~ Victims of Success…~

 Today, I saw him traversing the main gate of our block, lost in his own thoughts, his  stupor was apparent but he had to go to fetch items of his daily needs.

Partnering with his equally aged and ailing wife, Kishore Dass uncle is agile enough to do his day to day household work as I see him catering to his favorite pastime – Gardening. He has no vehicle – though he can easily afford one but prefers a bi-cycle to tread on the streets of our vicinity. Sometimes, he would be seen buying groceries and other sundry items for the day.

The other day when I literally ‘Caught’ him smoking at this age, I felt the childness in him. As we had our eye-to eye contact, he called me through a gesture and provoked me to comply and took a promise “Beta, don’t tell your Aunty 😊, she will chide me till eternity!” As I heard these words, I first burst into laughter in front of him – though I am at my honest best – I tried to atone him later, but he didn’t mind it!

I was seeing a completely different man, as my next-door neighbor, I have seen him reprimanding us when we were kids, though we completely deserved his abuses. His still broken windowpanes are a truthful testimony of our overzealous cricket mania. As we used to play with a hard- plastic ball, one of the shots made it to his windowpane at that unfortunate day. We all had to contribute our bits and pay for the broken glass shield – but were always intrigued by one question “Why has Uncle not replaced it with a new one?”

Coming back to the current times, Kishore uncle has become an old man, his wife is almost bed-ridden, both of his sons are out of India and living a comfortable life. Now he has no strength left to balance a bicycle – he hardly paddles that now , as I see it nicely placed in his backyard.

We had a good communication as we walked back to our homes – I sheepishly asked him one question “Kishore Unlce, why don’t you go and stay with your sons now? You require constant support and also with deteriorating health of aunty, how is it that you will be able to manage?”

He first smiled but his answer felt me with a guilt for younger generation “Son, both my sons have literally disowned us. They only call once in a month – that too it is an emotionless call out of just a formality. I told my elder son, if can join them as now we have lived our life and the ‘Call’ can be anytime soon, we often need medical help – I can’t manage things on my own now.”

I kept listening to uncle’s predicament. He stopped for few minutes to gasp as he had begin to choke whilst he narrated his story, then he talked “ He gave me a suggestion, are there no old age homes, you can go there. It is a safe bet for you now papa, I can arrange that for you from here. Don’t worry about money, I can arrange that too!” The utterance stopped but one thing started to roll out – “Streams of tears from his eyes!” – I turned stone – All these years, I have been actually not liking this grand old man of stature, but never knew that he was carrying the Biggest burden of his life on his shoulders!

 Today, many of us are parents to small kids, thinking as to how tough it is to up bring the kids – those sleepless nights, mid-night rushes to the doctors, Standing in serpentine queues for school admissions, daily doing the balancing act of household – Doing so for ages, one day , we all will find ourselves in the footsteps of Kishore Uncle – though our kids would be well settled and would have moved in their own directions of living – hearing these words what Kishore uncle heard will be a big ‘Failure of our lives’.

Many a time ‘Success’ brings its own ‘Failures’ – the charm of making it big would make you tread an uncharted path – a meadow where you want to touch the pinnacle of achievement, but the price that you have paid once you look back would be enormous!

I kept on thinking about the pain and anguish of an old man, how he must be feeling about his life and situation he lives in – the worst part being- he has never told his wife about what his son suggested him. She still adores both of his son and gives herself a motherly excuses that “They must be busy in their lives as it is very occupied outside India.” . I can well understand being a doting mother, she also would have been giving her sons the benefit of doubt of ignoring their aged and ill parents, so that Uncle should not feel ashamed of his children.

Today, I felt and have been constantly thinking about this story – ‘What a shame of such success , as you have been enveloped by it and have become a victim of it –  You can be rich and famous in any part of your life – but you can never meet your parents again if you loose them!’ This is a simple but a profound truth of ones life – I hope one day Kishore Uncle’s sons would be a witness to this fact – but by then the time would have played its part and they would be just a mute spectator of Destiny!