Parents
I was talking to a friend of mine yesterday evening. From his voice, I could make out that something was bothering him deeply. I tried to start a conversation and asked him if everything was alright. What he said next really moved me. It wasn’t a dramatic story or something but it really held me speechless for a long time. I couldn’t get this out of my head for the second day now.
The guys was basically a chennai resident, married and has kids. He was staying with his wife and kids in Bangalore while his parents stayed in Chennai. He is looking for a transfer for sometime now to go and join his parents in Chennai.
Both his mom and dad are in their late 60s. Last week, his father fell ill with typhoid fever and was admitted in hospital for a day. Only his mother was there to take care of his sick father. This guy talks to both of them almost everyday and he spoke to them several times in the last one week. But neither his dad nor his mom told him about the problem. His father is alright now and it is only now that they tell him about the typhoid incident from last week. They did not want to tell him about it before as they did not want him to get worried unnecessarily. They wanted not to disturb this guy when he himself would have several other day-to-day issues on his own related to work or his own family here in Bangalore.
End of the story.
Like I said, this is not a dramatic narration of sorts. But honestly, how many of us are lucky enough to have such self-less parents? Hmm…
g.arun said,
May 29, 2007 at 9:44 pm
anand,
most parents are self-less. u will also be one when u have a kid.
wats lacking is kids are not that self-less(towards thier parents). i.e parents maybe not as
self-less towards thier children as they are to thier parents.
btw, its good to see a personal post after quite some time.
vanand said,
May 30, 2007 at 1:04 pm
but the entire episode begs the questions if everyone is lucky enough to get such parents…
g.arun said,
May 30, 2007 at 9:55 pm
never mind abt like lucky parents, rich parents etc … u can be a lucky parent to ur kid and lucky kid to ur parent. u already used the word - selflessness which means no expectations.
vanand said,
May 30, 2007 at 10:13 pm
yeah, you are right - selflessness is the right word. just that it’s not common everywhere these days…
Ambimama - India » Many Difference between ‘Pasam’ ‘Karma’ and “Practice” said,
June 14, 2007 at 8:08 pm
[...] writes a nice article here. It was about his friend’s parents not sharing their difficulties. The father was suffering from [...]
Arun said,
June 16, 2007 at 4:37 pm
I AM LUCKY THEN. PERIOD.
Vijay said,
June 27, 2007 at 8:02 pm
We live in a generation where our parents are quite selfless. it’s for us to make sure we listen to their unsaid wishes!
Prashant said,
June 28, 2007 at 9:45 pm
well, I would agree for most part. Just that like any humans you are ‘expecting’ parents to be self-less. You feel justified to ask for them to live a saint like self-less life however its hard for them to detach themselves from the earthly pleasures- kids possibly the biggest one!
Having said that I guess this gives this generation a chance to lead by example :)
offer good education, upbringing to the future generations and don’t expect anything in return once they are in a state to fund themselves. This may set the ball rolling of a bigger freedom for the population 30 years down the line !
Preethi said,
August 28, 2007 at 11:15 pm
The bigger question… how many of us are unlucky to be living away from our parents… and not being able to assess for ourselves their times of need?