Is your heart a Lake or a Marsh?

It was the summer of a year that marked the beginning of this millennium. I locked up my apartment in a hurry and walked down the stairs. My heart was getting heavier with each step I took downstairs. As I walked around the block to my friend's apartment, the phone call I received from him a couple of minutes earlier was still ringing in my head.

"I got a phone call from India," he said in that call. "My Dad passed away". As he went on with more details, my brain was already processing fond memories of his dad  - a very funny, intelligent and compassionate man who also happened to be a doctor. The news sank into my heart instantly - bringing out emotions that I never thought I had in the first place. With each passing minute, the news was digging deep into me; generating a whole bunch of questions - how could this happen? How would it impact my friend, his sister and mom? Had they already found out about this? How did they react?

I lost my father at a very young age, so I knew how the loss of a father figure could affect a person's mentality. It is not just the loss of a person - it is the loss of a friend, a support system and most importantly, a brutally honest critic. All of this cocoons into something that makes you want to be a better person all your life.

As I entered my friend's apartment and hugged him, I completely lost it. I was in tears and and held him tight, looking to console him out of his sorrow(as if that was possible). He then patted on my back and said, "It's ok, It's ok". It was then I realized something - the news had not struck him yet; he was still in no man's land, coming to terms with what had happened. There were no tears, just a blank look which, to an outsider,  would give an impression that he had everything under control. But I had known my friend for sometime now and I knew that there was a void that was created which could only be filled in by accepting the dreadful fact of his loss.

After making arrangements for his trip to India, some of my other friends and I saw him off at the airport that night. This was before 9/11, so we could go all the way up to the gate. We rehashed some memories of  the man, there were complaints about the long flight and a few laughs out of my friend. I thought to myself - "Ok, he still has not grappled with the news yet, but maybe the 18 hours of flight will do it".

It has been 10 years since then, and I have to say that not only did the news sink in for him, but it has been with them since then. I get a sense of it from the conversations that I have with him, the blog posts that he writes and the off hand impromptu remark that comes out of him.

Which brings me back to the post's title (it's about time) - when it comes to your heart is it a lake or a marsh? When news comes your way in the shape of a black stone, what does your heart morph into? A lake in which the stone sinks fast, but can be easily taken out by undercurrents? or a marsh where in the stone sinks slowly, making marks along its way and hard to move around? Or a mix of both?

Let us hope that whatever shape our hearts take, it never gets a bad news stone thrown at it. I know life is not full of happiness, so if something has to be thrown at it, may it be pebbles - that skip until it crosses the lake, and are so light that they could never sink into the marsh.


Image courtesy :www.myspaceantics.com

Don't be a disaster journalist...

at least when chronicling life, that is.

Today, I was showing my daughter (who is almost a year now - time has the pace of a concord) the pleasure of being thrown up in the air. She was pleasantly surprised as was evident from her smile revealing her two small teeth. There is something in a baby's smile that attracts you like none other - may be its the innocence that they seamlessly possess or maybe its the fact that they are so un-adult (I know, its not a word) like.

The sun was shining bright through the window and its rays ignited a sparkle in her eyes. There it was - a moment I would  like to cherish and store - my daughter and I having a great time together.

But then , the inevitable afterthought had to ruin it for me. In life, we tend to be like disaster journalists when we chronicle our life. Flip through the photos in your mental photo album - have memories of unfortunate events registered  more than the pleasant ones? We tend to remember how friends, kith and kin were mean to us, how we got the short end of the stick in our lives and how hard it is to get through a normal day. When we grow old, will we talk about our kid's rebellion or will we talk about  all the fun time we had with them?

I don't know the answer, but I sure would like to capture the beauty of the moments that were pure joy and bliss, rather than focusing on the spectacle and ruin of moments that I would rather forget. The  truth is that bad moments hit us hard and the more we try to forget them, the more etched they are in our brains. Maybe the key is trying hard to forget the pleasures we own now, thereby digging it deeper into our memories.

BTW, did I tell you about the motorcycle accident I had? Oh wait...