Rolling the rim of my life back to the year 2020, when my 12th birthday (So as called MY FIRST BIRTHDAY by my family and doctors) was knocking at the door of my life, a significant achievement of mine for the previous year was that I came back ALIVE! As always, there was a party about which I had been blabbering for months to my parents, and my blackmailing dialogue for this one since COVID-19 had knocked at the same door before I was at - “Mom, Dad, I couldn’t celebrate it last year, so this year before me was that I have a chance!’
Amusing, right?
25000 COVID cases per day across India, post-traumatic me, my tensed parents, my worried family… It might not seem possible to have a party, right? But how could my parents deny it!? After all, the “Me, Coming Back” was true.
October 20 passed, 14 days to go for my birthday party on 3 rd November!
We started making the list of invitees, and all my friends and teachers knew what had happened to me, so no one could deny their coming. I called or sent a message to all the invitees- my relatives, friends and teachers -who are close to me. Dropping messages, I sent one to my teacher, Ritu Ma’am, who came to see me often in the hospital and at home. A few hours passed; I had gotten confirmation from many except her. Waiting for hers, I kept checking my WhatsApp repeatedly until a notification dropped in from her number, and I was eager to talk to her. But, you know, sometimes the reality turns out to be not what you expect, but something better or worse, and it was the second option.
The message that came to me was-
“Dear Reveda, your beloved Ma’am left us on the 17th. Unfortunate husband, Pawan”
Bummer, right?
First, it took me a while to comprehend, but then, a flashback to my memories with her ran through my mind, and I ran to show it to my parents. They remembered what she had said when she came home,” You’ll be fine soon, brave girl!” Now that I was, she left…I called him, but after the first ring, my Dad refused to do so. He asked me to give her contact number to him, and he called via phone. Sir picked up and later, after speaking for long and passing condolences, in the middle of the conversation, they learned that they knew each other, school friends!
Coincidental, right, but was it, though? As soon as he hung up on the phone, my Dad told me that she had passed away due to cancer overgrowth in her body. Soon, it struck me that when I used to go to school, she had started taking many leaves, and those days, in her classes, we had tests, but she did not just take them. Her health forced her to! Just as I spoke to my other classmates, they told me she wasn’t coming to school for a month before her passing.
Just like that, an invitee to my birthday party wasn’t there because she had been invited by
the BIG ONE to the BIG PARTY above. That’s why, you know, live in the moment because thinking about the time passed, more will. Thinking about what’s next, anyways, be it good or bad, you’ll have to face it one day. These were the bummers I have had, and hoping not to have more!
Stupid circle of life.
SO, MY FRIEND, WHY WORRY OR GET EXCITED NOW?
What has left, you won’t come back, and what is about to come to you, wouldn’t just vanish if you don’t think about it. The body is temporary, but the soul is immortal, and the time the soul gets to live in the body is limited.
Reveda Bhatt
Grade 9
The Aryan School
