The Sepulcher

I pause a little before stepping into the cemetery. Years of social conditioning has had a telling effect on my psyche. Cemeteries are bad places.

I know that is not true at all. They are just places where bodies lie undisturbed. They are protectors of the human bones. The souls are nowhere near those cemeteries.

Yet, there is this unmistakable pause – not just in my walk, but also in my mind the moment I come face to face with the unremarkable gate beyond which lay thousands of graves – some marked and some not.

“Get over it Nirmal. You know he is not there.” Nitya gently pushes me.

I nod. He is not there. By now, even his body is probably completely gone. It has been seven years since that fateful day. We have overcome that phase of life that we truly believed once we wouldn’t be able to put behind us.

All, thanks to “time”.

The age old saying that time heals everything is totally incorrect. It doesn’t heal anything at all. However, it just helps us cope with the loss better. Over the years, it has gradually handheld us to the point where we don’t turn into cooked vegetables every time we remember him.

Still, the most emotional two days of any year happens to be his birth anniversary and his death anniversary.

Elders in the family had cautioned us against building a memorial where he was buried. “In our religion, we do not build those tombs Nirmal. The body is supposed to decay into nature leaving no trail in this world.”

We were furious at them. How could we not do that? How could we simply let him go just like that?

Now, seven years later, as I stand in front of that pristinely built grave, I finally understand the wisdom of their stance. The very purpose of burying the body is to ensure it goes back into the environment recycled by mother Earth to feed the ecosystem. And it is a symbolic way of saying “Past is past. Move on” to the affected people.

By building this lovely tomb there, the very purpose is defeated. Because of the tomb, we tend to visit it twice a year. If we don’t, we feel guilty. If we do, we feel agitated. We can never effectively move on. The ghost of him is always lurking in the shadows.

Religious processes do have solid practical foundations. We don’t study them deeply to understand those concepts and end up criticizing them as superstition or make believe.

Between the two of us, Nitya has a markedly better grip on the situation. She had endured the last few days of him albeit in great agony. She had prayed God multiple times to take him away as soon as possible.

And God listened.

When the doctor finally uttered the most dreaded words any parent could hear, the first thing we both felt was a sense of extreme relief. Then we thanked God silently. Then we smiled at each other. Then we broke completely.

His final resting place had been dug up by the time I carried his mortal remains into the burial ground in my own hands. I remember taking one final look at my son, dropping a fistful of mud on his face and walking away immediately.

I remember that quite distinctly and clearly. I remember that every day of my life. All 365 days of the year… every year till now.

That churn that I experience in my stomach when I remember that, cannot be expressed in words. It cannot be communicated to someone who hasn’t been in that situation. It is a unique feeling, and possibly the worst form of torture on a human being.

Over the years, I have learnt to deal with that. I still remember. I still replay that scene every now and then. However, I don’t let that affect my daily grind significantly.

Except on two occasions per year.

The birth anniversary and the death anniversary.

On these days, because of the impending visit to the cemetery due to social compulsions, my heart rate goes up, the knot in the stomach returns and I lose my clarity of thinking. In short, I experience an anxiety attack.

I don’t want to make that trip. I am perfectly aware of the “fact” that my son is NOT in that cemetery. He is somewhere else. In a much better place. All that the cemetery has, is a tomb – that reminds me of the face of that kid in the hole when I dropped that fistful of mud on him.

At that juncture, pragmatism and logic lose their sheen. Emotions take you hostage. Time, which is supposed to gradually steer us away from tragedy, loses its focus and we end up in the hole we have dug ourselves.

Being the father, my suffering had been relatively nothing compared to what Nitya had to go through. God had kindly ensured that she learnt the art of dealing with that tragedy effectively. I am eternally thankful to God for that gift. She could sleep peacefully for the first time in months the day her son passed away.

Nitya nudges me. “Where are you?”

I shake my head and stare at the tomb.

She lights up a candle. We silently contemplate the stupidity of the entire show. There is a social norm. A binding that comes with the act of building a tomb. I should have done what my brother did in a similar situation. He let go of the kid. No tombs. Now he doesn’t have to worry about making that trip twice a year.

Grieving is a very slow and gradual process. We don’t need a tomb to remind us of what we have lost. I think it is better to take comfort in the fact that the boy is gone, his mortal remains returned to the nature and his final resting place cleared by Mother Earth to make way for others.

That’s the cycle of life and death. The sepulcher changes everything.

“Let us go.” She says after a while.

I nod and briskly walk out of the cemetery.

“What say, we take the grave down?” I blurt out the moment we get into the car.

Nitya takes my hand into hers. “People will say awful things about us if we do that. Are we ready to face it?”

I start the car. “One day, I will muster up enough courage to do it. I am fed up of these social norms and contracts.”

She smiles, “Remember? We said exactly the same thing when we were advised against building a memorial. How did that work out for us?”

I stop the car and stare at her.

“Maybe there is a reason for doing this. Maybe we don’t understand yet. Maybe we will, in due course of time. Like how we understand now that what we did back then was a mistake.”

“Wait a minute,” I say, “We have been told that building a tomb is not recommended in our religion. So taking it down should be the right thing to do. We have religious backing!” the words sound silly even to me.

Nitya nods. “And what is this religion, Nirmal? Isn’t it an understanding of the way of life – based on thousands of years of following social contracts? Isn’t it evolving continuously?”

I try to say something but she stops me. “You are not going to get the answers today Nirmal. You are not going to be convinced anytime soon. This discussion, frankly, has no logical conclusion – Not with our current understanding. All I am saying is, let us go with the flow – till we figure it out.”

I smile. “Ishaan would have been eight years old today. And we are discussing social contracts and societal pressures!”

“Time to move on” Nitya says “Sahiti will be back from school soon. And there is a big traffic jam behind us!”