That One Last Summer Before I Lost my Grandma Forever
The burden of repressed mourning for the loss of my Grandma chokes my being.
In those reverie scorching summers, I used to spend one month at my grandma’s house (My Nani). The orange popsicle melting in my hands and the cotton candy stuffed in my mouth are the exquisite fun memories of my summer days.
The average temperature reaches 42 Degrees Celsius every summer in India, so protecting children from these annihilating summers is necessary. My state of Rajasthan covers almost all the areas of the Thar desert. Hence, it is obvious how terrible summers we have to face. The afternoons of these summers are filled with emptiness & void.
Only the scrutinizing heat of the sun and the ice creams accompany each other.
It is a mandatory rule by the government of India for schools to grant 1.5 months or 2 months of holidays to all students. These holidays are like a boon to all students as we all anticipate visiting our relatives’ houses, especially Grandma’s house. I remember one of my teachers stating “Summer holidays are not for enjoyment, they are for you to study more.”
Yes! No one agreed to that; Every student made weary faces at this statement because we all knew our goal. Our goal was to enjoy ourselves like reckless, playful, delinquent kids.
Summer holidays are equal to happy holidays.
Like this, There is one such summer that is engraved in my heart forever.
I reminisce that summer in my adult life to relive it again.
That Summer:
When I was 10 years old, 6–7 days after the commencement of my summer holidays, I along with my mother and my elder sister packed our bags and got ready to ride on the train to the town of Sirohi now Pindwara (My maternal grandma’s town).
The train journey always felt thrilling like an adventure trip to me. I remember once some people pulled the chain of our train to get off at their particular desired location and it was not a station. HaHaHa!
I was so amused by that clever hack of villagers that I recognized the quirky experiences offered by travel. Somewhere I feel that that was the point when I developed a fascination for traveling.
You never know what may happen in the world of India;
Like a Pandora’s Box filled with surprises.
Anyways, We reached the station and were greeted by my grandma along with my cousins waiting under the blazing sun. I vividly remember my grandma’s old, sickened, wrinkled, tanned face filled with ecstasy on our arrival.
She was a woman in her 60s and always hooded her head with a saree that most Indian women wear. She had reddish-brown hair due to her constant application of Henna and her forehead was embellished by the prominent round Bindi( a red dot made on Indian women’s forehead). My grandma adamantly snatched our luggage from us to load it alone.
Now, when I recall, her greatest quality was being selfless. She would put herself in the most hazardous situations & would sacrifice anything to cater to our comforts; like a wildflower, she bloomed for everyone around. Once, I caught severe diarrhea from the heat stroke; my grandma healed me with her mere loving, soothing presence.
Her another fascinating quality was that she would not eat a single granule of food before feeding everyone in the house. Such a woman was my sweet Nani.
We arrived at her house and soon after I got invested in the mischiefs and playing around with my friends. It was the month of May and we had decided to stay till June end. I would play the whole day from the intolerably hot afternoons to the mellow evenings. The most admired games in my friends’ group were Hide & Seek and Ice Water; We would run like maniacs circumferencing our whole colony. This would lead us to get dehydrated from the hot winds called Loo that blow over the state of Rajasthan.
After ceasing our games, we would rush to grab Icecreams upon hearing the ringing bell of the street vendor. He had a cute cart filled with a wide variety of ice creams that could also be customized. My favorite one was Softie( a cone that can be stuffed with any type of flavor of ice cream) because it came within my budget; The budget of Rs 10 that my grandma used to offer me.
I never requested money for ice cream from my mother because I knew she would dismiss it in an instant. According to her, daily consumption of ice cream in summers can lead to sickness but my Nani never refused my yearnings. She would grab her tiny pouch from the shelf and take out a few coins to give it to me and my cousins.
My nani used to spend most of her time weeping in the memories of her deceased son(My uncle). She would get reminded about him in every feverish moment like how I reminisce about her now. He died in an accident when I was 4 years old.
Apart from my grandma, I also had a Great Grandma in my nani’s house. She was an agile, vibrant woman filled with the spirit of life. She would cook her best cuisine and serve us with great satisfaction. She would trod like a tortoise with her back bent forward. Me and my cousins would often mimic her walking style. HaHaHa!
At night time my grandma would narrate some bedtime moral folk stories. I would drift off to the most blissful land while sleeping in her embrace.
That Day:
On one of these days, I was compelled to wear my brother’s shirt as all my other tops were in the laundry to get washed. I threw a tantrum in front of my Nani to not get dressed in a boy’s shirt. That day my Nani said something to me that deeply hurt the core of my being.
She said “ Why can’t you wear a boy’s shirt? Anyways, we had wished for you to be born as a boy only. Why were you born?” …………
I am the second girl child to my parents; My relatives were expecting the birth of a baby boy before I was born and my Nani was one of them.
At that moment, I completely felt unworthy, dejected, and invaluable in front of her.
In that instant, all her love and care for me felt like an obligation, a duty, a fake act.
The moral stories that she narrated to me felt like a Hoax. My nani had a conservative mindset and patriarchy was deeply rooted in her psyche. I didn’t reply anything to her; I stayed silent with my eyes lowered to the ground and sprinted straight to another room. I cried with my eyes closed & wished in my mind that she should never have been my Grandma.
Now, the fact that god fulfills children’s wishes miraculously became affirmed.
Next Summer:
My Nani died in the following year by a severe typhoid and the guilt of wishing her ill consumed my mind altogether.
On my next visit to her house, I felt like entering a graveyard; no more of her fragile figure roaming in the house aimlessly.
I craved to hug even her silhouette if not her.
I craved to hug her only as a little girl if not her granddaughter.
I never wished for her death, Oh God!
I just wished that she was not my Nani; that I should never have been born as a Granddaughter to someone who desired a Grandson.
Though I have forgiven her over these years, her statement is still stained like a spot of black ink in my soul….
I hope you rest in peace, Grandma & I still love You & Miss You.
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