So last night I dreamt of Ma

Its odd — considering all this while, I was dreaming of people being sick, people crying and in each dream, I would be the “strong” one, pacifying people, taking care of them, running helter skelter.

***

You see, when you get tagged as having strength, more often than not, it is taken for granted. So when no one could handle Ma’s illness and her care in the last couple of days, I finally got summoned. Thing is, I had been asking for over a year and they kept shooing me away.

“I will come to you only when I am ready to die,” Ma had once joked. That was a couple of years ago. Her words were more than prophetic. Only in this case, the reverse happened.

But then, I don’t really agree with this alleged “strength”. Or at least I don’t believe I am strong. Given a choice, I would really rather not be strong. More often than not — like with Ma and in my dreams, there is really no choice.

***

So unlike the other dreams over the last month or so, last night’s dream was actually nice. Well kind of nice. Well, there were some nice things in it.

For instance, Ma was in it. She looked like how she was a few years ago and smiling. She was talking to me.

Then she was wearing that Magenta-Red silk saree of hers from many many decades ago. Ma had a bright skin tone and that colour literally shone and lit up the room when she walked in.

We were at some kind of a train station. I had taken a train from somewhere else to get there. It appears I had asked her to meet me there. From there, we would go together for an onward journey. I don’t think either of us mentioned where we were going.

I met her at the station and it was a very matter-of-fact meeting. But I remember just being at peace & happy that she was coming with me. So I asked her if she had tickets to get on to the following train, she said she had hers done already and I just needed to get mine done. I asked her if she knew where the ticket counter was, she said it was a couple of hundred metres away.

So I said, “Great, lets go get my tickets”

“I am not well, remember — I don't think I will make it till the ticket counter. I will sit here and wait for you,” she responded. And that is when I remembered that she was not well.

I ran down to the ticket office — it took a while, asked a few people the direction to the place.

Tickets procured, I jogged back to find her still sitting there exactly the way I had left her. I remember feeling relieved to find her still there.

We sat together and chatted for a while. She said a couple of trains had passed by while I was away.

The next one arrived. I got up and helped her up too. We hopped on to the train and immediately I got her a seat.

At one point, I remember her standing, looking out the train door as the train went chugging along. But all the while, I kept checking up on her — was she ok, was it hurting, did she want me to get a nurse, stop the drips for a while?

And we chatted — about movies, about books, gossiped about relatives. The usual stuff.

All this while, I don’t recall ever having discussed where we were going. It felt like an understood thing between the two of us.

As V woke me up in the morning, I don’t recall having completed the journey. I asked for 5 minutes more of sleep — just to see if there was a destination. My mind went back to the train and we continued to chat through the train journey. And that was nice.