A more positive title
would be “You are on your own” but I am in an outrageous mood with a rich hue
of morbidity now.
I last celebrated a Hindu festival in 1989 which makes it 31 years. Who is to be
blamed for such apathy? My siblings of course are culprits number one. It’s sheer, broad as daylight abdication of their duties in this digital age of selfishness where people
have time only for themselves, others may as well drown or hang from a noose, I care a damn. I
tried to drill some sense to my eldest sister for decades, “Look, if I die in a
road accident the cops will bring the unclaimed body to your house. Being a
sister of a bachelor means you are my guardian even if it sounds distasteful.” My
sister is blessed with an intellect of a buffalo chewing the cud in the shadows
of a tree on a hot summer day. You can beat the buffalo, skin it alive or hack
its neck in a slaughter house, but it cannot learn differential calculus no
matter how good the instructor is. It is easier to move a mountain and carry it
on your back than drive sense into a recalcitrant tambrahm woman. Or bang your head in the
wall, either the wall will come down or your head mangled beyond any surgical
correction but some women will never learn. So I continue to pay this cost: 31
years of no festival. I am no saint though as I curse with all the venom at this gross negligence on an Everest scale: may they experience a bit of my suffering.
Then
the neighbours should have included an orphan man into their festivities which
is what Kalpagam did. They would gift me festival sweets for years and I was
infinitely grateful to the extent of addressing her AKKA. Then a stupid clinic
came, we had a massive disagreement and all bonhomie built over decades
disappeared in a moment. The supply of festival goodies stopped, we even
stopped wishing each other face-to-face for neighbor whose front door is
opposite yours in the apartment. It is here Chennai fails, This city has not a
considerate nerve for the underdogs, no city on earth is more selfish and
self-centered.
Then
we come to friends in the Eliots beach. I might know 10-20 regulars for no more
than a hi and bye. Again it does not strike anyone’s minds that here is a
fellow who gets to be alone on festivals. I praise a lot of friends in my
blogs, but none as much harboured a thought to include me in a Diwali or a
Pongal. None thought of wishing me on the phones much less visit me with a
sweet packets and smiles. This gesture even escaped the minds of venerable Sarada
Mami or Ranga. In Chennai each one considers himself as an island, there is no
common human thread or any connection. So I end moaning my lot on festival
occasions.
My
nerves cannot stand the revelries of a Diwali where everyone is exuberantly happy;
womenfolk visit the temples in new silk saris, children bursting crackers from
dawn to dusk, families calling on each other and here I am with no one to
bother. So I would pack off to a Vipassana retreat before money came in
recently. Two years back I went to Pondicherry, last year it was Guruvayoor
while this year I was so preoccupied with stock market trading to feel the full
agony of loneliness on a Diwali day. Trust me, nothing feels more scorned and
discarded than that on that day.
It
takes a noble heart to realize another’s sorrow. But we live in an age where
even if you should shout from rooftops your angsts no one will bother. If Balakanth was ever aware that there is a human being on earth who has not seen a festival for 31 years, he would have flown to that place, hired cheer girls, ride on an
elephant for the biggest celebration of lights and crackers. His heart was
large. And if he knew a friend has not seen a festival in three decades, he
would have died of shock.
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