13 April 2011.

Six years ago we lost our father on this day. To radiation induced cancer of the bones.

We had a little function at the house in his honor this evening. This time I had decided not to have the usual puja at the temple or even at the Ganga. Instead, I did what he would have done for his own parents: have people over, eat together and listen to music. Generally, do everything that would have pleased him if he were alive. Behave the way he would have been proud of, wear clothes that he liked to see me in. Tidy up the house - he liked neat and tidy and rhythm and beauty in everything. He used the words "grace", "sweetness", "dignity", "honor" "rhythm" a lot.Heloved people. Strong people with highly defined sense of honor.

He said life need not be perfect but there ought to be rhythm in it. So we were brought up to work hard to maintain rhythm in our lives. And to remain on the side of what we believed was the side of the Truth. He had warned us: you would have to find your own Truth. Is it different for different people then? You would know in time.

He kept a Nataraj murti at his bedside table and often used to quote the Satyam Shivam Sundaram mantra to reiterate the importance of Truth and Beauty in trine with Shakti, strength. 

I remembered I had made a promise. I had to keep it. I had to stay calm, act out of reason and good sense, not lose my head when everyone around were losing theirs. My Father would have wanted that.

I logged into Open Salon. Went to check in on a blogmate that had made a promise and in trying to keep it had lost something dear to him.

It is 2310 IST. I was writing him a little note to say "Glad you are still around. Please stay and keep fighting". At that moment Disco Fett's blog died. I was surprised. It felt the same way as it feels when you watch a person die.

2330 April 13 by quirk of fate would always remind me of two losses: one of a man that said life need not be perfect but that there MUST be some rhythm in it; another of a blogmate that showed just how hard it is to stick to one's truth and reason.