LIFE.x

I chanced upon seeing this blog post when I thought about the short story I had written some time back. I too, for one started reading books from a rather young age. One of my first influences on reading was Uncle Suri. Read the story, and you will know for yourself.

Uncle Suri’s books

It was one of those melancholy moments in life, when the sun begins to flirt mindlessly with the gray clouds on the horizon. When the rain would sooner or later start pelting down in torrents, playing spoilsport to a bright and busy day.

I looked out of the window for the umpteenth time, and grimaced as the trees in the yard began to sway wildly, joining in this merry-making among the Elements.

As these muddied puddles grew magically into wholesome watery masses, my mind went sailing along into the depths of Time.

To a grey-tiled house surrounded by tall coconut trees and paddy fields. With a front porch over which the hot sea air blew relentlessly, cooled only by the stunning black-stoned floor. In the middle of the paddy fields was a tiny shed.

It was in this small shed that uncle Suri would sit for long hours, almost always with a book in hand. Uncle Suri was my mother’s only brother, a gentle, peace-loving man, whose only love in life seemed to be a passion for books. Keats, Wordsworth, Shakespeare, Wodehouse, he had known them all in his fanciful pastime.

Grandfather wanted uncle Suri to become a doctor and follow the long-standing tradition of doctors in the family. But uncle Suri was determined to never wield the stethoscope. Not for him those pills and prescriptions.

Instead, uncle Suri decided to become an employee in a government office. In this position, he laboriously squinted at files in the daytime and found solace in his beloved books at night.

So deeply engrossed was uncle Suri in his books of yore, that he would often turn a deaf ear to grandmother’s chides. ‘Suri, her only son, took no interest in daily affairs of running a household’ she’d mutter to an inquisitive neighbor. ‘Suri, her only son, refused a career as a doctor but chose to remain a clerk in a hot and sweltry office’.

Uncle Suri’s only response to grandmother’s words was a deep silence that seemed to resonate through the quaint wooden furniture in the room. Smiling to himself, he would pass a hand over his bald pate and turn yet another page of his book.

Then one day, grandmother’s sisters were heard whispering, ‘Suri is getting himself a beautiful bride’. Uncle Suri married aunt Lakshmi in a simple ceremony.

Aunt Lakshmi adored her husband, and would cook all his favorite meals, iron all his clothes. Her gentle nature won her a position next only to uncle Suri’s books. And that was a grand honor in itself, for aunt.

Days went by and uncle Suri continued to thrive in this idyllic world around him. Where father, mother, sons, daughters, sisters, brothers, nieces and nephews were all woven in a lovely gossamer fabric set aside as a backdrop. Time took a pause, like a weary traveler seeking the shade of a magnificent tree.

Then, one day, aunty started to complain of a strange pain in the chest.

“It must be something you have eaten” mumbled uncle Suri, not once looking up from the open pages of “Macbeth”.

Days passed on, but aunty’s chest pains stubbornly persisted. On the eighth day, uncle finally shut the masterpiece and walked into grandfather’s room. Grandfather lost no time in admitting aunty to the hospital, where she was ushered into a large room smelling of disinfectant. We were allowed occasionally to visit aunt, and hold her tiny pale hand for just a while.

When visitors came pouring into our house inquiring of aunt’s health, Uncle Suri would mumble “it must definitely have been something she had eaten”. Soon after, he would potter off to the bookshelf and hungrily feast on the book-lined shelf.

Aunty died that summer, leaving behind a big void that could never be filled. Like an empty box of chocolates with only the lingering aroma of what it had once held within.

Uncle Suri lived on with the Macbeths and Miss Marples decorating the moth-eaten pages of dusty books, quite oblivious to the fact that his children had grown up. Grandfather had even arranged for the marriage of uncle Suri’s daughter. All along, Uncle Suri was a silent bystander to all these developments, unfettered by such ‘momentary diversions’, for there was more to life than sons and daughters. After all, there were books and even more glorious books.

Months ago, the news got around that uncle Suri was suffering from cancer. Some of us visited uncle, in his tiny room, surrounded by book-lined shelves.

As the cancer grew, he read less and less. When the doctor gently broke the news of his health, uncle merely shrugged and said “I have no cancer young man. The cancer is in the minds of people, of politicians, of crooks and of evil men…”

Uncle left this mortal world with a smile on his face. After all, he was finally going to the land of great poets and writers who had helped him on his journey through this mundane world of human beings and humdrum happenings…