Drawing Parallels

Drawing Parallels

Rosetta’s journey through space carrying its infant Philae in its pouch for dropping off onto the comet for research is a journey out of this world. It also forces me to draw parallels with life’s journey and our glaring inappropriateness.

The Orbiter Rosetta carried on undaunted through the dark corridors of the unknown for a brave ten years carrying along with it in its pouch the lander Philae through harsh and unknown conditions. When the time was appropriate it let go the lander to make a near textbook landing on the comet which man’s wants to explore to reassure him as to the origins of the earth and by extension he.

Unfortunately during the opportune time the landers few organs malfunctioned and the lander could not be screwed on to the surface of the comet in the way that it was rehearsed and tested on earth, leaving enough gaps for it to bounce twice as a tennis ball and resting probably sideways under the shadows of a high rise rock cutting its solar panels off from receiving the rays of the sun which would have otherwise enabled it to feed on for its nourishment.

Latest reports suggest it has run out of back up batteries and is in hibernation with a chance of waking up briefly when it nears the sun in its orbit to revive the solar panels before perishing in the heat of the sun. The mother craft Rosetta will keep a watchful eye in the sky hovering over the comet to look for signs of revival before the whole experiment tapers off under the melting heat of the sun.

In life, parents make their journey through trials and tribulations dodging the unknown to make life meaningful all the while educating the young ones with life’s experiences and lessons on the way. When it is time, it lets go of the young one allowing it to venture on its own, into paths and territories unknown, helping to build a better world.

During this journey it is the upbringing that decides whether the child will fly away whole or whether some of its organs are underdeveloped and therefore would not be able to grasp on to the gifting of life and this universe. If it is not whole then probably it will bounce quite a few times like the lander to settle finally in a place and circumstance not wholly intended but brought about due to this malfunction which is a direct result of wrong upbringing. 

Like the lander life may play its part to partially help it to get off this position, a second chance trying to manoeuvre a position of comfort that would leave its solar panels receiving the rays of life, but it might also lead to a situation where like the lander he may be left dangling in mid-air and clinging on for dear life. If such an incident happens then the young ones may be left to the mercies of the universe without much scope of revival or they may be left isolated in the cold waiting for a life cycle to receive the bounties of life enabling it to at least gasp in relief.

Like the lander a flawed process of rearing and upbringing will only expedite this route to extinction as it nears the testing phase in life when it will not be able to stand up to the heat and lose its sheen and glamour; nay its individuality melting away into the sun.

Robin Varghese – robin_vargh@yahoo.com

16^th November 2014

Till death do us part

Till death do us part

I watched as she drew in her last few breaths, a palpable joy coming over her face as if she knew what awaited her if she had not popped the pill. A smirk grew across her face as if to suggest, I go on my own terms, I have cheated death, and I have chosen my time- so long till we meet again.

For us gathered around her bedside it was like having to watch someone die the way we have never seen in our lifetime. All the deaths that we encountered or heard about, our relatives, parents, friends and neighbours have all been while we were not looking. Most of them went in their sleep; others in hospital, still others were long dead with only the formalities to be completed.

This was the first time I was staring at death on the face, the first time I was seeing someone draw heavily on the last available resources that her body would allow her to. In fact this was the first time I was looking at death face to face albeit on the face of a loved one. The pain that I went through and the emotions that drained out of me during those final moments were incredibly tough, hard to explain. I wanted for a moment to force her jaw open and dig the pill out. Yes, we had talked this over many times and we had agreed on the timing, but the person fading away was my dearly beloved wife.

It all started a few years into our marriage, when she had a splitting headache, which we concluded to be associated with some form of treatable migraine or the like. This increased over a period of time till we were forced to take it seriously and consult a doctor. The reports were startling since we had to prepare for a surgery to remove a tumour. We went through it all and seemed on the road to recovery, when it recurred and this time the doctors concluded that the second coming was even worse and non-treatable giving my wife at best 10 years to live.

We went to the best of hospitals the shrewdest medical brains in the country but the ailment grew worse, so much so, that the disease seemed to manifest at a faster rate and the doctors rewrote their findings to now declare that she only had a few more months to live. How dreadful were those words, those findings, those conclusions. We hoped and prayed it would go away, a miracle would take place, but the body kept reminding my wife on a daily basis the nearing of the end.

Doctors had also described in detail the pain and suffering that would precede the end and it seemed so hopeless. Why undergo this pain and suffering when it was clear that the end couldn’t be averted? This pain was not only to the patient but to all those who loved her, to each member of the family, her dear friends. The purpose of pain and suffering would be justified if there was some sort of succour in the end. She would have gladly embraced it if there was a way out in the end, at least a distorted outcome with life hanging in the balance would have had us think another time.

But when all hopes are dashed and there was helplessness on the medical front and with the doctors treating her, what should she battle for? Why should she endear known hardships? Why get into that territory when you couldn’t find your way ultimately? Therefore she decided that it was not worth fighting, taking on the pain and suffering and make others suffer when there was not a glimmer of hope, when even miracles seemed to shamefully bow their head, when prayers wouldn’t add to the hope.

Now the only thing that remained was when and how the ending should be. She decided that she would immediately take up pending things she so wanted to do, things that were on the back burner due to the constant visits to the doctor taking its toll. There was no point visiting hospitals and doctors when the outcome was known, instead utilise the available time and energy to live life to the extent possible befitting her age and aspirations, remember she was only 29 years old. It was better to utilise the residual strength in the body to achieve the things she wanted to do rather than waste it on tiring efforts that were meaningless.

So the day we chose was the 3^rd of November 2014, a lovely day when heavens doors would be open, when the path to heaven would be clearly visible from down under, when the birds would be at their chirping best, when she could feel the breeze coming in through the open windows and the sound of the leaves rustling, when the reality would sink into her loved ones, when the awareness issues she hoped to create in the country and through the various mediums would be somewhat brought into the limelight.

We all held hands and prayed as a family when the soul was departing from her body, never holding her hands as she stumbled into the darkest depths of another world lest it be construed as our reluctance to let her go, because there was no going back, no coming again, for somewhere in the distance I heard the voice of my dearly beloved wife lovingly whisper into my ears, into our ears, into the ears of all her beloved faintly, seemingly fading but unmistakable- I have challenged conventions, my job is done keep fighting my lovely, my friends till we meet again.   

Robin Varghese- robin_vargh@yahoo.com

4^th November 2014

(This is an imaginary piece of writing nothing to do with actual events of the death of Brittany Maynard, a terminally ill woman who chose to end her life battling an untreatable cancerous head tumour for which she even chose to migrate from her home in USA, San Francisco Bay area to Oregon to get onto the right side of the law)