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ABNORMALLY NORMAL

I lost my grandmom 3 days back. She was like a mom to me; having brought me up like her son in the formative years of my life. Such was her love for me that even when she could hardly walk, she would insist on heating and serving food for me when I was in India.

My grandparents have been my pillar of support and my warm place throughout my life. Their faith in me and support of everything I did was absolute, unwavering. My needs came ahead of their own.
I was very close to them.

And in the space of a year, I lost them both.

And on both occasions, I immediately moved on to living my life as if nothing had happened. I went for a run, went to work the very next morning and went and had a drink with my friends.

Yes. I paid my respects in my own private way by visiting the school my grandmom used to take me to and by visiting the house in Bandra they raised me in.

But other than that, life continued its normal beat.

Normal. So normal, that it is almost abnormal.

The same was true when my grandfather passed away last year. I jumped straight into the celebrations for my brother’s wedding. I helped with the event, danced, sang and went back to work.

Yes. There are times when I break down in private when a memory comes rushing back.

Yes. The grief stays on for longer; in that I cannot ever get over the unhappy memory of losing my loved ones and re-visit the good times. That stays a constant across all the deaths I have seen.

But life feels normal immediately after.

A de-fault switch that goes off, pushing me to move on and live my life, like the death did not happen.

A strange urge to think about what is to be done, the next day.

I have struggled with a feeling of being heartless. And then rationalized it with the fact that my heart and eyes swell with grief everytime I think of them before I board a flight.

I have struggled with the realization that I may be in denial. But I know I am not. The fact that I can’t call and talk to them every Sunday is a reality I can’t deny.

And so I understand that being normal is my coping mechanism. It is not an act. It is my reality.

It prolongs my grief but it allows me to keep moving on.

I am abnormally normal after losing people who I love.


And hopefully the ones I have lost are looking from up there and smiling in agreement.

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