The tale of two aunts

In the last two months, two of my aunts (periyamma) passed away. The first one had two sons, three daughters and ten grand children. The first son is a retired Engineer from PWD; the second son an agriculturist; one of the daughters is a teacher; other two daughters are married to businessmen; one of the grand son is a business man; another grand son is a computer science research scholar at IISc, Bangalore. But this periyamma’s old age life, despite having such a large family, was very troubled. No body was willing to take care of her and as a result she was kept in an old age home for some years before she became very ill. During the funeral, there was reflectance among the sons to perform the rights. The IISc scientist grand son didn’t even bother to remove his shoes at the funeral ground near the pyre. As soon as the funeral was over, every one was in a hurry to get back to normal schedule and hence the final rite (karumadhi) was performed urgently, not even wanting for all the relatives to participate and pay their respect.

The second periyamma was not a direct relative, though she was living with my sister’s family for the last 18 years. She was 95+ when she died. She lost her husband when she was very young and had no children. When she died, my brother-in-law, though did not have any obligation, performed all the rituals assuming the place of her son. I performed the rituals assuming to be her maternal side representative. The funeral was well attended, the entire neighbourhood and all the relatives attended and payed their homage. The last rite (karumadhi) was performed at Perur, without skipping any of the rituals.

I wonder about this irony. One lady, with a large family chain and educated family members spent her last days almost like an orphan. Even in her death, I felt that she did not get the respect she really deserved. Her demise was a relief to many.

But the other lady, though having no surviving blood relationship or a legal family for more than fifty years, lived and died as a complete family person. Many miss her today.

The revelation is that, the completeness in life comes not with the physical presence of family members. But with the love and affection we nurture among them.

Life is just not about living with family members. It is about creating a family out of the members living with.

Who am I? (part 2)

This is one of the stories that I often remember whenever I think of the question “Who am I?”

A sage, an enlightened soul once came to a country. The word about his radiance and power spread across the town and a lot of people started visiting the sage. When the news reached the king of the country, he too wanted to see the sage. He sent a messenger to the sage, inviting him to the palace. But the sage refused to move out of his kudil. Surprised and even enraged by this response, the king himself came to the kudil to meet him.

When the king arrived the sage was in meditation. So the king had to wait for some time. When the sage opened the eyes, he saw the king standing in front of him. The king thought that the sage would be pleased, because the king himself had come to see him. But to his shock, without any expression on the face, the sage asked him, “Who are you?”

This took the king by surprise and he said with a tinge of anger in his voice, “Can you not guess who I am…? I am the king of this country!”

The sage looked at the king. “Oh… is that so? The king is your position… your job…! But who are you?”

With his face becoming even sterner, the king answered “I am the great Raja Marthanda Chakravarthi! Haven’t you heard of my name?”

The sage politely told him… “Yes. I have heard of that name. But it is just a name and you are not the name…! Who are YOU?!”

Now, beginning to get confused, the king realized that this man was no ordinary man. So he thought for a while and said pointing to his own body “See me, I am the king, Raja Marthanda Chakravarthi, in this body, alive and standing in front of you!”

The sage smiled and said “That is just your body… but who are YOU?”

This triggered something in the king and this time he cautiously said, “I am this body with all the flesh, blood and every thing put together”

The sage was not impressed. Pointing to the king’s arm he asked “What is that?”

“My arm” said the king.

“YOUR arm? If that is YOUR arm, and the arm is not YOU, and like that every part of YOUR body belongs to you but it is not YOU, then who are YOU?”

The king started realizing that this was not a simple question. So he thought for a while and finally said, “I think … I am the prana… the breath, because if there is no breath, then I won’t be there”.

The smile in the sage’s face broadened. He said “can you hold your breath for a while?” and the king obeyed. Then the sage asked him, “So, when you were not breathing, did you cease to exist? You were still here, right? YOU were breathing. So, if the breath is not YOU, then WHO was breathing?”

The king was now totally lost. With all reverence he said… “I guess it is my thought, my feelings and emotions, my intellect…” before he could complete the sage interrupted,

“MY thoughts, MY feelings, MY this thing… MY that thing… WHO is that MY?”

The king realized his ignorance and fell at the feet of the sage and told “Swamiji, please take me as you disciple and let me know the answer…”

The sage smiled and said, “If you keep meditating on this one question, you will attain enlightenment!”

When my Guru told me this story, it created a stirr in me, and I did loose many nights sleep thinking of this story. My Guru did give me some answers. But, he also said that those were his answers and that need not be mine. It took me many years to get just glimpses of my anwer. I know that no one could give me my answer. Every one needs to find their own answer. I am still searching inside me!