Dear Papa,
It has been thirteen years since you left all of us and went into a world beyond our comprehension. Not a single day passes when I think of you and my eyes remain dry. I somehow never feel whole after leaving you burning on that pyre. A part of me burnt with you that day, and what remained has wanted to see you again ever since. It is impossible for me to have a story of my own without you. After all — I exist because of you.
I do not remember everything. That is what makes it hurt in a particular way. What I do remember, I hold onto with both hands, afraid that even those fragments will someday slip. So I am writing them down today, before they do.
I remember you leaving for the State Bank every morning at the exact same time, without complaint, year after year, with the quiet sincerity of a man who took his responsibilities seriously and never made you feel the weight of them. I remember dropping you to the nearest cab stand, and on days when the cab was late or something went wrong, I would insist on driving you myself. You hesitated. You always hesitated. I didn’t understand it then. I understand it now — you preferred your own inconvenience over mine. You shielded me from effort so naturally that I didn’t even notice it was a shield.
I remember the day I told you that a relative was asking an exorbitant amount in the name of school fees. Without a second thought, you offered me your debit card — your entire account balance, unconditionally. The trust in that gesture was so complete, so unselfconscious, that something locked into place inside me. I couldn’t bring myself to spend a single rupee beyond what I needed. You didn’t ask that of me. You didn’t need to. That’s what trust at that scale does — it becomes your conscience.
I remember that you called me every single day, just to ask how I was doing. Twenty seconds, maybe. Sometimes less. But in those twenty seconds, I felt like I had someone watching over me. Someone who was keeping track. Now there is no number flashing on my phone. There is no one keeping track in that particular way. It sounds like a small thing until it is gone, and then you realize it was the whole structure.
I remember the samosas. Every evening, you brought them home because we liked them. That was the full explanation — we liked them, so you brought them. No occasion needed.
And I remember one evening when you came home with more food than usual — a small spread, almost festive. We had no idea why. I asked you. You smiled and told me it was your birthday.
We ate. We celebrated. We forgot.
Next year, the same thing. You brought the food. You told us. We ate, celebrated, forgot. Every year you remembered my birthday and gave me something. Every year I forgot yours. Every single year.
And now — now that I can never wish you again in this life — I remember your birthday like my life depends on it. I cannot let it slip. I will not. The forgetting that I took for granted has become the thing I guard most fiercely, because it is all I have left to give you.
You would have been 76 today, Papa.
Happy birthday.
Everything you built is here. The house, the habits, the quiet values you never once announced but simply lived. It is all here. But none of it feels fully real without you in it. I have an earnest feeling that all of it is only meaningful because it reminds me of you.
Even as I write this, my hands are shaking and my eyes are wet.
But it’s okay.
See you soon.
