The Philologist

Regret is a big word
So many go down without lest some hurt
What could have been talked
But we just sat there and moped
What could’ve been became what was
And thinking of what was makes you cuss
In the end, nothing can ever matter and it gets good
For all we are, nothing but worm food
For all those of you who do have regret,
The way ahead, know but there are two
Many decide to let ego win but with fret
While letting everything go is the path of a few
The way you go is so your choice
But the better way ahead gets up your poise
But in the end, nothing really matters,
because in the long run, we will all be dead

She stretched her arms and legs. It felt so effortless today. The air she breathed was pure and light- like it caressed her lungs in a way like never before. Her heart wasn’t beating slower or faster than it should be. As her foot touched the floor, she felt a connection between her and Mother Earth.

She got up from the bed, stretched again and walked towards the window. A pale ray of the sunlight was falling on her face. The early morning sun had never been more welcoming.

She looked out of the window; kids were playing on a ground not far away. Middle-aged walkers were brisk walking, trying to burn the excess calories of the previous day.

Her glance moved to the main road.

Early morning office-goers were piling into buses at the nearest bus stop. The morning was in all its glory.

She was feeling alive more so than ever. Her stance was strong, and she was ready to face the day headlong.

Something felt amiss. A cup of coffee, was it? She turned around, blissful as she could be and then suddenly she met reality- her ears and eyes adjusted to the cacophony of human and machine sounds.

.

.

.

A bunch of doctors and nurses were huddled around a hospital bed- trying to defibrillate a patient. The patient on the bed was shaking whilst a high voltage electric current passed through the body. She inched towards them to see what was happening. And at that moment, she heard a shocked voice and a machine noise. It was all over!

Her eyes went pale as she caught a glimpse of the patient’s face and the flatlined heart monitor as the nurses covered her face with a white shroud!!

Hazy vision, stifled breathing, heart racing at 120 bps, constricted blood flow in my hands, overall choked up feeling- my day couldn’t have been better.

Reading the title + the first line might have brought in a thought that I had that ‘virus’.

Thank God, no!

At least, not yet!

Praying never!

That is how I felt gearing up, while I went for my COVID PCR test. Hazy vision owing to the face shield, stifled breathing as I wore 2 masks (a 3 ply surgical under the icing on the cake- a N95), heart racing at 120 bps (well, that was just stress). 2 gloves had given my hand a rubbery feeling and the overall choked up feeling was by wearing a PPE overall (the shop specially brought from the distributor just for me, alas- was tad 2 sizes small)

The lab was just a short while away from my place. As I got in the car, the overall gave way, ripping in desperation. Now it was just 2 pieces of cloth dangling over my body. Throwing it out and getting back in the car, now it was just the face shield, masks and gloves for my safety.

At the lab, I was totally overdressed for this party sans the astronaut style PPE clad nurses.

Most of them were just wearing a mask. Some had gloves. Some were just wearing cloth masks. At a place with a higher probability of getting infected, better to be safe than sorry.

The testing was quite fast. From filling out the form to getting the nose swab, I was in and out in less than 30 mins. To say, it took me more time to find the lab than being in the lab.

And testing negative, boy, that was a sigh of relief. A relief, that I stayed safe during the safe season.

The season ahead is worth the watch!! Hope to stay safe and requesting all to be vigilant. A momentary lapse can end you up in the daily government tally. Stay safe!!

**runs to sanitize hands** 😉

Tea- a beverage fabled as a drink mistakenly discovered by the Chinese and made ever-so fanciful by the British over its vast empire including India.

Earliest historical reference on Tea in India dates back to 12th century AD while the British started producing it commercially and with China, India constitutes over 60% of the global tea cultivation.

Being an indispensable part of the daily routine, making tea varies from person to person, household to household. Hundreds of varieties make its preparation an art, and if ‘yours sincerely’ were to make it, it would be a dis’art’ster.

Either tired because of no sleep or tired of sleeping too much, be it with 3 hours sleep or 12 hours sleep, waking up groggy has always been my forte.

Post ablutions, the moment I step out of my room, a cup of steaming hot ‘chai’ would be sitting on the dining table, its aroma wafting through the air.
Intricately spiced with cardamom, cloves and ginger, its sweetness just right, this cup of joy had always been my mood raiser and deciding factor for how the day was going to be.

Then one day, I got up to an empty home. My family had left me ‘Home Alone’ for some shopping.
Expecting that the usual cup of tea would still be there, I walked to the dining table, teeming in anticipation.

The dejected look on my groggy face was seemingly becoming evident as the table had no cup of tea..

COVID time cooking experimentation had made me transform from a novice cook who knew just one dish to a fairly decent cook who could whip up something at ease. Biriyani, pasta, curries for roti, you name it, I could try to. Disaster stricken kitchen, pots and pans lying berserk post-cook is on you.

Just one hiccup!

I wasn’t very sure about how to make tea.

My earlier experiences of making tea and coffee were limited to my Nespresso machine or emptying a premix sachet or my office regular black coffee with no sugar.

So I did try.

Put the water to boil, added the tea leaves, a clove, cardamom pod and waited for the smell to waft through the air.

It did.

A pungent, putrid smell did waft through the air. Was it the cloves or the cardamom? Or was it the tea leaves? A quick smell test ensured all were smelling the way it was supposed.

Then it hit me, a slap on my face.

I added three tablespoons of tea instead of the 1-1.5 teaspoons, which was the norm. Watering down the brew was the only option.

To make me a cup of tea, I transferred the foul-smelling liquid into a bigger pot and added water enough to make tea for all the houses on my floor.

I left it simmering and went to attend a call.

My parents were calling to check if their gargantuan little boy was up.

Tea was simmering, and I went on talking.

It would be an exaggeration if I told you that my tea leaves were devoid of colour and the tea was pitch black. Well!

It had simmered for too long.

The smell had gone, or was it just olfactory adaptation?

I added milk powder to the glass and was pouring hitherto to another to get my froth on.

Alas, it was too strong. I kept on adding milk powder, enough to feed a child from age 1 to age 3 in the cup of tea, and it ended up becoming a thick mash.

I could freeze it to make a pudding.

A cup of tea, a feeling of joy, a sip of bliss had turned to become a slurry of mayhem.

Tomorrow, I intend to make coffee. I can hear the rejoicing Columbian coffee growers.

TLDR: I screwed up making tea! Exaggeration- quite a bit.  

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It was just a white curtain that separated them inside a large room in a hospital bustling with patients, doctors, nurses and bystanders. Busy as always- people were filing in and out- of course, they were as this was the pre-COVID era.

Two beds on either side- an older man was sitting on a chair at the far end of the room. He was snoozing lazily on the chair, waking up troubled every time he heard some mild sound. He had dark circles under his eyes- he hadn’t slept in days. His chair was between the window and a bed where an old lady lay.

She lay motionless next to the windowsill on a bed far too large for her. The rays of the morning sun had its way on her face. She was as radiant as the rising sun. Her wrinkled face was glorious, calm and elegance intertwined even as she lay still. Tufts of wavy silver hair was falling on to her face. Her body rose and fell with mild undulations- the only sign that showed that she was still alive. The dangling remote control for the bed was moving in sync to her breath. Monitors and screens were stable with squiggly lines moving hitherto. A central line was placed on her neck, her life support for medication and fluids to keep her alive.

She was a mother, a wife and a daughter. She had everything- a high profile job till she retired, drove a Mercedes till she couldn’t drive anymore, a large house, staff to wait on her head to foot, everything she needed and wanted. And something she did not need, definitely didn’t wish to have- cancer- oesophagal carcinoma.

It was almost cured, she was better. The lost hair was slowly growing. She was talking. And well.

And then, she collapsed during a function. People were filing in day in and out while she was at the hospital. Soon the number started dwindling. Then it was just her and her husband. The painkillers were always keeping her sedated. He was there, every day, every night, by her side- just going home to get fresh sets of clothes.

On the other side of the room, he was getting restless on his bed. The IV cannula on his hand was being filled with one medicine after the other by a nurse. His little eyes were fixated directly upfront. A piercing look from him bore deep into the nurse’s heart as he winced in pain. The doctor told him he is getting better. His ‘neck thing’ was off since yesterday, and he was counting his days for his ‘hand thing’ to be removed. His little fingers counted days. Days were becoming months, and months were almost becoming a year. He had lost count now.

He was a boy, full of fun and frolic, climbing trees and throwing stones at trees and boys who jumped on the trees. He was a studious chap, scoring well in his class. He and the boys were enjoying life till he fell on the ground that fateful day. The nurse in the school gave him a glass of glucose, thinking it was the heat. It wasn’t. He lost his interests, and he was suddenly weak. His friends thought he was lazy. He no longer climbed trees, and he no longer was studious. He was no longer himself.

He got admitted to the children’s ward in the hospital. He used to cry every night in pain- cancer was a tough disease to beat. He hadn’t heard of cancer. He had just progressed from addition to subtraction in school. He used to cry silently every day in anguish. People used to come over to see their children with presents and toys. No one came for him- just one of his teachers came- the day he got admitted- to dump his belongings there. He couldn’t fathom the intricacy of such a disease but could comprehend that fact- that an orphan had no one.

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The nurse was newly assigned to the paediatric oncology department. Every day, as she comes in to give the children their medicine, everyone cried or resisted. He was lying there getting injected into the cannula. That bravery made her notice him- a young man in the guise of a six-year-old. She couldn’t help but notice that no one came to visit him. She saw his side table empty- just one book- a battered old Enid Blyton. Other kids had games, toys etc. brought in while he lay gloomy. Despite the pain, they used to laugh, play and move around the room. He just lay there- eyes transfixed straight ahead- the eyes spelt pain.

She found out he had no one. Connecting the dots then didn’t require a rocket scientist- he was sad because he had no one. She felt his medicine reception would be better if he were to be moved to some other place- away from children with doting parents and a plethora of presents. So he arrived in his new room.  

The old lady was staring out of the window as he arrived. She wasn’t expecting a roommate, nor did she want to- the double room was hers to stay- a wishful request from the doctor made her oblige.

His eyes met hers. It was a silent connection. Unspoken words meant more.

Every day, they ate together. Her central line fed in glucose, while he ate his meal. She was always up to see that he was fed.

He was up and about when she woke up. He would push the blanket on to her bed if it had fallen. He would keep her company, always by her side without uttering a word.

Days became months.

Every week a small package appeared on his side table. A toy, maybe a book, some chocolates, sometimes even a new set of pajamas- he was happy. Soon became keen to know his benefactor.

She was improving. He was improving. Her central line was out. They started having lunch together. She would weakly sip on her porridge while he would devour his rotis.

As she started getting better, dinner too was together. Her husband too would join them, while getting amused by his antics.

Not a word was uttered.

The white curtain was drawn at night while they slept.

His presents kept coming.

Slowly, he would perch up on her bed, cross-legged at her feet while they would look at each other in silence as they had their meals. As she started having solid food, home cooked meals started coming. He would eat with her- she would sometimes feed her.

He would slowly get down from his bed, hoist his plates and carry her plates too.

They started having all meals together.

She started walking slowly- he would try supporting her while she and her husband would pace around the room but the 6-year-old’s body was too small for her to hold.  

Not a word was uttered.

The white curtain was drawn at night while they slept.

His presents kept coming.

He was smiling. The nurse saw progress in him.

He was happy.

He saw a mother.

Doctor had come up to her one day trying to make utter her first word- ‘Ayush’ came as a gushed whisper and then as a firm call.

She was expecting him to come running to her. She got up from her bed, past the doctor and her husband and moved the white curtain – the bed was empty.

She stood in shock.

The present in her hand burned her fingers as the nurse wheeled in another patient.

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She lay there, unperturbed.

A gentle whisper near my ears.

She dodged my outstretched hands.

A mockery in her eyes.

As I lay on my head, for some shut eye.

Again she went, a whisper and a taunt.

Made me wide awake and agile.

She was fast and frisky.

I was so not to be.

She just wanted to see me try.

I just wanted to get this over

Then did I whip out my tool.

Brandishing like a sword I went after her, oh my dear

Crack went the whip

Crackled and mangled she lay.

In the electric net of doom, her remains astray

Thus concludes the tale yonder

Of how I killed a Fly that interrupted my slumber