On visiting my parents house every week, I visit my mom’s room for sure. I open up her side drawers to find her handwritten notes on scraps of paper. The most organized person I have ever seen in my life IS my AMI. Her dressing table is still set the way she left it. Her clothes are still hanging inside the wardrobe. No one wants to touch them or give them away. I think we all still want to believe that she is alive and around.
I could feel a thin layer of dust settling on the top of her clothes. Two weekends back, I took them out, dusted them…cleaned the wardrobe and with much love, returned those clothes back into the place where they belonged. But this time…I was not able to find her body’s perfume in her clothes…I wish it had not faded away.The sweet smell of her hair in her scarves has gone. I saved a few strands of fallen hair from her scarf. Her hair brush doesn’t smell like her hair any more. I open her lipsticks often to see the marks of her lips.I opened her hand bag once and found how neatly she used to keep her vanity items. Her wallet had passport sized pictures of my father and my brother. The pack of sugar free snacks…a packet of tissues and hand sanitizer.
Everything is there…but not the one who owns them. The only reality of life is DEATH…nothing stays forever…and death is the only truth that can never be a lie.I wish people could value and be grateful for the blessing they have in their lives.
People say kind words to me like: you are brave, time will heal this, it shall pass…the truth is that it came to me and I had no other choice but to pass through these burning coals. Time does not heal us, it just teaches us to live with the loss in our lives.The show must go on…they say!
How I managed the NORMALNESS of life requirement under this trauma was no less than a juggling. More on this in my next blog. I HAD to burn in this cauldron and yet not lose my sanity…mourn on this loss yet take care of my kids at home and at school. No one deserves to be ignored. I have a duty and a much loved responsibility. My job is what I love…looking at those bright faces and AHA moments my students get, gives me more zeal to dedicate myself and bring a change in their lives.
Am I keeping well? Yes, I am…I have grown out of this and I will share it soon how. One must admit that it is a scar that will self-bleed and then self-heal ….a pain that turns to pangs sometimes and then goes away. The umbilical cord…the belly button…I am made in her body…a part of her is ME…still lives in this world. I am HER now…and so are my other three siblings.
Someone has her skin color and hair texture while someone has her shape of hands and feet, and someone has her habits and nature.
Yet…we have to stick together to feel her presence around us.
Losing her made us realize how important our relationship is and how important sticking together as a family is.
Self-healing 
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