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Love Letters
50 Years
Hence
by Aparna Chatterjee
You wouldn't be
here on this earth, neither would I...
Just like our grand-parents and great-grandparents... We hardly know
what life they led, what turmoil they went through, what were their
reflections on life...
Death infuses so much of 'nothingness' into our existence...
When our forefathers lived, all their emotions, feelings and thoughts
were of so much paramount importance and relevance not only to them but
to those playing pivotal roles in their lives...their parents, their
siblings, their friends and lovers, their children, their co-workers and
colleagues...
And now when they are no more there...whatever happened to those
nitty-gritty feelings...all vanished in the thin air...just like they
are now 'out of sight' for us...those everyday little thoughts and
responses which meant the whole world to them and to their peers, none
of them exist now...so much irrelevance, so much triviality, so much
non-existence, Mortality makes of us...
So I was just wondering about the relative importance of our thoughts
and actions...how very time-based and limited to life, our relevance
is...
At the moment, every single view-point of ours influences our diurnal
decisions and choice. And sometimes we get carried away to the point of
despair, desolation and disappointment if our expectations are not
fulfilled...yet we feel so positive at times, hoping for new experiences
and changes in life...feeling happy and grateful about whatever comfort
God grants us...be those physical, material, academic or spiritual
milestones...
Amongst my grand-parents, I was quite close to my Grand-Ma...though I
could only visit her on my annual visits to our home-town in Asansol
every year or she used to come over to our place in Nainital, once every
few years...And I do have cherishable memories of her...like trimming
her nails with my nail-cutter...as she was quite frail and shaky to cut
her own nails...so she always entrusted me this task, when I was around.
And she used to tell me that I'll go abroad because I looked like a
memsahib to her, some sahib from abroad will come and wed me off...I
used to blush and laugh at her assumptions...though never knew it would
be so coincidental and partly true...that I would get married abroad.
And I do miss her so much at times...yet, I wonder, that with her demise
a decade ago, all her human feelings, thoughts and sentiments also
vanished with her life's last journey to death...
May be, her soul is still somewhere in the sky, amongst the twinkling
stars in the night, or in the gentle breeze that touches me ever so
often...or she may have taken re-birth in another home...or is waiting
to be ordained by God into another human's body...or has attained
Nirvana - Freedom from The Cycle of Rebirth - Salvation. So many
possibilities...Yet No Definite Answer.
All the above thoughts about life and death make me feel the futility of
existence ... yet, we are not Robots...we are humans who think, feel and
perceive, acting as per our influences in life...so even if we consider
ourselves in a continuous journey from life to death to re-birth and so
on and so forth...such a consideration doesn't help us negate the
everyday little 'ifs and buts' we go through in our diurnal survival of
the fittest on this earth.
We are prone to react if things go wrong...we do feel sad, happy,
hopeful, morose, thinking about our present and past life events...even
though we know that after our death, all these human instincts of ours
become non-existent and irrelevant...for we ourselves don't know where
death would take us...what would be the ultimate destination of our
soul.
So 50 years hence, I wouldn't be there, neither would you...yet besides
our happy thoughts, we also nurse some grudges and hard feelings between
each other or amongst our family, friends and foes...but that is what
makes us 'human'...it hurts to feel...yet we cannot help feeling...can
we ?
What is done cannot be undone...the past was tumultuous between you and
me...it has had its repercussions...left behind scars and stains of a
tainted relationship...it is no more the same...you know that and I know
it too...
And it is so hard to pick up the broken pieces of a shattered glass, and
start afresh...
However, one thing is for sure, whatever we do in our present life, the
results of our actions, be those good or bad, are borne by our coming
generations...our children, their kids and their next
generation...long-term consequences could be many. Hence, we should act
sensibly as responsible citizens of this human world. Because we as
well-wishers of our progeny, would always want to wish them well in
their life's endeavors...
That is a long, 'boring' mail for now..! I always come to bug you so
much with my boring thoughts...yet, when these thoughts overflow, I need
to contain those, and because you are my Diary...I make notes to you.
Adios,
Apu
February 19, 2006
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Love Letters
The Week of February 19, 2006
Creating National Alternative : First A New Policy
Agenda by Rajinder Puri
India's Communist Parties: All Bark But No Bite
by Dr. Subhash Kapila
US History - Lesser Known
Facts, Analogies & Surmises Part 2 by Gaurang Bhatt, MD
Protesting the Caricature of Islam by William
R. Stimson
The Search for Shangri - La by Dr.
Amitabh Mitra
50 Years Hence by Aparna Chatterjee
"Exercise" Your Stresses Away by
Rajgopal Nidamboor
A New Brainwave by Neeta Lal
Natural Evolution and Happiness by Dr. Anil
K. Rajvanshi
Measure Your Value by Naira Yaqoob
Let's Celebrate Life by Viraj R. Rai
Earning The Proverbial 'Bread and Butter' by
Neha Girotra
Vengeance – A Short Story by Kusum Choppra
Portrait of A Man – A Short Story by Naiyer
Mallick
Reflecting Upon the Body by Aparna Sharma
Kerala: The Land of Boat Races by Dr. V.
Sankaran Nair
Girls as Workhorses by Nitin Jugran Bahuguna
Sewing Together a Coalition by Anuja
Mirchandaney
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