that brought me to this mortal world abandoned us in the quietude of seclusion, and the suffering of a dreaded affliction.
Often, agony and anguish protracting perpetually, whether at the physical plane of existence or otherwise, attains closure through dying, which appears as the harbinger of finality, and yet, is a mere stopover in life's eternal voyage.
Savagely, death is a process of purification for the unborn Soul.
Vivid recollections of those darkest moments in 2014, still, evoke an inexpressible sinking sensation, representing an unassuaged grief churning within. Torrential downpour wasn't even the least of all causes for clearly remembering that horrendous evening.
As I drove through the narrow lanes, heading towards the rental accommodation of J.V.T.S Garden in Chhattarpur Extension, escorting pulmonary specialist Dr Hemant Tiwary, for an emergency check up on Papa's deteriorating condition, a phone call changed everything.
Words uttered by Ma froze my heart for more than a few seconds.
'Ashu, hurry back home. Papa isn't breathing anymore,' Ma lamented, in a desolate voice, which I'll never forget. But, brutishness of time, doesn't hold up for a pause.
I dashed upstairs with the Doctor in tow, to witness a sight beyond the worst nightmare of a wife ululating next to her soul-mate. The crestfallen look in her eyes choked the air out of my lungs. Dad’s forehead felt cold as ice when my palm touched it. In defiance of his promise, made to me as I was leaving home, Papa breathed his last, before my return.
For a man who's entire actuality got founded on selflessness and compassionate empathy, an audience of barely ten mourners at his funeral rites, seemed a whole new benchmark of divine sadism.
As we spectate the suffering of a dearest own, life's cruel irony doesn't go unnoticed.
By not merely debilitating a man of strength and resoluteness of will to a caricature of inanimate feebleness, Parkinson's disease had inflicted unspeakable harm to the corporeal form of my father, and ensuingly, on us too.
Perhaps, some sentiments never wane only transform to become everlasting companions.
Once, karmic unions get fostered by oneness of predestination, none, including the Supreme Godhead, possesses the prowess to break these inseparably intertwined bonds of emotions.
Shambu Nath Kaul, imbibing the essence of Lord Shiva and blessed with the nobility of a seer, incarnated on earth amid the palpability of sin. And, his actuality narrates a legend of untold piety, which even those dwelling in the highest spiritual realm or the ordinariness of humanity drenched in the craving for materialism, can neither fathom nor emulate.
Despite three years since his departure, Dad remains entrenched in every atom, each molecule and within all cells, sustaining this outermost self. Indeed, they constitute the extension of his life force.
After all, he facilitated the continuance of the deific Dattatreya bloodline, into which, we took birth.
Therefore, ineffable as they may be, words emanating from the profoundness of sentiments are an endeavour at paying homage in remembrance of a noble man, who managed to transcend the etymology of being a Dad, thereby redefining fatherhood, forever.
