The Letter-O- Openness

To read N's story, please click here.

"Arjun do not feel pity and guilty for not spending time with me.  And don’t show sympathy towards me as if I’m starving here for something.”  His mother smiled.  He remembered her smile in her younger days when he was a child.  Then she forgot to smile—he too forgot how she had smiled.

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Continued from the scene before

“We go travel somewhere, Amma.” Arjun warmed up to start a conversation with his mother as he had planned. “If I ask you to plan it, what place you top in your priority list?” He brewed the masala tea as his mother had instructed him and poured it into two cups, one placed in front of her.

She sipped the tea eagerly. He felt contented.

Since his mother had moved in with him, he hadn’t spent enough time with her.  He felt terrible about that.  His job is like that--having no set programmes, he should be anywhere at a sudden alert of a crime, even in the middle of the night.  She had never complained about that.  Tonight, after the conversation with Kovoor, he decided to find time with her.    

“I am sorry, Amma, I cannot spend time with you.”

“What is bothering you, son, suddenly?  Let me guess it--someone has pointed out to you, you don’t care for your mother, so take her to see some places.   Am I right?”

He clinched inside.  His mother was right --someone had inspired his words.

Arjun thought the sufferings in her life made her less disposed towards cherishing ambition. 

“Arjun do not feel pity and guilty for not spending time with me.  And don’t show sympathy towards me as if I’m starving here for something.”  His mother smiled.  He remembered her smile in her younger days when he was a child.  Then she forgot to smile—he too forgot how she had smiled.

Arjun had developed an idea of a mother looking forward for a life centred around him.   Kovoor gave him a different perception.

“Children are not for you and your time but for the future.  He gets his education there, finds a woman there, marries her, gives me a phone call, asks me how I am, and am happy.  I am happy with that emotional connection--nothing more I should expect from him.  I don’t want to impose myself on him because nothing more is possible.”

“I was going to ask for help from you.”

While he wondered about the help, she said, “can you help me select a computer.”

He was overwhelmed. 

“We have planned for a project as a group, my colleagues and me—some are retired like me.  Write and publish stories for children.”

She was a great storyteller.  He remembered how the images and the characters she created before him had transported him to another world to escape the fear and the anxiety caused by the violent behaviour of his father.  Children would love her stories.  He felt ashamed he hadn’t estimated his mother’s capabilities.

“Of course, Amma, I shall help you.”

“I have one regret only, “She said.” He waited for her to spell it out.  “I haven’t broken off from my relationship with your father much earlier.  You got no good lessons from him as a boy and a young man to take into your life as an adult.  I am sorry.”

Is he reminding him that he lacks as a man in life? 

“I’m not saying you did anything wrong, my boy.”









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