Big Pati

Big Pati. My great grandmother. She was so kind, that every minute with her made me feel happy. She was very old and frail, and even though I couldn't understand what she was saying because I didn't know Tamil, she always made me smile. Every time I met her, she smiled and said that she remembered me, when sometimes she didn't even remember her own granddaughter, my mother.

She hugged me when I sat next to her, asked me how I was even if she was too tired to speak. I love it the way her face wrinkles up when she smiles. Whenever I hold her shaky hands, I know she's trying to tell me something. She's 86 years old, and not afraid of anything. She got married when she was sixteen, had three daughters at the age of seventeen, and she educated all of them so well, that all three of them including my grandmother, went on to become great bankers. She was that brave. That's what I like best about her.

One day, when my grandparents came to visit us, something which I was dreading came along. We got a call saying that my Big Pati was ill. Her lungs and kidneys weren't working properly, and she had to be admitted in the hospital. I knew she was going to be okay soon, and I kept chanting Gods name. I had a dance performance that day, and after some of my dances were over, my mother came backstage and told me she was going to Chennai because my Big Pati wasn't doing to well. I just nodded my head not knowing what to say. After my dance program was over, we went home and ate lunch. My mother and my grandmother then left for the airport. That night I looked up at the stars and told God to make my Big Pati alright soon, and hoped he would listen to me. I called my mother after dinner, and my mother said that Big Pati couldn't recognize my grandmother or my mother. Then just before I was going to sleep, my grandmother called and said that Big Pati had passed away.

That night I wept, and blamed everything on God for not saving her and taking her away. It would be so different for me not to see her again. I've loved her all this time, and I want her to know that. I've never experienced anything like this in my life before, and I never wanted to. But at the same time, I'm really happy that she had such a long life filled with happiness and joy, and I hope it will be the same even though she's up there and I'm down here. I know that she's still holding my hand from heaven and smiling at me, telling me what to do.