Making way for the new

It is easy to talk about change, but when it actually happens, the pain in letting go of the past that shaped and nurtured you is agonising. Have you ever witnessed the pillars of an old world order crumbling in front of you to make way for the new?

When people from my childhood pass away, I have deeply sensed this loss as though a part of me is lost never to be returned. I think I am about to witness a similar loss when my childhood home will be bulldozed into oblivion in a couple of months.

The home that my parents worked hard to set up and live their dreams in for nearly 45 years!

The apartment complex that was standing on prime land in Mumbai was the cynosure of the eyes of ambitious builders who had grandiose schemes to net multi-million buck profits.

After considerable arguments, protests and stand-offs, the residents finally gave in and signed on the dotted line of the contract that will allow the builder to construct a towering skyscraper in place of the humble four-storey apartment complex.

New abode

It seems a great idea for my parents to be able to get a cracking new abode in three years. But considering that they are septuagenarians, this was not a part of their dreams.

Ideally they would have loved to grow old together pottering amongst knicks and knacks of the past, rifling through family chests of rich memorabilia and turning the page on the sepia-toned pages of the albums that tell the story of our growing up days.

But last week was painful, when they had to say goodbye to so many memories and literally steel themselves and allow the rag-pickers and junk hunters to take away so many things that had no meaning for these scavengers.

Vacating the apartment was a painful rite of passage. Every little square inch of place had its significance in their mind.

A balding, one-armed doll from my childhood, the damp, moisture- swollen, dog-eared cardboard piles of our ludo, snakes and ladders and other board games; games that we would ferociously contest and squabble over on our weekends.

Agonising

Two torn kites, a broken sitar (a stringed instrument), a set of threadbare silk and cotton saris my mother received from her mother-in-law, some copper and brass utensils ... it was agonising for my parents to shed the layers of past memories.

There were so many things I would have loved to keep with me forever, but I couldn't be with them to share this pain of parting with so many precious things.

For hours they sat stunned surrounded with the rich treasure of memories they had of the house and the stories linked to every object in their home of 45 years where they had probably led the happiest years of their lives.

The rag-pickers were impatient, the junk shop guy couldn't wait to part with a few bucks to buy what he thought was sheer "trash". If there was space to store every item, my parents would have taken every piece with them, but that was not to be.

So stoically and silently they went through the ordeal and shut the door on their home, one last time. In a few days, the bulldozer will flatten out every corner of the garden where my mother planted her rose bushes, her jasmine creepers and created a beautiful oasis for us kids in the concrete jungle.

The home will be reduced to just cement and concrete debris. But that is what change means.

Many things happen gradually and silently, but certain things have to be severed with that decisive and dramatic sweep of hand and that pain is unbearable.