Funeral

If there is such a thing as an ideal death, it was the way my mother-in-law passed away in her sleep at night never to see another dawn. After years of illness and trauma she has finally found happiness. It has left a profound impact on her children and my eldest child who was very close to her, all of them would love to see her again.

As I watched the flames flickering in the crematorium, it brought back vividly images of another funeral, of my father who passed away many years ago. As an eldest child I had a very close relationship with my parents even though in later years the younger siblings found more favour. Like an unquiet ghost his handsome photo still haunts me, conjuring up images of more care free days of my youth when T. V. Mobile, internet and email were not there to invade your privacy. A sense of remorse rushed through me as in later years I was indifferent towards him. As the flames leapt higher and higher, the smoke reminded me that my mother-in-law was waving goodbye to civilization.

Standing so close to her, one gets an unbelievable sense of our own permanence. You become conscious of mortality like you have never been before. Knowing that you don’t have forever to put things right and do all the things you want to, makes you wake up. At the funeral some mourners got into an argument over the rites and rituals, I guess it is really a conduit for their own grief and pain.

I spent a lot of time in Jesuit schools and attended many funerals. I was really impressed by the beauty of their carved caskets and always had a secret desire to be buried.

Even though I was born into a Hindu family, my wide circle of friends of different caste, creed and religions and travails abroad had imbibed in me elements of Islam and Christianity in good measure. However, the thought of lying in a cold coffin and returning to earth and becoming part of the soil is now not that attractive.

As I cross fifty years on this planet my present feeling is that my ashes should be scattered in the foaming sea near Tellicherry near my ancestral Tharavad where fish small and large sharks swim in harmony. I have spent many hours by the beach in Quilandy in profound thought and in awe of the sea, so I think this will be an appropriate resting place. My relatives and friends are spread all over the globe, but if our spirits live on, as everyone wants to believe, then they will all be able to traverse the ocean to come to my resting place. Instead of the Pujari chanting slokas which no one understands I would like some violinists to play Tchaikosky’s Winter Reveries, while my pyre is lit by the beach.

Having lived a full life I would like my 13th day “wake” to be held in the ‘Colonade bar’ at the Secunderabad Club. There should be plenty of whisky – and other alcoholic beverages the perfect drink for such occasions- and lots of jollity. I dare not imagine the stories escapades & jokes friends and family will swap about me, but I certainly think it should be a happy occasion.

I do believe funerals help the bereaved achieve a certain solemn sense of peace. Death is as impossible to ignore as life and I don’t think about it in a negative way. I firmly believe in the life force rather than the death force.

I would rather relish and look forward to every day rather than waste precious time contemplating death. I can always meet the loved ones I have lost if there is afterlife.

The images of my beautiful mother-in-law and handsome face of my father flash before me to capture the quintessential era in which they lived.

It is as if people who have passed away, are all in some large continuum of the spirit, and it will take more than death to drive away their memories. Nothing stays the same.