Losing Amma, Finding Home by Uma Girish

Author:Uma Girish
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Hay House
Published: 2014-12-13T00:00:00+00:00

16

SLIDING INTO A DEEP SLEEP, I STEAL MOMENTS OF PEACE. But somewhere in the murky light of night, fitful dreams sneak in: Amma is writhing in pain, she’s screaming, she’s being wheeled away on a gurney, I am screaming. Finally, the nightmares release me from their clutch. A delicious inertia claims me in the pre-dawn hours. When I eventually awaken, grief rushes at me: fresh, raw and real. I shut my eyes tight, lose Amma all over again.

It’s Sunday morning. I wander around the apartment, an untethered balloon, directionless, lost and floating. I didn’t know a two-bedroom apartment with two people in it could feel so desolate. Our apartment is well-heated, but I’m shivering uncontrollably.

The phone is silent. I haven’t made any friends here, mostly acquaintances. But then, we’ve only been in Chicago nine months, and I’ve spent two of those in India. Not a lot of time to cultivate a social circuit, plus I wasn’t really very sociable, with my life turned upside down. No one really knows me. No one knew my mother. It is a painfully lonely place to be in.

I gravitate to my laptop and open my e-mail. It is the quickest connection to Chennai, the only place I really want to be.

A snowstorm of condolence messages drifts into my inbox.

An aunt writes: ‘… losing a loved mother makes us feel orphaned, as if we are cast out alone in the world …’

‘I’m sure words are pretty meaningless under the circumstances, but I do hope you find the strength and acceptance to cope …’ from an editor friend.

‘What a sad time for you, especially being so far away from her … I’m sorry that you cannot come back as a tutor this semester …’ writes my ESL supervisor.

‘Perhaps God was kind enough not to let her suffer too long …’ a well-loved teacher writes.

A friend, my pregnancy buddy (she and I had our babies a few weeks apart) writes, ‘… I went through the same experience in 2001 with my Ma. I am almost crying now, feeling your grief and recounting mine … now I can see Ma’s smiling picture every morning and think fondly of the angel I had (and still have) in my life … it will be the same with you …’

But the next two e-mails punch me with the power of profound loss.

A friend from Madison writes, ‘… I can only imagine that it must hurt like hell, particularly since you are not only far, far away, you are also in a place lacking in the comfort of friends and family, others that you know and are familiar with … time marches on, inexorable and unyielding, proving we are ourselves just ephemeral, proving that we should not take ourselves nor our beliefs too seriously, instead focusing on our lives now … I have no idea if you can drive up here, but if you care to, you are always welcome. You know the place, the house, the room. Come here for laughter,

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