26 October 2017

How I met my new Facebook friend but never talked to him

This is an interesting “intersection point” where a friendship was established. But no words were spoken. I am not even sure how to write about somebody that you have not talked to. But here it goes…

I had made a quick dash to Ahmedabad to meet a friend about some work related stuff. In between our meetings, we had strolled over to the Crowne Plaza next door to catch up on some food. We were sitting at our table in some deep discussions, when I realized that the waiter was standing next to me. Instinctively, I told him “Just a glass of water”.

I had almost turned my head away to continue with the discussions when I realized that the reaction from the waiter was not exactly what I was expecting. I turned back and saw him pointing to something hanging from a lanyard around his neck.

That is when I realized that he had no ability to hear or speak.

That is not an everyday experience I go thru. It took me a few seconds for the whole thing to sink in. Meanwhile, he fished out a small diary. Presumably for me to write on. I smiled at him and pointed to my glass. He got the message and went away.

But I was totally distracted the whole time. Multiple times, I saw him helping other guests so seamlessly. Did not betray any signs of shyness. He would interact with every guest with the same level of sincerity and proactivity as he would if he could hear and speak. Except of course, it was happening thru notes on a notepad and finger gesturing.

Finally, I told my friend that I had to meet Hardik again. I signaled him to come to our table. Which he did. And then I was stuck again. How do I ask him questions? How do I tell him that I was totally moved by his courage?

Presuming that I was ready to order, he brought out his notebook again and pointed out to some blank space below what I assume the previous customer had written – “Black Coffee”. Not knowing any better, I drew a long line and wrote “I am very impressed by what you have achieved!” and gave it to him. He read it and looked at me. There was obvious delight in his eyes. He did his namaste thing.

I turned the page and wrote further that if he wanted to be friends with me and chat, he could email me. And gave him my email address. He scribbled something over it. I turned the notebook around to read it.

Want to take a guess what wrote? He wrote – FB?

I am an idiot. What was I thinking giving my email address to a millennial? Facebook it was!!

He himself located his FB profile on my phone and sent himself a friend request!!!

That is how I had a memorable “intersection point” without ever talking!!

This story will not be complete without a shout out for Crowne Plaza, Ahmedabad. I am not sure whether this is a global practice for them or just in India or just in Ahmedabad. In any case, hats off for stepping up to the plate to make this a better and caring society. May your tribe increase.

Category: Intersection Points, Vacations | 29 Comments on How I met my new Facebook friend but never talked to him
25 October 2017

The changing times…

It used to be that as the sun rose from the far end of dad’s balcony, I would pace up and down waiting for him to wake up. It used to be that we would have the first cup (or two) of tea together sitting in the balcony and watch the morning unfold.

Not any more…

Now I just want him to sleep peacefully as long as he can.

Perhaps, sensing the void this morning, my mom came and sat down quietly beside me to have our morning tea.

The new normal!!

Category: Family in India, Vacations | 5 Comments on The changing times…
25 October 2017

My first grade class (home room) teacher!!!

“Thank you for coming all the way from Kolkata to Ernakulam to see me. I feel very special today. Nobody has done that before”.
“No, no, no, that is not how it works”, I quickly responded. “I am the one who is here to say thanks for every way you influenced me when I was barely a few years old. In many ways I am today who I am due some of those early influences”.
“Plus”, I admitted, “You had asked me to come and meet you”.
“I did?”, she asked somewhat confused.
“Ah! You do not remember, do you? I will tell you that story”

That is how the conversation began the moment Mrs. George opened the door. She was my class teacher in first grade. Last time I had talked to her face to face was in 1973. This year, I had tracked her down to a place about 1500 miles away from where we used to be and had promised her that I would come and see her. Especially given the great difficulty she has in moving around (both her knees are shot) and the fact that she is valiantly fighting Parkinson’s, I was determined to make that meeting as quickly as I could.

After she slowly walked to her chair with the help of her cane and I settled next to her, I continued-
“You lived in Aurobindo Avenue. 5th street, right?
“Indeed”
“Back in the mid eighties, there was a girl on 8th street on your road that I used to be romantically linked with. One day, I was coming back from her house, and I ran into another old schoolmate of mine – Soumitro was his name. He lived on your street. He had mentioned that a year or so back, you had realized that he and I had become classmates after leaving your school. And you had asked him to ask me to come and see you if he met me again”.

“Not sure why – I believe I had gone back to my college a few days after that or I was feeling too awkward (and I was plenty awkward those days), I never came and saw you”.

After pausing for a moment, watching her take in the whole story, I finished up:
“Mrs. George”.
“Yes?”
“I know I took too much time. But I have come today and I have kept your request”.
“Thank you!”, she smiled.
“And I brought something for you”
“What?”

That is when I fished out a printout of a photograph I was carrying for her in my backpack.
“Do you remember this?”
“Looks like a class picture during Christmas party”.
“Indeed. Mrs. George! December, 1973!! I want you to keep this picture”.
As you see from the photo below, I spent quite some time naming the students and giving her an update on where they are and what they are doing. Much to my surprise, there were a few names she recognized instantly!!

The rest of the afternoon went remembering so many of our old teachers and me learning about her early childhood days in the rubber plantations near Kottayam district and her days after she left our school.

I got introduced to Mr. George. Mrs. George showed me pictures of her daughters and grandkids. I even got to see a picture of her from her wedding day!!!

If there was one meeting I never wanted to end, it had to be that one. First grade! First class-teacher!! There are still many more memories we did not get a chance to share! But I had two flights to catch before I could get back to my place (there were no direct flights for me). Reluctantly, I took leave.

“Rajib?”
“Yes?”, I looked back at the door where she was standing to say Bye to me.
“What happened to that girl from our road?”. I think she was trying to tease me.
“Oh! I married her!!”.
Going by the big laughter she gave, I did not think she was expecting that answer!

As the Uber guy started our one hour drive back to the airport, I felt a surge of emotional high for being able to see Mrs. George after 44 years to say Thank you. As well as the simultaneous pangs of the inevitable question – Will I be lucky enough to get another chance to finish off a few more stories?

Category: Intersection Points, Vacations | 26 Comments on My first grade class (home room) teacher!!!
20 October 2017

I never knew snoring could be that reassuring

One of the challenging aspects of going down with some of these eventually-life-consuming ailments is that everybody – the patient and others around have to go thru a sharp and excruciating learning curve getting used to the new normal. One usually does not get trained for these kind of phases in life. Sometimes, the best training you might have is what you recollect having seen happening with your grandparents or other elders while growing up.

Yesterday, most of the day we struggled with that learning curve. Dad was clearly uncomfortable. He was being very restless the whole day. Kept us on our toes trying to figure out how to ease some of his pain. The problem is that patients cannot always describe what their problem is. Of course, with his speech severely debilitated, he had his own challenge even putting words in his mouth

At around 11 at night, my brother theorized “I think he is having difficulty with his breathing”. Among all other complications, my dad is also a COPD patient. His lungs are very weak and only a fraction of it is functional. My brother then gave him a treatment to boost his lungs – I guess some kind of medication that you inhale thru a nebulizer.

In about 45 seconds or so, dad went off to sleep From his facial expression, you could see that he was much more comfortable. It seems his challenge was he was not getting enough air, but obviously, a patient like him cannot self-diagnose it. We had to learn it by stumbling upon it.

At the time of writing this – and it is past 6:45 in the morning, he is still knocked out. In fact, I can hear him snore. No other sound can be as reassuring as that right now.

Going back to last night, we then finished up dinner, got mom to sleep off and then spent some time knocking ourselves out too 🙂 My brother, sister in law and myself. Finally, we were relaxed enough to open that bottle of vodka that I had gotten after fighting thru the rains last evening 🙂 Whipped up a quick cocktail late at night…

Stacy Roy Roderman, you had wisely advised in a prior comment that I should remember to take care of myself too. May I submit this picture as Exhibit A in support of that 🙂

Category: Family in India, Vacations | 1 Comment on I never knew snoring could be that reassuring
20 October 2017

Day 2: Glimpses of his old self

The morning was relatively better and then it quickly deteriorated from there. However, on the brighter side, he slept well last night. Which means, we all slept well!!

In the morning, I had put him in the wheelchair and wanted to take him out. But we got completely stalled by the steady and heavy rains. We were all rained in for the entire day. I had brought him out to the living area and had him sit around with us.

In a glimpse of his old self, he asked for the newspaper. Between my sister and myself, we folded the newspaper and turned the pages occasionally for him. I could see him intently and slowly read the words. And then he would lift his head up and stare at space like he was thinking something or trying to remember something from the past.

Eventually, he slept off in his chair with the newspaper in his hand.

Category: Family in India, Vacations | 6 Comments on Day 2: Glimpses of his old self
19 October 2017

That unassuming, oft-forgotten other parent of mine…

Those smiles and better-than-normal state for my dad did not last long. I had gone to bed at around 12:30am. By 2:30, my dad’s ailment had taken a firm grip and gotten the upper hand. I woke up suddenly to loud yelling. Glanced at my Fitbit to check the time and rushed to my dad’s room.

Dad was in bed – clearly awake – and was yelling as hard as he could. The assistant lady was helplessly sitting beside him. And my mom was deep asleep next to my dad. My dad was trying to wake up mom with the one arm that is still functioning. But mom is so overcome by exhaustion – and as I have mentioned before, she is a patient herself – her body just could not take any more in spite of all that chaos that was happening a foot away from her.

I went by my dad’s side and started to calm him down. He was slurring all the time. Completely incoherent in his speech, there was absolutely no way to communicate with him – let alone apply reason or logic. You could sense that he was feeling very helpless and wanted my mom to be with him. As part of his brain damage – he calls my mom “mom” now!!! He does not remember her name. He just calls her “mom”. I will write about a defining moment in my life about my dad and his mom (my grandma) later.

I tried a lot of things – getting him to sit up, getting him to lie down, giving him water, just talking to him in soft voices…. He kept on going thru a phase of what seemed like a few moments of logical thinking (“Go to your bed! It is too late now!!”) followed by a few minutes of complete insanity (“Call mom! She has borrowed money!! I need to drink milk!! – and those were the words I could actually comprehend). In about 20 minutes he tired himself out and then went off to bed.

I went to mine to start writing my blog. He woke up in another 10 minutes and we went thru this cycle three times till he finally slept off at around 4am. My mom never woke up at all thru all this.

Sat in the balcony and made a few birthday calls to US. Checked the emails and realized one of my patients in hospice had “transitioned” this morning. When I went to check on him on Monday before leaving for India, I had met his son-in-law there – it was pretty evident he was not going to make it for too long.

Shut down my computer, overwhelmed with my thoughts of my dad, my hospice friend who is longer no more and my mom.

When I go to hospice, it is a volunteering thing. If I want not to deal with a situation or am frustrated by a patient, I can always walk out. Or go to another patient. I have a choice.

The caregivers in the hospice – they have less of a choice – but at some level this is their profession. They are trained for this and to some extent, they have chosen this as their calling. But still, my heart goes out to them watching them keeping their sanity amidst some of the gut-wrenching scenes. (How do you really deal with a situation when the patient helplessly looks at you and asks – “Can you speed this up?”. Yes, I have seen that happen with one of my patients)

The assistants we have here at our house – my heart goes out even more. They are not professionally trained at all. These are middle aged women who are doing this because they need a livelihood. I have found, so far, all of them extremely compassionate and incredibly patient. What they do not have in training, they make up in sincerity.

And then there is my mom. She is having to carry the biggest burden of the care giving. She has refused to sleep anywhere but next to my dad in spite of knowing that she is going to not get much rest. Dad is yelling always for her – without any rhyme or reason. She has not complained yet of her situation even once or has asked any of her kids for any more help than we are giving now.

Here is the tough reality – she was offered no choice. Life dealt her not the brain stroke itself but the biggest collateral damage it can cause.

Being a primary caregiver is much tougher than I will ever realize.

By the way, when I went back to dad’s room, mom was changing his diaper. To give them some privacy, I stepped out and came out to the balcony to enjoy the dawn break – something my dad and I often enjoyed together.

Went back a few minutes later and saw that the kitchen lights were on. Stepping in, I saw what was going on… My mom, instead of going back to sleep, was in the kitchen making tea for me!!!

Like I said, being a primary caregiver, is very very tough.
Being a mom? Much tougher, I suspect.

Being both? Beyond my level of comprehension…

Category: Family in India, Vacations | 82 Comments on That unassuming, oft-forgotten other parent of mine…