Senile

He sits silent in his favourite armchair. No words, nothing ever comes out of him. One so famous for order and discipline, now sits crouched in a corner. His senses have discarded him.

Now and then, he poses a question about the time, place and welfare of his kids. Some pretend not to have heard him. But when a fond face steps before him, though it has grown much in age and in pain, his dispassionate face breaks into a smile and he asks: “When did you come?”

Once more an era steps before him when he danced to the whims of a fatherless little girl who watched television sitting in his lap, for whom he bought sweets that vanished in a few minutes and with whom he wandered in this new city.

All the stories that are told about his partial loss of memory, his absent-mindedness and lack of consciousness are proved wrong when I, who call him Bapu, may be the first grand-daughter who named a grandfather (with a name that he used to sign his letters) steps into his view.