ganpa's rants

,   It was a Sunday morning as different as it can ever be. I was awoken by the tragic news over the telephone, of the passing away of one of my old friends who I was given to understand had given up his long struggle with cancer. He had obviously not wanted to mention this to me when we had spoken a few weeks back. Not that we were very close, but that was typical of the person he was, self-effacing and modest. However, he was the type of person who always took the effort to make a call once in a while when he was in town just to enquire about my well being and catch up on old times and how our friends were doing. Something far more than most of us, including yours truly does. He was an affable guy and always had something good to say about everyone. We met a few days later, on a rather gloomy rainy afternoon, at an informal sort of prayer meet for him. As per the norm, a few of those who knew him well, spoke about him. Post the ceremony, a few of us gathered together and in...

Back in the early 90’s, I was in my late 20’s, employed,   when my parents first broached the subject of marriage to me, I was shocked and brushed it aside. I was fine and was scared that marriage would alter my life drastically in some way. Slowly this became the topic of every other discussion at home. Every time my parents came back after attending a wedding the pressure would build up and eventually in 1993, I did get married.     If you belong to a middle-class south Indian family, then you would have in all probability gone through an experience similar to what I have just described. While life did change after matrimony, I did manage to retain most of my bachelor life style, primarily because my wife was doing her MD and was away from home and I had moved to a different continent. As the years passed the life I led, barely changed until one fine day when my daughter was born. I remember seeing her in my wife’s arms and that is when it struck me like a ...