Random Musings

I woke up that day with a disturbing nightmare of having fallen down from somewhere. My pulse was racing as I wiped the sweat of my forehead. I couldn’t remember where I fell from but I felt the pain. I got up from my bed and walked towards the window. The morning dawn had illuminated the landscape. I could see the coconut trees swaying  to and fro as if being caressed by the morning breeze. Could I have fallen of a coconut tree ? ? A strange unpleasant sensation was developing within me. My thoughts were going haywire. I remembered the bed sores of the patient who had been paralysed waist down after having fallen from a coconut tree. I had dressed his wounds for a good part of my  Internship in Medical College. He was a coconut plucker at an Estate and the sole bread winner of the family. I wondered how his family was doing. Rest assured his sons didn’t take up their Dad’s profession. Over the years I have seen a steady decline in the number of coconut pluckers in our ‘beautiful’ state of Kerala (GOD’S OWN COUNTRY). Most of the next generation have left the shores  of coconut land in search of greener pastures in either the desert or in places where the snow falls. The show however still goes on and our trees get encircled high up with metallic baskets to catch the falling nuts. Still more we have imported machines from our friendly Oriental neighbours  to pluck these nuts. The last Pluckers standing  have actually turned lucky as expensive cars go to their mud baked brick houses to get them to perform their ‘holy’ acts.  I have heard of  ‘hybrid ‘ saplings which grow to smaller heights are now available in the market.  My thoughts were disturbed with the ring of my phone. It was from my Resident.

“Sir, a patient has come with history of a heavy object fallen on his head. He is unconscious. We are now taking an emergency CT Scan. Will keep you updated about the progress and Sir, they say it was a coconut fallen on his head”.

I looked out of the windows at the coconut trees.  They swayed innocently in the gentle morning breeze.

I wondered how long more we would take to understand where we all went wrong  …… 

Reflections of the Unknown

I ask you all a question ... Do you know who you really are, other than what you were told, and what you were made to believe ?

We all have many a tormented past, which continues to influence us throughout our lifetime. Look at our faces , severely traumatized; tormented by fragments of past or present. Don’t most of us look the same then? We go through our day to day activities like the hands a clock. Ticking away. Many, not knowing the value of each tick. That’s how most of us work. Mechanically,not knowing for what for whom and why.. Our lives too are consumed by what we do for a living. Sometimes even without a free hour to pamper our desires. Most of us wear various ‘masks’ as we go through the journey called LIFE. We lose ourselves somewhere in the process. Scary: we don’t even realise it happens to us.

We spend hours together learning the science of the world yet we don’t exactly know a lot about us as much as we wished we knew. We are ‘masked’ now and have started to like the comfort zone.

We all go through the same process : hesitant to do the unthinkable; wondering, pondering, nervous and on pressure we hesitantly stagger forward. We kill the voice within ourselves and the reflection we see in the mirror is no longer ours.

Finally, when damaged by our own actions and thoughts, after our lives have taken its toll on others and us, the luckier among us get this very same attack of conscience. The stranger in the mirror looks at us and gives an evil grin.

Some survive to LIVE again another day…

Rain drops

A Mother’s sentiments about her daughter with ‘special’ eyes.

Mole (phrase for referring to your daughter fondly in Malayalam), the most exciting thing happened to me today! I want so much to tell you all about it and share my excitement with you, but at three years of age you wouldn’t understand the significance of my discovery

You were right, Mole ; I heard the rain drops  fall today. I was sitting right here on our balcony  , looking out into the sunset , when I heard it. The autumn breeze was stiff, and the coconut trees were swaying . The clouds had become dark and the  sunrays had long disappeared. This they have done for hundreds of years—but today was different—at least for me—because I heard it. I heard it for the first time …..

Ever since we learned how seriously impaired your special eyes were, I have tried to teach you more about this world. I’ve struggled to explain what clouds look like, about the beauty of trees and the rich green of the paddyfields. And oh, how we’ve argued. You say the trees are fighting; I say the wind moves them so that their branches bump into each other. You say the sky looks the same throughout , I say it depends on the time of the day and the season. And I’ve tried to explain that we don’t hear rain drops falling we see them and at the most we can feel the drops.

Today, as I sat alone on the step, I shut my eyes and listened. It was one of those rare moments when I didn’t need to be anywhere or do anything. I just listened. And then I heard them. I heard the leaves rustle in the air as they fell—bumping into each other. When they reached their destination, they tumbled across each other as the breeze stirred them. An then I heard the rain drops… The beautiful sound they made when they caressed the Earth’s soil. The puddle of water splashing as the new rain drops joined them. The restless chirping of the birds. A soft thunder filled my ears. I can hear without straining now. I just needed to tune down my own mind so that I could hear. My closed eyes filled with tears as I listened..

I listened to the rain drops for the first time…..Mole , I love you.

 You don’t see much anymore, but God has given you perceptions that I can’t understand. Thank you for sharing a little bit of your gift with me. Thank you for insisting that I listen...to the rain drops.

Thank You

It was the time of the year when the Monsoons had just set in. I had a long day at work and had returned to my newly renovated apartment. There was a dusty fragrance in the evening air as the Earth received its first showers of the season. I sipped on a hot cup of tea as I sat in my balcony gazing at the sky. I was disturbed. The lady’s voice reverberated within me.

“Thank you Doctor” , was what she had told me with her eyes looking straight into my eyes. The coldness of her stare was still haunting me . A month before, this lady had brought her 8 month old baby girl to me after the baby had supposedly fallen of the bed. Xrays revealed a fracture of one of her bones of her leg for which I put her on a plaster cast. Once the general anaesthetic wore of the baby was shifted to the recovery room where I saw the baby along with her Mother. My attention was diverted from my examination of the limb in the plaster cast and the sound of the crying child  to the infants fingers which were pressing vigourously on her own eyelids. She was also trying to poke her own eyes. I looked up at the Mother and she spontaneously said that something must have gone in the baby’s eyes and lifted the baby at the same time blowing into its eyes.  I reassured the Mother everything was alright and told her to come and meet me after 3 weeks.

I did some research on this peculiar behavior of the child.

Promptly three weeks later , the mother and the child came to me. X-rays showed the fracture had healed and I took her of her plaster cast. As soon as I had removed the cast the child started to press and tap her eyelids.

I send the child with the Mother for an inter departmental reference .

Today my fear had come true when the Mother came to me with the child in her arms.

She looked at me and said “Thank you Doctor , for sending me to the Eye Doctor who has diagnosed that my little girl is blind....”

She turned and walked out of my consultation room.

I took another sip of my hot tea and looked at the evening sky. The rains had stopped. The sun rays streaked through the dark clouds reminding me of the various gifts of the Lord that we all take for granted.

This THANKYOU will remain in my mind for a really long time ...

The Renewal

The Holy season of Lent was about to start. Giving up on meat and alcohol was the routine for me like most of my fellow brothers (although some of my loving brothers do insist that alcohol is a pure vegetarian drink).This year I wanted to give in more. So coming to Mangalore after leaving the secure and comfortable ambience of my private practice in Kodungallur was never an easy decision. I had driven down and by early evening I was eating masala dosa ‘s fried in pure love made by my beautiful wife. The customary practice to take a shower after a long journey had started to give me disturbing vibrations. I took the towel and entered the area to take a shower. I was feeling like a fish out of the water. For 31 years of my life I had taken a shower with hot water. Growing up in the Gulf made me an addict of this habit and I didn’t bother coming out of it even after I left the desert . I stood staring in front of the shower . I always had nightmares thinking of this dreaded moment and now I was living it. I turned on the shower and stood away from it as a fish would on seeing the fisherman’s baited hook. The cold water droplets splashing on my feet had started to make me sweat. The feeling of the coldness was travelling up my legs. Vague thoughts were racing in my mind. My pulse started galloping. Voices in my head were trying to push me away. I thought of my gold fish which I had in Kodungallur and how it must have felt when I released it into a nearby river when I was leaving for Mangalore. I closed my eyes and prayed.

Lord let me forget my past and make me start afresh….

I took a step forward and felt the cold water on my skin. The water submerged my body and i felt as if I was being caressed . I could feel an electric shock somewhere deep within my body. My muscles were relaxed and my body started swaying with the rhythm of the droplets. I was on a new high experiencing something new , something refreshing, something I was scared to experience all my life and above all something I was enjoying. I could feel the happiness of the fishes as thy swam in the cool waters and realised why they never wanted to experience the life on Earth.i realized how happy my goldfish would have been (contrary to my belief) when I released it’s chains of bondage. I saw a new light. Stepping out of the shower I was longing to relive that experience.

I do not know how long I will be able to cherish this and live with these thoughts but till whenever I can, I know I will be like the fish in the water..... Completely at peace and not trying to reach out for  the luxuries of Life on Earth.

I could hear my wife shouting that she has got the hot water ready for my bath.
My season of Lent had just started.

Love, compassion and faith

Somewhere along the Konkan coast on a fine Sunday morning in a local church the congregation was celebrating the Holy Eucharist with great fervor and enthusiasm. The Church was bustling with activity just as in the bar along the road. Three drunkard friends were sitting on the countertop and having their round of breakfast drinks. Corruption in the government was their matter of concern as they criticized the sorry state of affairs. The church bell rang and soon the congregation started to disperse.  An old man walked up the church stairs and began asking for alms from the dispersing crowd. The crowd was giving peace offerings to their relatives and friends and had not observed the old man collapsing to the ground.  He was a heart patient and had just suffered a heart attack.. The people all around him were busy getting into their big cars and switching on their air conditioners to escape the heat. They had turned a blind eye to the needy. The drunkard friends had reached the church to give their Sunday offerings. They saw the old man lying deserted in the church campus gasping for breath. They ran, picked him up and took him to the local hospital. He survived the heart attack and gave thanks to the Lord.

I wonder who were the true ‘Catholics’ ?

Let's talk....

“Respect your elders.”

 It’s a phrase that just about every child would have heard at some point during their growing up years. The emotion being that those who are older than us have more experience in the worldly ways and that their perspectives have a broader value than us and our friends. In many cultures, this is taken a step further. Stories of our ancestors and forefathers are passed down from generation to generation with the hope that the young will gain knowledge from those that have gone before.

It seems to me that the modern way is different. We don’t respect our fathers, we don’t respect their experiences, and we don’t respect their knowledge. At the same time we don’t overtly overthrow them, we just simply and very conveniently act as if we have forgotten them.  There comes a time when we realize we  should have listened to our elders but by then your children would be telling us ,”Dad , mind your own business “.

Advices have always come to me in plenty, in various forms as well. But when it comes from someone who is right at the bottom of the medical hierarchy it is always taken with a pinch of salt. This is what Ramakanth Gite – a ward boy in my Medical College Hospital had to tell me when I had the ‘fortune’ of sharing a table with him in a local bar. Our common passion for the spirits together with non availability of a place at any other table got me seating next to this white haired bespectacled frail man.

(This incident took place more than a decade ago when I was a 2^nd year medical student)

“I am sixty five year old man.. Seven years back I retired from Govt.  services. I was a ward boy at KEM Hospital (a leading Govt medical college hospital in Mumbai) for more than 32 years. I think I have been posted in almost every department there is in a Medical College. From pre clinical to clinical and from wards to operation theatres I have seen it all. For the past seven years I have been working in the hospital ( a private medical college) where you are getting trained to become a doctor. I believe I should work till my last breath thereby giving least burden to the people close to my heart”.

Now Gite took out a packet of beedi’s from his shirt pocket. I offered him a cigarette from my packet of Gold Flake Kings.  He refused it saying he would never give up on Dinesh beedi’s.  I also thought of giving him company.  I took a beedi from the packet which was kept on the table and lit it.  I was smoking a beedi for the first time.

Gite was enjoying my company.

“I have two sons and they have given me four lovely grandchildren.  You see, at least two of them have said to me that they would like to become physicians.  Now, that may change.  They’re still young.  They may yet become engineers, teachers, actors, sportsmen or many other things.  But if they choose to follow the medical path, I have some things to teach them.  And so, since you are young enough to be my grand child, and since you also desire to become a medical doctor, I will share some advice with you”.

We ordered our next round of whisky.  My beedi had been extinguished. (I still haven’t mastered the trade of smoking a beedi).

Gite sipped his whisky and continued, “It occurred to me once that medicine is not like it used to be.  I believe doctors are like artists. Because, cliché as it sounds, and no matter how much we become absorbed in this internet era of ours, medicine is an art.  Anyone who tells you otherwise has not practiced enough, or has forgotten what it was like to practice.

So, I give you the ward boy’s version of ‘Becoming doctors.’  But it might also be called ‘Becoming wise and compassionate human beings.’  Because the traits I want to inculcate in my little ones are those we all need in large quantities, if we are to navigate the world for good.

So, what would I tell my children?  What advice can I give you from years of walking through the medical college corridors?  “

He gave me a smile and dabbed his finger into the acchhar (pickle) and pasted it onto his tongue. Gite was in no mind of putting an end to his thoughts and I was in no hurry. Rules of thumb and a few stories followed.

“Humans are good.  I have seen old couples love one another to the very end.  An aged couple once touched my heart…she had some form of terminal cancer and he was kind as any old man I have ever met.  They loved each other so much, and he would sit by her side the whole day and talk to her   Ask him the time and he would tell her  how to build a clock.   But they so loved each other !!!   I have seen grandparents tenderly raising the children their own sons and daughters abandoned.  I have talked with parents of drug addicts, struggling to do their best for them.   I have seen young parents loose infants and mourn in ways you could not imagine.  I have been amazed that the scary, tattooed men (with jewellery all over them and  who resemble the ‘goondas’  from any of Ram Gopal Verma’s underworld movies)  was all tears and kindness, no matter how they may have looked on the outside.  I have met men and women who could have been on disability, but who worked on despite their shortcomings. I have seen prostitutes giving their mother’s milk to their little ones.  I know physicians who give their all, at all hours of the day and night struggling against the system to give their best to the poor patients.  Humans are capable of enormous amount of love and compassion. And there’s the other side of the coin.  Humans are wicked.  Just last year I saw a man who had severely beaten a child.  And he himself had been beaten in jail. I have seen doctors taking money and writing false medical certificates..  In fact, I have seen doctors denying treatment for the greed of money.  Men and women routinely cheat on their spouses, become addicted to alcohol, drugs and pornography, and drive their vehicles illegally and while intoxicated.  Humans lie, cheat, steal and do everything else imaginable to lower our expectations.  And some of the worst wear expensive suits and speak perfect English.  Do not be deceived by external appearance my son”.

He ushered for the waiter to get us some more tit bits to eat.  I was actually waiting for him to continue. He didn’t disappoint me. (I was relaxed as the tit bits were complimentary…!!)

“I know of an old drunkard.  He had served time in jail for murder and would regularly come to the casualty completely drunk.  Either he would walk in alone or else the local police would have brought him in after some street brawl.  Either way he would always be in an inebriated state.  None of the casualty staff nurses would tend to him.  He was very harsh and crude with his words.  So many a times it was me who used to start an IV line for him.  My years of experience putting in IV canulas helped me as I pushed in the sharp object into his pulsating vein in one shot.  He often threatened to kill me.  He could have.  He would never lie down still.  The alcohol in him would do all the talking.  He was vey loud and profane.  In the middle of his fury I would go up to him and tell him ‘Gawde, there is a baby sleeping in the next room.  Please be quiet..!!  And believe me he would stop the commotion, would apologize and start weeping. I came to know later that Gawde could, and did  recite verses from the Bhagavad Gita on a daily basis…!!!

I have seen all sorts of people.  From people like Gawde who has no money to multimillionaires.  Money is what makes the difference.  But I feel medicine is not only about making money.  Money cannot make you happy; money cannot provide the meaning you so desperately require in order to press on toward the goal to which you were called.  Many of the least happy doctors  I know make lots of money.  Money compels many bad decisions, and many moral perils, in which men and women make bad decisions because of the lure of cash.  The news is full of their stories.  But money is not evil, it is the the lust for  money which is the root of evil.  If you do your job well, you will deserve to be paid well.  Compensation is appropriate, and the lack of fair compensation for work will kill your work enthusiasm and productivity quicker.  Never be ashamed of your skills, or of the desire to be paid for them. And always remember that money is payment for the time of your life, which you have spent in training to become a doctor.  You need the money, and your employer needs your skill.  They key is to have something someone needs, and to be willing to do what others don’t want to do, in places they don’t want to go”.

The waiter came and gave us our next round of whisky with the bill and reminded us that this would be the last order. I smiled at him, looked at the bill, took out the money from my wallet and gave it to the waiter. I told him to keep the balance as his tip.

“You are young my son and you still have a long way to go.  May God give you many long decades of life.  But in the end, we will all exit the earth.  I have seen a bunch of death and participated in quite a few deaths…I mean, as a hospital staff.  I have watched aged men and women die slowly, holding hands.  I have seen infants who died in their sleep.  And I have seen young people, in the prime of life , die tragically from accidents, or from cancers that they never expected.  We can delay it; so live healthy lives and don’t take unnecessary risks.  But in the end, it gets to us all. Because this is so, life is precious.  Moments are precious.  Do not waste them.  Use them in genuine pleasure, use them in love, use them to produce and create and leave behind a legacy of wonder.   And so, I struggle to use every minute well.  A life in which death is certain should inspire you to fill up every breathing moment with something good.  I hope to stand before God, exhausted because I was still moving forward when I died.

A famous philosopher once said ‘Your true calling is the place where your deep gladness meets the world’s deep need.’  Let me say that again……J J …..(forgive me for my Facebook addiction..!!! )

You have gifts of love and opportunity.  So find the things you do best and use them for the good of the world.  But don’t be surprised if your calling changes with the years, even your profession!

Calling may have nothing to do with your job; your job may merely exist to support your calling.  Your calling may be something you desire deeply; or something you have not yet even discovered.  Be patient, but be persistent just like how I am with alcohol.  All the best my son, all the best”.

He gulped down his last peg of whisky. We got up and started walking out of the bar.Before parting ways I shook his hands. I smiled at him. I still felt incomplete…..

I stooped down touched his feet and took his blessings.

We parted ways and haven’t met since.

 (I pray for Ramakanth Gite’s soul to rest in peace)