The simple gift of joy

I am told that when I was born there was great rejoicing in the family. Although I was a girl but maybe because I was the first child of the household. I was dear to all the members and ours being a joint family there were quite a number of them. Our house was always full of great hustle and bustle. There was an incessant flow of relatives who came visiting us regularly. Our home was near the railway station so when ever any relative happened to pass by our city they made it a point to pay us a visit. There was never a dull moment in my life with so much of activity taking place. By the time I grew up I had become attuned to seeing so many faces with a great number of new faces being added constantly to my list.

I was adored by my uncle who never tired of praising me and lovingly called me his princess. My aunts kept my share of sweets and fruits which they handed over to me as soon as I returned from school. My grandfather loved to take me out to the market when he went shopping. He enjoyed stopping at every stall and asking me my preference in vegetables and fruits. He never forgot to stop at the sweet shop to buy for me my favorite sweet. The person who was very special to me was my grandmother. I followed her all over the house and watched her performing her daily chores of cleaning and dusting, making preparations for the afternoon and the evening meal. I loved to help her in nearly all the chores. In the afternoons she would sit down in the gallery and sift through the wheat removing the tiny stones and other grains from it. I would also sit by her side and help her in this. She was very dear to me and had a long list of stories from the Ramayana to share with me. It was her daily ritual to read out from the Ramayana. One day I found her sitting with the Ramayana by her side. I was surprised to see her like this as the Ramayana lay unopened. I inquired as to why she was not reading from the book. Sadly she told me that the print was too small for her to read as her eyesight was not that good now. I felt greatly distressed by her unhappiness. I now thought of buying a book of Ramayana for her which had bigger alphabets. I began searching for it at nearby book shops but did not succeed. One day I was told that it was available at a book shop located at the other end of the city. I did not waste time in obtaining it. That evening as she sat looking sadly at her Ramayana I replaced it with the new one and asked her to read from it. She looked at me with questioning eyes and when I opened the book for her the look on her face on seeing the large print is beyond description. Her eyes glistened with tears of joy and her face glowed with happiness. It was a magical moment for both of us.For her it mattered that somebody cared and for me that I could show my love and care by bringing back into her life the joy of reading the Ramayana once again.

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