Home is Bliss

Home is bliss. Bliss is the product of a positive attitude. The sort of feeling that it is all nice and still better be. May be a divine stance where the worldly things have limitations and life beyond needs relaxation, the physical condition which induces happiness and learning. And learning we do, and do it on, till the day the perception ceases and the ultimate of all knowledge is reached. That is when it is all light, all see through, till the ends, some nouns, like endlessness where the negatives and positives intermingle and yet not quarrel and annihilate each other. Just both lose their identities. They simply merge in some noun-form which, all of which get dissolved each other into the solid, liquid, air or ether or whatever we call it, My Lord, it all becoming the only one, worshipped by many as many and yet not exhausted ever by a bit because if you add or subtract infinity from/with infinity, the infinity will remain the same infinity, know?

Today is my father's 15th anniversary. Hardly the man still lives in many-body's memories. Mostly just impressions. And people get aged quickly, their brains losing the shine. It grays. Colours are lost. And in the deepening tones, My Lord, your face appears. That is why You are My Lord.

I try to tell my wife how I feel about you. Somehow she thinks it is different. Whatever is Sanskrit is different. Vijatheeyam, of the other castes, is common in old testament. Those days STRIFE was the catchword. Then The Lord arrived and LOVE became the catchword, but still the old mindset prevails. It is a path of analytical out-casting which prescribes anathemas and indoctrinations. An outcome is this Sanskrit Phobia. I say anything and it looks different and an un-academic fanaticism creeps in and I snail back into my shell and at the most use earphones. That is the last I think. That is why these people who shout the CHEVITTORMA, the thing repeated in the ears in a very different rhythm, would continue even after the heart stops.

The phrase, 'Jesus, Mary, Joseph, be in company with my soul' is repeated till the top of the head turns cool. Then they change it as ''Jesus, Mary, Joseph, be in company with this soul' and cease to be heard. That is death. My father had said it himself, loud and clear, in its different style and died. I am to be near his grave at 5.00 and it is 4.30 now. There I will stand near him while an Episcopal service would go inside the church when it is re-consecrated. Benevolent Bishop Mar Thomas Chakkiath is officiating. I would not meet His Excellency. I prefer to be anonymous like my father. So I roll up my sleeves and put on chappals and reach the school for my class at 2.20. Also there is the peace club meeting.This club is actually a non-violence hub. Mostly little ones. They light candles and take an oath. I just do not rise my hand because oath- taking for me is something like getting married and all. I tell Ahimsa Paramo Darma. That is what Shri Buddha had taught. I tell the students to look at each other. Straight into the eyes and smile. All those who can, can bring peace. They are at peace. 'Be open. Be light and you can bring peace around you', I said. Peace had been the central theme, right from the early times. All have learned the periods from the prehistory to post-history. I mean, post modern and all. And all through the times, from vedic period every chanting ended saying, Peace, Peace, Peace. That is santisantisanti. The physical peace, Spiritual peace and third one, relating to all those beyond. I quickly say the famous santi mantra of YV .Ch. 36 v17. Heavens be peace, the atmosphere be peaceful, earth be peace-filled, waters fill peace, plants bring peace, forests, where the law of the jungle prevails, be the place of peace. [And into the peace, My Lord, You take me]

Those in brackets I did not tell. So small they are. I just told them, dears, both peace and non-violence had been the most important themes of India. And it is internal, as much as it is external. It cannot be imposed. Those who say they can impose peace through war cannot be correct. OK. I do not know. You think. And yet it was not yet three.\n",1]
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CHEVITTORMA, the thing repeated in the ears in a very different rhythm, would continue even after the heart stops.

The phrase, 'Jesus, Mary, Joseph, be in company with my soul' is repeated till the top of the head turns cool. Then they change it as ''Jesus, Mary, Joseph, be in company with this soul' and cease to be heard. That is death. My father had said it himself, loud and clear, in its different style and died. I am to be near his grave at 5.00 and it is 4.30 now. There I will stand near him while an Episcopal service would go inside the church when it is re-consecrated. Benevolent Bishop Mar Thomas Chakkiath is officiating. I would not meet His Excellency. I prefer to be anonymous like my father. So I roll up my sleeves and put on chappals and reach the school for my class at 2.20. Also there is the peace club meeting.

This club is actually a non-violence hub. Mostly little ones. They light candles and take an oath. I just do not rise my hand because oath taking for me is something like getting married and all. I tell Ahimsa Paramo Darma. That is what Shri Buddha had taught. I tell the students to look at each other. Straight into the eyes and smile. All those who can, can bring peace. They are at peace. 'Be open. Be light and you can bring peace around you', I said.

Peace had been the central theme, right from the early times. All have learned the periods from the prehistory to post-history. I mean, post modern and all. And all through the times, from vedic period every chanting ended saying, Peace, Peace, Peace. That is santisantisanti. The physical peace, Spiritual peace and third one, relating to all those beyond. I quickly say the famous santi mantra of YV .Ch. 36 v17. Heavens be peace, the atmosphere be peaceful, earth be peace-filled, waters fill peace, plants bring peace, forests, where the law of the jungle prevails, be the place of peace. [And into the peace, My Lord, You take me] Those in brackets I did not tell. So small they are. I just told them, dears, both peace and non-violence had been the most important themes of India. And it is internal, as much as it is external. It cannot be imposed. Those who say they can impose peace through war cannot be correct. OK. I do not know. You think. And yet it was not yet three.

So I make a quick trip to the worksites and reach home, type the piece and try to blog it before the taxi comes. But it is very slow in my obsolete machine. So I email it to Ms.Vijaya, once my colleague at Kovai where I was on exile. She taught French and I would make her pronounce the names of books and authors. We in Kerala followed the 'Zhan' for Jean sort of thing propagated by Great M. Krishnan Nair, whose weekly columns we read to familiarize ourselves with international literature. And she was one of the very few who read literature for literature and was knowledgeable by common standards – a quality which is rare among school teachers of late. Oh. No. I don't cast an evil eye. I am one of the same trade. I am good. And like me everybody is good.

And I send the piece to her and get in the taxi with my mother and pick up my wife and daughter on the way and reach the church to find the bell are chiming on. It is the Eucharistic procession. Beautiful songs accompanied by an able orchestra. My niece comes running. When was the consecration? 'Yesterday it was,' she giggles. What is at home? Chicken and appams. It seems the chicken centre was not open when she went to by live ones. Then she justified telling it is Friday and being very accurately practicing Christians, we would abstain from meat and will not eat even if tempts a lot and all that and my brother gets cross and gets the chicken in curry. Whatever, it tastes so tasty that I forget to call my driver who was also a parent. I think of it only when my brother says what manners I have. So I run out into the rubber trees and get the man and drink tea and start at half past seven to meet Amminiamma.

Once like my own mother, Amminiamma is now bed-ridden, struggling to talk, My Lord, in the last stage, after a full life. She conveys a tradition, the history of these places, the myths, the mingling of them, beyond her frail figure, as the myth, as the history, as people will talk about her.

Then we return and sleep to get up very early for my daughter to catch the Trivandrum train to refer in the British Council Library. I drop her in the station where the three other team-mates wait with the ticket. Then I go to school and see the effect of the highest tide of the year till now and drop my wife in the bank and give my bike for servicing for I have to attend the wed-locking of two of my brightest old students. Back at home I relearn- Home is Bliss and try to blog this piece.