by Anitra Lahiri

Created on: December 30, 2008   Last Updated: January 18, 2009

Your death was as mystical as your life. You died painlessly in a little brick cafe atop a mountain in India.

You lived a life of relentless courage, leaving your homeland of India at the ripe age of sixteen. You lived a life of tenacity, re-building business after business no matter how we may have discouraged you. You lived a life of extraordinary hard work, waking in the pre-dawn hours to commute sixty miles a day as we lay, content, in our soft, warm beds.

I regret that I didn't hug you more, that I didn't thank you enough, that I never told you how beautiful you were. I regret that I didn't stand up for you more, that as a child I felt shame in our skin color. I regret that I couldn't hop on a plane and attend your funeral; I wish I had been there to witness your ashes return to the earth.

I don't feel the need to cry, though, because I feel you with me. I feel your laughter, your joy, your bliss, your arms of protection. I feel your pride, your approval, your love. I feel you with me when I stop to admire a hummingbird, when I am greeted unexpectedly by a butterfly, when I freeze in awe of a wild buck standing before me, when I breathe in the "clean fresh air" as you used to say.

I am so grateful that I had you in my life to hug and love and adore. You taught me to appreciate the beauty of nature, to sit in awe of a simple bird, to drink in the vibrancy of flowers, to love animals. I have inherited some of your soulful wisdom, your Indian eyes, your love of poetry.

I remember you, peanuts in one hand and a cold beer in the other, sitting by the pool in your blue swim trunks, your left foot rubbing your right, your massive muscular biceps- remnants of your days as a gymnast. The way you carried me on your shoulders when I was a tired toddler, the way you pretended to be a bus as you brought me to bed every night, the way you sat beside me and consoled me with words of wisdom when I was bullied at school, the way you always offered Sanskrit wisdoms, the way you laughed at your own nonsensical jokes, the way you smiled at me with gentleness and pride, the way you handled me with humor and patience when I crashed your Mercedes Benz, the way you helped me find my way out when I was lost in center-city, the way you smiled from ear to ear when you sat with your grandson, the way you loved your wife and children...

These are with me always. I love you a million billion billion times.

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