Rest easy Maiya

Fifteen years! How long is fifteen years? It’s very hard to say. I still remember when I was fifteen; I was in ninth grade, full of vigor, full of energy, had my first crush, no thinking about tomorrow, life revolved around the next football match and which song to listen to. That time fifteen years seemed like forever.  Comparing that fifteen years with the last fifteen years the relativeness, futility, and sorrow of life comes into full perspective.  I will never forget that moment fifteen years ago in September of 2004 when I first realized that my mother is no longer able to read and write. The woman who taught me everything, who held two master's degrees, was unable to recognize her own handwriting and could not figure out a single letter.  A few weeks later doctors diagnosed her with early stages of Alzheimer’s. One of the rarest forms of pre-senile dementia. She had just turned forty-nine. My entire world shook in a minute. I didn’t know what was next. All my plans, hopes, and dreams dashed in a single shudder. Life stood still. Doctors just gave us two years to a maximum of three.

I don’t know how the past fifteen years went by. Every day was suffering, pain piled up over pain,  the sisyphean ordeal, a fight against invisible disease without any cure. Slowly she lost her faculties, senses and eventually bedridden.  In those years I got an engineering degree, drew the first salary, published a book, got a tenured job, got married, and had a baby. But my mother was unbeknownst to all of these, all my life’s milestones she never knew. God knows how I longed to hear her voice at least just for once. But despite that I knew every night when I spoke to her before I went to sleep, deep down she understood.   Now after all these years of struggle against unwinnable battle finally she drew her last breath on Tuesday.  

Losing one’s mother is the greatest irreparable loss one can ever experience. Now after consigning her to flames, a huge void, an abysmal emptiness has been left behind in my heart. But I know at least now she is free, emancipated from all the pain, and nothing can harm her anymore. And for me, that is an ultimate solace. All I can think of right now is the poignant line by Yann Martel - “Afterwards, when it's all over, you meet God. What do you say to God?”

Rest well Maiya. Love you. Always.