(It's not just our blood relations that define us, it is also the family that we find along the way. Today is Kaka's birth anniversary. This is a little memoir I had written about him when he passed away a few years ago. I believe it is only right that I post it today. He was one of those few people I shared a special bond with. I know that he's watching over me from someplace and I want him to know that he's remembered and that I miss him.)
There’s life, and then, there’s death. Inevitable. The ultimate truth of life. Simply as if you are born to leave. But when it comes as suddenly and unexpectedly as it did for Kaka, it leaves you numb. It brings on the realisation that nothing is permanent and how important it is to live each day to the fullest, just as if it is your last. Because change is the most absolute law and that is what we should learn to live with.
Kaka is survived by Kaku and his three children – Rupa Tai, Rahul Dada and Mehul Dada – all of them way older than me. And then, I was the fourth. Because Kaka always called me his “Maanas Kanyaa”. When I first heard about his demise, it was this image that refused to leave my mind – Kaka sitting on the Bhartiya Baithak in his living room and as I push open the partially closed door, his happy and enthusiastic exclamation of “Arre wah! Gayu!!!”
Kaka was an artist as well as a poet (and sometimes a writer), and he was exceptionally good at both. He had painted this portrait of Ahilyabai Holkar (holding a miniature Shivlinga with her palms closed around it), which had taken him quite a long time to complete. Such was its beauty that if some lay person had seen it in its earlier stages, it would have seemed complete even then. But no, Kaka wouldn’t rest until it became perfect – adding layer upon layer of paint till it really became so. I (then a teenager) used to tease him about it. Whenever I would ask him about how come he still hadn’t completed the portrait, even after all this time, he would reply with a smile, “Beta, there’s still finishing to be done!”. Incidentally, as a kid, it was Kaka who first encouraged me to draw after he saw my lithe drawing book, where I had drawn silly cartoon faces. And it was Kaka again, who gave me my first paint brush along with a little blue box of water colours and a colour mixing palette. And to this day, I still have them all.
Kaka wrote as well but he was more of a poet. As a kid, I remember wondering at the length of his poems, simply because all the poems I had ever come across till then (courtesy: school textbooks) were all limited to eight or ten lines. Interestingly, it was Kaka again, who edited and finalised the draft of my first speech (my Maushi had written the speech for me) – the one which I gave in school when I was around four years old, on 15th August, 1997 – India’s 50th Independence Day. I still have a copy of that too.
I was a student of Rupa Tai’s since nursery. My Maushi used to come to collect me from school sometimes. That’s when she and Rupa Tai struck a friendship. It was from there that the acquaintance had begun. Being the first child and an only daughter, Rupa Tai was very dear to Kaka. Then some years ago, she got married and moved to Indore. You could tell from the way he was reminiscent of her, that he missed her very much. Even though he stayed nearby, I used to go and visit him mostly on festivals – Dasra, Sankrant, Ganpati season, etc. But I specially never missed Rakshabandhan and Bhaubij. Meeting Kaka was rare and it became even less frequent when Rupa Tai got married. But whenever I went, he would always say this – “Beta, you know, you are so much like Rupa. Whenever you come, it feels like Rupa has come home.” – And I would smile and touch his feet.
I am very grateful to my life, for having given me some really amazing people. And Kaka was one of them. There is so much I could write about him but it could never fit in the matter of a few pages. I have known him practically all my life, since the time I was a three year old kid. He had lived 73 years in the world, but he never appeared even a day older than 60. Perhaps it will be hard to believe, but I have never seen him without a smile on his face. Never have I seen him get angry or utter a harsh word, ever. He was so full of love. May be it was his pleasing aura that spread cheer all around. And this is something that a fatal heart attack can never take away.
I have always wondered where people go after they die. And I guess, I have found the answer, at last. They don’t go, they come. They come to live in our hearts as memories... as alive as ever!
I Love You, Kaka... And I Miss You!
- Gayatri Shejwal
