A legacy gone

Today my mind is infested with sadness, remorse and nostalgia. It’s a complex mix of old memories, some of them very old, of childhood, in our patrimonial white, marble mansion.

My 93-year old paternal grandfather passed away couple of hours ago in the same house. In fact, for me, and I believe for my siblings too, he was the mansion, or the mansion was him. In any case, the two went together in our minds – grandfather’s signature white clothes and the pristine, white marble of the three-storey bungalow that he had purchased at least four decades ago.

Baba, as we called him, was a self-made man, who had seen a lot in life, ranging from the early loss of his near and dear ones, financial struggles and business failures. But he was relentless- as if mocking destiny and challenging it. At some point, even destiny gave up before his persistence.

Born in erstwhile Calcutta (now Kolkata), he came from a modest Marwari business family. Dissatisfied with and refusing to accept rebellious his circumstances, he set out on his own. He always knew he would make it big, and he did. It seemed as if he was always one step ahead of life – knowing what it held for him. He guessed, anticipated or may be just knew what was coming. In his death, he was no different.

He had seen it coming.

After my French language exam today, my brother reluctantly called me to let me know of his passing, shyly asking before breaking the news, how my exam had been. He couldn’t stop sobbing on phone, as he rushed to return to India from Europe, where he had been for a business event.

The whole evening has been with family members on call, each dealing with his or her own regrets, just as I do here. They are all heading to the white mansion, to bid their last farewell to Baba. They tell me he is laying calmly, as if in a deep sleep. I can only imagine him there, though he is probably in another dimension now. Will I ever see him again? I don’t know but something inside of me tells me that I will.

My tears ditch me. They come up to the rim of my eyes but somehow decide to recule, like waves that change course at the last minute. My throat is clogged, as if with a big, round pebble that I fail to gulp. It just stays there, reminding me of my sadness.

I was not particularly close to Baba. Our relationship remained bittersweet at best. We were both stubborn, each in our own way. But we had accepted each other as we were, without judgement. But there’s something that makes me want to cry, even howl. It’s the vacuum that he leaves behind, that overwhelming sense of void that will follow us like a shadow, probably forever.

In my mind, he was the constant, never-changing reality of my hometown. A trip home meant a trip to the white mansion, to greet Baba, clad in white, swinging back and forth in his posh leather chair in his home office.

I recall suggesting to him several times to document his life experiences in a memoir which younger generations could benefit from. He would laugh off at the idea and like all of us, brush it aside for another day. Well, I wish I had insisted. But wasn’t I too busy in my own meaningless little ventures?

Well, I lost my chance.

I may never have told you this, but I really miss you Baba. I miss the strength that I felt with your mere presence, that feeling of being cocooned if something were to go wrong.

Be happy wherever you are. Something tells me we’ll meet again. In another life or another dimension may be.

PS: The picture on the post is a beautiful memory from the year 2019, when he came to visit me in France. It is taken outside a pizzeria where we ate lunch as if there’s no tomorrow.