The Talk

There is nothing better than your home. This fact was understood by me yet again after I came back from a week-long work trip to Hyderabad for attending a conference. I had taken an evening flight and was home by 6 pm. I was tired and just after a little chitchat with mom while having tea, I moved to the second floor of the house so that I could relax in my room. The atmosphere was pleasant and the cool evening breeze made me to go to the terrace along with my headphones to listen to some soothing music.

When I reached upstairs, I found Malhotra uncle who stayed next door taking his usual evening walk on the terrace. I smiled at him. He always had a little chat every time he saw me. Today, I was in no mood for the chitchat. I just wanted to relax. But before I could plug in the headphones, he called me.

‘How are you, beta’ , he asked as usual

‘I am fine uncle. Thank you so much. How is your health?’

‘Ah, it’s fine now. I don’t have any pain right now. It was painful for sometime but after that it has been extremely peaceful’

‘Great.’ I said hoping that I could now go and listen to music.

‘You seem to be tired’, he asked

‘Yes uncle, I am tired, I just came back from a week long work trip.’

‘You shouldn’t stress that much beta. It’s just not worth it, you know. We have the habit of stressing over unnecessary things in life. At the end, what matters is how well you have lived, how did you make people around you feel, how many good moments you gave them and how do you want people around you to remember you after you’ve left’

I just smiled thinking, ‘Why did I even come to the terrace. I didn’t want to listen to another lecture about how should I be living my life? And why is he suddenly saying all these things to me? He has always talked to me about how much I want to achieve in life and what all he had achieved in life. Why the sudden change? Has he joined some art of living course?’

‘No courses can teach you how to live life. It is you who has to decide your priorities. And trust me, what you think as priority now would look farce after certain milestones’ – he said as if reading my mind.

'But, you have to'… and before I could complete my sentence, I heard mom call me. Pheww… What a savior of a moment. I didn’t want to hear any other spiritual guru in the making. So I just plastered a smile and started walking downstairs saying that mom is calling me.

‘I know you are finding my words as spiritual now, but trust me you would find them true when time comes’ he said as I dashed downstairs.  

‘What were you doing on the terrace?’ mom asked.

‘Nothing. Went to listen to some music. But.. Just leave it’

‘Why don’t you go and rest, you told me you were tired’

‘Yes mom, I just going to do that’

‘By the way, did I tell you that Malhotra uncle died day before yesterday? He suffered a massive cardiac attack. They took him to the hospital, tried a lot with all those machines, what do you call them.. err.. never mind.. but then they couldn’t save him.’

My mouth just went dry.

This post is written as a part of April A to Z Challenge 2014 under Non-Themed category. I am doing two posts for this Challenge and Themed posts can be found here.