It was a pathetic scene to watch. But somehow Nammu Aunty
took courage. She braved to speak to her children. I helped her in getting connected
to her children. Funnily, each one of them said that they have some meeting,
urgent work and not being able to move due to illness. The daughter was very
eager to come, but she had the problem of some bomb scare and the flights being
cancelled. The ultimate result was that none of Nammu Aunty’s children turned
up. It was uncle’s elder brother’s son (whose mother had passed away) who did
the last rites.
When someone questioned about her children’s absence, Nammu
Aunty defended, “They all were very eager to come. But they all had problems. It
is not like my husband was ill and was counting his last days. Then we could
have told all the children to come for seeing his face. But now they have
genuine problems. So why blame the poor kids?”
But I came to know from the third son who was close to me
during school days that all the sons had invented some bunkum stories not to
attend the funeral. I started wondering, ‘Did they not like their father? Is
that why they did not make it?’ I do not know how he became close to me and he
became distant from me after his marriage. But he found me as the medium to
express his real feelings. I was almost like a punching bag for him.
The three sons were close to each other. Though their wives
did not like each other very much, they were united when it came to treating of
their in-laws.
I later came to know the bitter truth. Since your father has
not done anything to us, why go? Anyway his favorite daughter is there. Is she
not the one who took away all the jewels of your mother? – These words were in
some form or the other by the daughters in law.
I know how the marriage of Nammu Aunty’s daughter took
place. The marriage was very simple. The boy was also a very friendly person.
He insisted that he does not want any money from the girl’s side. But uncle was
keen to have a big reception. Everything was going smoothly. Out of the blue,
the boy’s elder brother, who was expected to attend the wedding from Chennai,
came in with blood oozing out of his head. It was a horrible scene to watch. He
was pursued by 2 rowdies. They wanted some big amount of money immediately. To save
his other son, the boy’s father was desperate. Nammu Aunty, who was a mute
witness to the whole scene removed all her jewels and tied them in a small towel and handed over to the boy’s
father. The thank you look on the boy’s father told Nammu Aunty that she did
not make any mistake.
But the mistake had been committed from the point of view of
the daughters in law. They all had come to the wedding. The three girls started
cursing their mother in law and the hatred grew as the time passed.
They restricted their husbands from contacting their parents.
There was no communication for quite some time. Nammu Aunty was feeling bad
whenever she got news that she got a new grandchild. The three sons behaved
like cowards. Their argument was, wives and kids are their future. Why go to
the past and spoil the future?
Nammu Aunty and uncle were not happy. But they still tried
to believe that the sons are too busy to meet with them all, though in the
heart of hearts they knew their kids have deserted them.
But daughter was not like that, was their satisfaction.
But suddenly, there came a bolt from the blue. The son in
law became jobless in the USA.
Daughter was in doldrums. Nammu Aunty took a hard decision to
take care of her daughter’s plight.
This led to more distance from her sons!
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