The Atom

'Kotobar tor aayna bhenge-chure 

ghure taakai ...

Aamar mawte tor moton keu nei,

Kotobar tor kaacha-aaloy bhije 

gaan shonai ...

Aamar mawte tor moton keu nei.'

~ Album ~ 'Hemlock Society'

Sometimes I wish I was never born. I would then be nobody. Nobody would then know me. I would probably be a particle in the infinite. A particle, merely, but with no pain, no suffering, no heartache, no sleepless nights, no despair, no regret, no failure. A particle, in the universe, like million others, flowing in space, spending ages in a state of nothingness, or something close to that.

But, unfortunately, I am no particle. Yes, science would like me to believe I am constituted of atoms and stuff like that, but then this self I see in the mirror, is a thousand times more sensitive than the atoms that make her.

Or else, how could a few lines of Gulzar take me back to all that I am wrestling all day to lock up in the realm of subconsciousness? How is it that whenever I look at my daughter’s face while she is sleeping, I can see that gaping hollow in her heart? How is it that whenever I see Mr Bachchan onscreen, I can simultaneously visualize his biggest fan's face flush with that happy pride from somewhere in the clouds? How is it that each second, amidst all my work, I never ever forget the man who just wanted to live … a few more years?

Because, I am not just an inert particle in the irrevocable scheme of things. I am a wife who loved, tried, prayed, pleaded yet lost her anchor. I am a mother who knows she can never be a father. I am a woman who looks for answers in lemon yellow ceilings, as if they will suddenly appear. And remove all doubts. Restore lost faiths. As if ...

A couple of months before Amitabh moved on, I had taken him to a psychologist for some counseling. The doctor was a pleasant young lady, cheerful, eloquent, and definitely, amiable. She spoke to him for an hour, and then called me in and asked him to wait outside. As I took my chair, the first thing she asked me was, ‘I know this is tough but what did his doctors say? How much ‘time’ does he have?’ I stared at her like a student trying to recall some part of a learnt poem before the teacher and then replied, ‘one year’. She was actually trying to draw a plan on how best she could help him live his life in this ‘one year’.

And then she directed her attention to me, the terminally ill patient’s wife, and mother of a five year old. The first statement she made was, ‘No matter how long he lives, a year, a little more or a little lesser than that, your journey will be tough. You have no choice but to go through it, his pain, his fears, your pain, your own fears, his leaving, and then, with your grieving. You have to bear it all. Because you will live on. When he stops. So your journey will change tracks maybe, but will continue to be difficult.’

I was listening. In my mind, I was trying to picture a life without him. A day without him. I mean, what would the world be like without this man who is sitting outside? Would the earth still wake up at dawn and crash to bed at bedtime? Could things possibly be the same for me without him around? My mind was numb with fear. Petrified at the images this doctor was trying to hold before my eyes, of the future. A future I did not want to be a part of. I simply could not relate to the strength she was trying to build up in me ... for a life without a part of me. After all, he was just around me ... in the waiting lounge that lay outside her chamber. I allowed her to speak and simply nodded to all that she said.

For she knew. Knew the blatant, killing truth. Knew, ‘one year’ was too ambitious a ‘time’ to ask for a man whose deep, sunken eyes could see the devil lurking in its frozen black cloak, every hour.

She was right. He didn’t even have half a year. Rather, we didn’t.

And it is eight months now. Without him. Without seeing him, or speaking to him. Without a call from him to ask if I wished to go out for dinner. Without slogging it in the kitchen to prepare all that he loved to eat. Without him humming his favourite song with his angel at bedtime. Without him, to get the trolley cart each time we went for grocery shopping. Without him ever driving the little one to school again.

Perhaps, he has flown into the rivers and then, merged with the sea. He is now a particle maybe, what you call an atom, or a bunch of them, going up as mist, floating some thousand miles above us. Where aeroplanes hover. And, sighs too. He is now that silent reminder that Guria’s uniform needs to be ironed, when I had forgotten all about it. He is the warmth I feel when at times, Guria, quite unexpectedly asks me to bend down so that she can kiss me on my forehead. He is the love I feel each time my daughter does something nice and then asks her mom, ‘ Mamma, are you happy?’

He is in all these words I write. For without him in my soul, where would the words come from? He is the pain I bear … the smile I attempt … the laughter I hope to accomplish, someday.

He is. 

The atom that glistens at the corner of my eye as I end this post. 

The relief I feel each time I create, a moving space, where you can meet him. 

And he can meet you. 

The hug that startles, every time you tell me, you understand.

He is. And will always be. 

The atom called 'me'.