My Father and Me (2)

Maybe it was my last entry that got me thinking of my father so often this past week. Maybe it was the fact that June is always associated in my mind with my father because his birthday was on 10th June, Fathers' Day falls on the third Sunday in June and he passed away on 15th June.

My father was 90 years old when he passed away and 50 when I was born. My earliest memory of my dad is actually of him singing me to sleep. I remember lying face down on his chest, feeling his chest rise and fall with his breathing. I remember the feel of the soft worn white cotton singlet under my cheek and my father's hand on my back as he patted me to sleep, singing a lullaby he made up. This song was essentially a stringing together of the vowels and consonants of the Tamil language!  On some evenings, instead of singing, he would recite the months of the Tamil year.  And that is how I learnt my Tamil :)

My dad's last years were not comfortable ones because he had Alzeimer's. I wish I had not been so busy, so far away in Singapore. I wish I had made more of an effort to visit him. During my last visit, he was convinced that R who was six then, was me. And he was confused as to who I was. I remember visiting him in hospital and he kept asking me what day it was, what date it was and I cried to see him looking so lost. Immediately, he asked me "Why are you crying? What do you need? Do you need any money? Have you eaten? Don't cry." And I felt six again.

I didn't get to see my dad before he passed away and that is a sadness I carry. I had heard he was ill, but I did not know how ill he really had been. I would have liked to have said goodbye. My sister tells me he did not recognise anyone at the end; she says that to console me, that in practical terms, my absence did not make a difference. I like to think my father knew how much I loved him; because I know, without a doubt, that my daddy loved me.