Grandparents die in your 30's
My last living grandparent (my mother’s mother) was 98 years old when we once visited her in Negombo. We exchanged cheerful chats over tea, walked, and talked about the kids. For my sons, she was their great-grandmother!
After merely 3 months, we saw her again. But this time, she was stuck to a bed, visibly just the bones and skin remaining in her body, barely being able to move a hand.
For the majority of us (based on un-statistical evidence backed by non-scientific observations), we will see our grandparents die in our 30’s.
We will see their last days, the struggle at the mouth of death, knowing that there’s not much time left in this world.
We will see the way they fall to disease and the way they yearn to unite their families. To see their kids and grandkids one more time.
The helpless days, the final days.
I witnessed both my grandmothers (mother’s mother and father’s mother) passing away around the time Sahaswara (my second son) was born. And I remember noticing the resemblance between a newborn baby and a grandmother in her late nineties fighting death.
Seeing that really puts the Shakespearian writing on the ‘second childhood’ into perspective (from The Seven Ages of Man).
The helplessness in the eyes, fully dependent on the ones that surround you. Trusting they would look after you and keep you safe and fed.
I would sometimes just close my eyes and imagine myself in that state, it’s good to be familiar with it, I thought.
Life (survival) is a miracle…
The thing you also realize is - the stories you had heard as a child and thought ‘that could never happen..’, start happening mostly in your 30’s.
These are stories of despair, from death to divorce and losing health or wealth.
But these could be the same stories that motivate you and remind you to fill your life with un-regrettable experiences now that you are still in your 30’s.
The reminder that you shouldn't or (actually) cannot wait around..
As another famous saying goes - “Every day I look in the mirror and ask, 'If today were the last day of my life, would I want to do what I am about to do today? ' And whenever the answer has been 'No' for too many days in a row, I know I need to change something.”
I’ll leave you with that thought…