Farewell

Farewell

You watch her lying in bed,face still beautiful at 73, the body shrunk to a skeleton after a thyroidectomy. She is in a lot of pain in spite of the hourly painkillers and you can see her rubbing her hip and legs but she does not whine about it. She has never complained in life - she has always demanded things from life and got them exactly the way she ordered. She is not about to make her exit leaving the memory of a shrivelled, suffering person. She is determined to face it by herself and if possible go with a smile. But Fate likes to humble you and force you to accede defeat. The pain becomes so intolerable that she finally says "can you give me something to end it all? I cannot bear to die so many times every second."
You love her but you can do nothing to take away the pain or share in it. All you can do is watch helplessly and cry. It seems right to accede to her request and help her go quickly. You know it in your heart and your mind.
It is against the law - that draconian system which makes laws to determine how people should die when it is conveniently silent about how people should live. There is no law punishing sons and daughters who fail to feed their parents or care for them but there is a law punishing those who help them ease their pain when all else has failed and purely motivated by love.You turn to religion for solace and guidance. It says it is her Karma and she has to go "through" it in order not to carry it over to another birth. Someone else says that it amounts to murder and warns of the sins of "brahmahathi".
So you wait and pray -pray for her to go, not to live, for there is no dignity in her life anymore. There is no law against wishing for someone's death. And finally when it comes it is all a relief and you have no tears left anymore and there is no loss to mourn.