Longings of a heart

The homemaker has the ultimate career. All other careers exist for one purpose only - and that is to support the ultimate career. ”-  C.S. Lewis. Ever since our daughter was born, Alice does not have a single day of uninterrupted sleep which practically means being on call every night for one year six months. In that continuous caring of our child, Alice forgets an equally important need. And that is taking care of her own self.  As a husband who delivers sleeping gases to patients and who gets partially anaesthetized in the process, I have little help to offer her in the domestic predicament of ours. So, I decide to take my wife on a road trip. The resort is situated in an idyllic setting. The private beach is free from loitering and huge crowds. Next to the beach are green lawns with coco trees and a beach facing restaurant that serves meals. A gaggle of tamed geese run helter-skelter as we walk through the paths to our cottage. our room is few meters from the beach ...

It is a cloudy summer morning in Vellore. The enigma of the weather is a good start to our road trip. We make arrangements months ahead. After the rigmarole of MD entrance and final exams draw to a close, Alice and I decide to hit the road again. With my in Laws willing to take care of our daughter we are allowed to take the more adventurous route to the beach city of Ma habalipuram . Two years ago we made this journey through Chennai. A thorough net search reveals that the travel via the ancient cities of Kanchipuram and Chengalp at tu cuts down the travel by a couple of hours. As we trudge along the bus station, it is not difficult to spot buses to Kanchipuram. A time saving service takes us to the temple city within 80 minutes. We board a bus with very few passengers. It being a Sunday and holiday season, the meagre number is a possibility.  The clouds eclipse the sun and it makes the heat conducive for an annual getaway. We soon mount NH 4 and reach Ranipet ...

Christians all round the world would get up to celebrate another Easter today. They believe that Jesus rose from the dead today. For them, His resurrection is the anchor and cornerstone of faith. As Jesus stood victorious over death, He shall ultimately come back to judge the world. For the Christian community, this morning ought to be a source of hope that no matter how thick the darkness of the night, the first ray of the sun is able to break it. Things are indeed gloomy for Christians around the world. I am writing these lines two days after terrorists stormed into a Kenyan university and shot 147 Christian students. Islamic state in Iraq and Al Sham (ISIS) has conquered chunk of Middle East and they now control land larger than England in pursuit of the Caliphate. Executions and martyrdom have now become daily words and worse insignificant words. In India after the new government came to power, it is estimated that around 600 attacks happened over minorities in the firs...

The media is abuzz about making choices. The recent Deepika Padukone featuring short film showcases women making their points on liberation and empowerment. They want to make their own choices. They want to be free from the male chauvinistic and paternalistic society we are in. But something struck a wrong chord. Many people were offended than inspired by the two minute video that is going viral among netizens. Some argue that the choices the film talked about were concerning the elite and urban women only, while the rural illiterate woman needs empowerment for more basic issues like survival, food and protection from abuse. Forget about sexual freedom, they need cover from domestic violence and child marriage. What emerged out for me from the video is that we are being encouraged to be selfish. More than ever before, the media and the culture is bombarding us with ideas that rights are all that matter and we need to go any distance to grab them. But hardly do we find someone tal...

‘Life is a congenitally transmitted sexual disease with 100% mortality’. - Jostein Gaarder, Sophie’s world. ‘So God created mankind in His own image’. - Genesis 1:27. The surgical intensive care unit was buzzing with activity on Monday morning. A platoon of doctors was on rounds making their assessment of the critically ill. After they had ceremoniously washed their hands to control hospital borne infections, they moved on to the next bed. The patients on the other side were the only living beings in the midst of the high technology medical equipment. There were tubes sticking out of all the orifices of human body. Machines delivered breaths to the sedated patients through an endotracheal tube, with monitoring of vital parameters displayed on digital screens. The nursing students with their teachers, the respiratory technicians and the critical care fellows- all made the place busy enough. Suddenly high priority alarms went off. I, being the peripheral registrar posted ...

“Your father knows that you need them!” Luke 12:30. Another month has gone by. I see my salary slip and wonder how we’ll pull through these 30 arduous days. How will our needs be met? In the same mood of dejection, I look at the calendar. MD entrance exam is only few months away. There is tons of material to be read and assimilated. Will I be able to get into ‘the dream of my life’ this year? What do the professors think of me? Am I good enough? I look into the mirror. I get sad about my frame. Why am I losing hair? My waistline is just bulging beyond redemption! Thoughts take me into a downward spiral of worry and anxiety.  My daughter next to me keeps playing with plastic toys that squeak on pressing their bellies. She squeezes them with all her might and the sound that follows exhilarates her. She does it again and again. Suddenly her expression changes from wonder to pathos and then to almost inconsolable sorrow. Her wail is no less pricking than a Shakespearean tr...

After a busy day in neuro-anaesthesia, with drooping eyes and gas filled lungs, I reached home. I began sipping a cup of tea when our daughter began to cry. My wife had gone next door for some help and daddy was officially on the duty of babysitting. Considering that she was hungry, I offered her milk from the feeding bottle. She pushed it away. I tried to entertain her with music, rattles and lullabies. None of them worked. Her arms were wide open which meant that she wanted to be carried. In few moments, the cry turned to wailing and then to shrieking. I did not want to carry her, more out of tiresomeness and less out of my paternal duty to correct my over pampered kid. She kept on howling as if she had just suffered an injustice in a cosmic scale. I did not budge. I stood right in front of her but did not touch her. Her grandparents and aunts love was only spoiling her. And my wife not being around gave congenial conditions to correct Amitha, our eight month old child. This last...