Tag: Achan

  • On the first anniversary of ‘ordinary kindness’

    It’s Saturday. The intercom rings at 5AM. D and I both curse, and a 20 second conversation follows on how this had to be a delivery, and why the security is buzzing us when we have agreed on “9 to 9, no calls”! D manages to reclaim some sleep, I can’t.

    At 7 ish AM, I am pissed, and have to use extra willpower to enforce my morning exercise routine. I want to give that security guy a piece of my mind, and hurry to catch him before his shift gets over. Turns out I am a minute late, and the other security guy doesn’t have his number stored. WTF dude! I am even more pissed, and tell him that I need the number when I return from my morning jog.

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  • The ordinary kindness of Mohandas

    My surname is very unobtrusive. It is present in all my official documents. It’s absent in my signature, and when I am casually giving my name in say, a form, I stop at my middle name, which exists courtesy Kerala’s matrilineal ethos. The surname’s modest behaviour is apt for the person it represents.

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  • Moving past

    It’s April 24th. Later in the day is my favourite part of the week – the Sunday evening ritual with D. Balcony, drink, sunset, and mood music. Sometimes we fill it with conversation, and sometimes we’re just content in each other’s presence. Today is extra special because it’s our anniversary – 19th.

    It was a week ago, when it suddenly struck me that back in April 1993, he would have still been in a state of shock. It had only been a few months since he turned 49. They would have celebrated their 18th later in the year. But it wasn’t to be. A month ago, she passed, leaving him with a boy in his teens and a girl in primary school.

    In that moment of my realisation – of what he had lost – I saw everything he has done since then in a new light. And after all these years, I understood, and wept, for his loss.