A homage to my friend

Homage to my friend

We lost a dear friend and a most wonderful human being, Guru Venkatesh Gopalakrishnan this Saturday, after an 8 month long battle against Cancer. Guru was first diagnosied with Stage IV lung Cancer in July 2010 and had endured multiple Chemos and radiation with the hope that he will win this battle but it was not to be and he finally succumbed to the disease. Guru was a non-smoker, a teetotaller and a vegetarian and the doctors have no idea what triggered the disease. But most important of all, he was a fighter, he valued life and thought it was worth living and he fought till the very last minute and never gave up.

Since I have always thought writing helps me give a voice to my thoughts and feelings, I wanted to write something here to describe the grief that has overtaken my existence these past two days, I wanted to say many things describing how beautiful a person Guru was, but turns out, I am quite at a loss for words. My mind is empty, I can't think of the right words. I have tears in my eyes and my heart too. I spent the past 2 days with the grieving family and am finally sitting alone this afternoon thinking about everything that transpired. The 'why' is just killing me. I would like to believe I am a rationalist and that there would be a reason why this had to happen to him, and right now, we don't have any answers. I hope I have the strength and clarity of mind to help his wife and two kids and the rest of the family to pull through this ordeal.

Guru will always be missed and will always be remembered, and he will continue to live in our memories and hearts.

Happy Valentine's day!

I don't need a bunch of red roses to make my day brighter.
I don't need chocolate to remind me of how special the people in my life are to me.
 I don't need jewelry, perfumes, cakes, dresses, watches, gadgets and what not in gifts to tell me that I am indeed loved and wanted(and no, I don't give them either). I don't need a Valentine's day to remind me of all the love in my life.

A hug, a kiss and a few words of love are all I need.

On this day of special sentiment, I wish you all to have a beautiful day filled with love and care. I know that a lot of the above things mean a lot to some of you, but I hope you don't get swept away by the wave of meaningless consumerism that hits people the world over on this day every year (A BIG 'thank you' to the corporations)! And I hope this makes sense to at least some of you reading this right now :-) (And if it doesn't, it is perfectly alright! Please do have a delightful day! :-) )

The sale

We were selling a car for a friend last week and went through the usual protocol. Take some pics, put together an ad on Craigs and then, play the waiting game (which is basically the toughest part if it's a big sell). Fortunately, the car was a reasonably new one in excellent condition and a stick-shift in that, so was much in demand. We got a few calls the very same day and managed to schedule some appointments with some prospective buyers.

And so it happens that this father and son pair come over, the son was going to college and his generous dad was looking to buy a nice car that the boy can be proud of and can also put to good use. I was just back from work and was already in the kitchen working my usual evening shift with my son in tow. So I didn't interfere and let the man of the house handle the visitors (besides, he was the one 'dealing' ;) ). And then these people were gone and we got on with the rest of our evening and with our lives in general.

A couple of days later, Sashi sends me this message 'The car is sold!'. 'Who bought it?' I ask (as if it really matters who bought it). 'The dad who first came with his son to look at it' He pings back.

And almost as an afterthought, he pings again 'I'd have been surprised if they didn't buy it. The young man..'(he meant, the son) '..was quite open and naïve and he told me and showed me very clearly how much he liked this car. I suppose he needs to sharpen his business skills ;)'

That was a very interesting thing Sashi said, I thought.
The young man was probably just being honest in showing his sincere appreciation for a thing of beauty and value and such is the sad state of wordly affairs that we, grown-ups, in all our wisdom choose to look down upon that simple honesty as 'lack of business skills' or as not being 'wise'. Wait, didn't we always consider honesty to be a much-valued trait in people?

And when I spoke my thoughts to Sashi, he shrugged it off, 'Such is the world, and I don’t think it’s related to the times. It’s always a game of one-upmanship and whoever does that successfully gains materially. It defeats the purpose of character building and a virtuous life, for sure, so it’s up to everyone to figure out what’s more important to them, and to what extent.
I do see that part about it being “sad” but such is the way it is and I don’t see any value in attaching emotions to it.' he says

So, simply put, we are actually telling our children that if you want to have a comfortable/successful life, you have to be manipulative and fake. It's probably not as black and white as that but it sure isn't as nice and rosy as I'd like it to be either. What do you think?