The Dark Night

Have you ever had a moment in time that seems like minutes or hours even though it was only a few seconds? Have you ever seen everything before you play out in slow motion, where you are aware of everything around you, yet you do not know what is going on?

“I have. I feel blessed and protected.”

I’d like you to take you on a small journey, a journey of coming back alive, up and kicking; which can never be done and dusted. An astounding journey that drove me to my limits. Where one realizes how it feels to come back to life, to apprehend the lies that one has been telling oneself; an experience that even a million dollars can’t buy. 

Suddenly it feels that life is too small to accommodate all of us and hence, the ‘deaths’. And then you struggle to figure out if there is some way that you and your soul can stay down here, together. You see we all have this feeling that as we grow up we no longer have the innocence and 'feel good emotions' of childhood. Trust me, when you feel you’re no more you click onto those emotions only to feel that they work fine; to see them alive in you, somewhere hidden inside your heart; only to go back to the time when you had actually seen this beautiful heaven, Life, when everything used to be so simple; when up was up and down meant down. Well, I wish life could give us a seat-belt as we boarded so that if we got a jerk someday, we could still have a second chance to fall back and realize our mistakes before we stumbled and ended up paying the price.

The five day Durga Puja festival came to an end like every other year.

It came to an end that year too, yes; three years back, with the immersion of idols passing off peacefully. They say the air of festivity holds us all together, but that night the meaning of togetherness was about to be changed. You see death is no surprise. It stays with you at every step you take, as you walk, as you go out as if she feeds on you; seeking for that one mistake you may commit and then keeps repeating your name over and over, till u can’t stand it.

Well, I guess everything happened that one night. I was inside my room thinking about how I should be preparing for succeeding challenges in my life until I heard the noise associated with the preparations for idol immersion. I got excited. It told me not to think too much and be happy, or at least to pretend. So as I joined hands while bringing the idols to our neighborhood shrine, I joined hands once again while taking the idols out for the immersion ceremony. In Kolkata, this ceremony is no less than an ecstatic celebration. So I decided to take part in the procession without informing my parents who were fast asleep. It was midnight. I quietly opened the rear door and went out to join the boys for immersion. It took us almost an hour to lift the big and heavy idols on the vehicles and go to the nearby canal.

The canal where we go for immersion every year has its own story to reveal. It is infamous for taking a number of innocent lives each year. It is a deep canal that runs 20 meters underneath a small bridge. Generally dry, it runs full only when water is pumped into it at night, especially during the immersion of idols in religious festivities. To top it all, we were not the only ones waiting to toss those colossal structures off the bridge down into the stream; there were others too. The stream was full of idols floating in the water, half dissolved with pointed bamboo sticks tapering towards the sky.

Back in our shrine, we were all ready to set forth. The procession started moving to the accompaniment of loud music. You could see almost every man and woman breathing in a drugged manner, having forgotten their sorrowful lives. For as long as they stay they would want to stay like that. I was standing by the biggest idol, one of the goddess Durga. We reached the location. It was a mammoth task to unfasten the idols from the vehicles and put them on smaller ones to perform the rest of the rituals. This included circumnavigating them seven times before tossing them into the water, off the bridge. As you can imagine it was not an easy task to lift those big chunks of soil swathed over bamboo sticks. Not everyone dares to do it, for they think they might come under them and end up getting injured. To be on a safe side they pretend to get engrossed in the crowd but never come forward to actually help out with anything. No, I do not complain about such men as they do not understand the notion of being helpful.

We took turns one after another and unhooked every idol, laid them on the three-wheeler and continued swirling seven times, as they say. The time came to take each one and let go of them into the swirling whirlpool one by one. As we bade every idol adieu, it was time for the last and the heaviest one. Keeping pace we all held the idol right above the ground beside the cliff. I was right in front when the idol was tilted towards the cliff. Just before we got ready for the final push and removed our hold on the idol, I sensed the end of my tee-shirt was wrapped over a stick.

By the time I realized this it was too late. A sudden jerk, powerful and dominant threw me up into the sky and within seconds I was tossed in the deep whirlpool of water, scattered with the remnants of the other statues.

As soon as I felt the touch of running water I let out a loud scream, hoping someone or the other would soon catch a glimpse of me, jump into the water, find me from infinity and pull me out of it. This is what we all do in the end when we freak out. We feel weak, incarcerated before the vulnerabilities of life; we tend to scream out of the situation, and so I did. I cried as loud as I could to reach out to people who were busy dancing to the tune of music. It was after 2-3 seconds that they somehow chanced upon me. Yes, they were on the same bridge while I was falling down into that deep dark running stream. Shrieking not only because I wanted to be alive but also because I suddenly envied their attempts to be on the ‘safe side’.

Those were the longest 2-3 seconds of my life. It took me to a slow-motion era where I got hold of each and every memory where I was at fault, ever since I came to my senses. Later on, I came to know that it’s only when you see death so close when you see your life slipping out of your hands, that you find everything around you beautiful. No matter howsoever futile it had been so far the whole journey seems incredible. You anticipate getting one last chance or a miracle. We know it is never easy to contemplate the end-of-life. You can never pretend that you are without fear but my prime feeling was one of gratitude for having always been loved throughout my life. You begin to notice symptoms like soaring heartbeats, shivering night sweats, goose-bumps, time slows down and you feel guilty at that moment for not meeting your objectives, for not being able to pursue what you have dreamt of, for not conveying an apology for your misdeeds, for being reticent all throughout your life, for not seeing this beautiful city ever again and last but not the least, for not conveying adieu to your parents, one last time.

It was really strange. It was strange to realize and accept your mortality at the age of 22. It was just one of those feelings that I ignored. Milliseconds ticked by and I expected they will keep on coming until the unexpected happened. So I stopped worrying about the small, meaningless stresses and tried to remember that we all have the same fate. After all, I should do what I can to make my time feel worthy and great, to appreciate every moment in my life.

I swear you will not be thinking of those things when it is your turn to go. So basically, I saw my body wasted away right before my eyes. There was nothing I could do about it and all I wished was, that I could have just one more birthday or Sunday special lunch with my family. ‘Just one more – time’.

Till then I knew nothing about swimming but in those few moments, I suddenly thought of coming out alive. Coming out alive from those deep currents, full of deadly, pointed logs scattered all around, that too with such huge waves trapping me in her lap?;

Yes. I vowed to myself that I’d be safe. For if the heart is strong, the soul is reborn with each new day; life after life; age after age; forever.

I was always afraid of the water. I was always afraid to leave the edge. They say the deeper the water, the weaker the wave, but the night had its own plans. The current was at its peak, perhaps to keep the semi-immersed idols drifting onward. It was at that moment that I hit the surface. I remember I could possibly cry out for help once or perhaps twice at most. At the back of my head, I knew that no one could hear me given the loudness of the music.

Do you know how it feels to be calling out for help when something, somewhere deep inside tells you that no one will ever come to rescue you, to save you from your plight and set you free from such heart throbbing nervousness? Someday, you will know.

So as I fell inside it felt as if I was caged inside a pitch-dark room with absolute numbness, nowhere to go but to just sink down and die. To be honest, for a few moments my mind was frozen due to shock as I could not believe my fate. I could not believe how the entire situation turned so bad for me. That too on such a night where I had come out without even informing my parents, who were fast asleep thinking I was sleeping in my room. Down there the adrenaline shot through my veins and made me go numb. My eyes and mouth were wide open as I let out heavy sighs. I eventually ended up swallowing a good amount of water, which in turn made me feel lethargic. I sank deeper and deeper with the unconscious self, getting paralyzed, with tears rolling down my face. As I sank to the bottom of the canal, it simply did not occur to me that there was anything I could do about it, had my leg got stuck in the mud.

I couldn’t have been in the water longer than a few seconds, but in my memory, the moment stretched like a film reel, each frame full of distinct sights and sensations. I felt as if I was spinning around with the current. Deep inside, I was waiting for my breaths to get shortened and eventually free my soul away from my mortal being because that was easier than sobbing inside the water. I remember coughing repeatedly, and then the reel got cut off and there are no more images, only the feelings of inadequacy and shame for having disappointed my poor innocent parents. A couple of times on the way down I tried holding my nose, even tried holding my breath as much as possible only to convince my sobbing self that those breaths were enough to survive.

I had only a few seconds left to stay alive before I ran short of breath and start kicking my legs here and there in search of air, which pulled me even deeper. It would be unfair if I say I did not get into flashback and see my childhood, a series of memories ranging from the oldest to the newest ones.

Growing up, seeing my mother holding those little hands of mine taking me for a walk, those sweet dishes I first ate, celebrating birthdays during tough times, giving us more than what they could afford, holding us all together and imbibing good ethics, teaching us moral values, from happiest to the unhappiest ones, going out of the way, protecting me and sister when my father used to go out of the state for months. When life was simpler with just a bowl full of rice and some fried potatoes and so on the memories took me back into every such a corner which I till now embrace and feel great about.

Those few seconds actually felt like a lifetime, waiting for me to leave for the heavenly abode.

Within a few seconds, I sensed the bed of sand underneath me inside the pitch dark water. I still do not know how but I felt a sudden urge to live, an impulse to come back to life as if this was all planned; as if Goddess Durga had knowingly planned this all and pulled me down with her to sink and eventually realize the beauty of life, its value, and insurgencies. I believe that awakened my soul. I sensed the blood gushing through my veins. As soon as my feet touched the bottom of the canal I realized that this was the chance. It was all I had before I ran short of breath and sucked in some more water and felt drowsy. Before I could think of anything, I sat down and pushed myself up as strongly as possible. After a few seconds, which felt like years to me, I saw moonlight filtering through the deep green water above me as the light was getting clearer and brighter, a strange sense of victory got into me, and eventually, I came above the surface.

But that was not it, my friend. As I arose and could take in enough oxygen to feed my lungs with the right amount of fresh air I saw myself holding onto a floating Idol, that too of goddess Durga herself. It was easy until I realized the idol was going under the water again, of course, due to my weight. I utilized all the energy I had and could. I knew if I sank then there was no possibility of rising up again.

‘No you can’t die again, now that you’ve come up; shout for help for you’ve wasted all your energy, my dear. Now if you go down, you are never coming up’ – my mind yelled at me, within those fraction of seconds.

I literally cried my heart out as the idol was sinking. I had no energy left in me. Tiredness has draped me in her arms. As I was about to sink once again, a boy jumped into the water with a rope without wasting even a single second just to save me. Who was he, why did he come running to save my life, all these questions felt so tiny at that time.

The rope had fallen over the water near me and I held it like never before and urged myself to gather all my lost strength for one last time. This gave me some more energy to hold onto that rope for if I sank in and my grip failed I would be engulfed in the whirling current. That was the time I felt, “Yes, humanity still exists. Good people with golden hearts still exist. What does it take to become like them, like human beings? – Absolutely nothing”.

The boy caught me by the neck and started dragging me to the bank. As the current was very swift and strong and, was flowing in the opposite direction, it took several minutes but finally, we reached the bank. As I had swallowed a good deal of water and was completely unconscious, people laid me on the bank and pressed my belly. Thank God, the water gurgled out and I became conscious once again. Meanwhile, a huge crowd had gathered and all of them were patting my back, surprised to see me alive. The crowd full of parents who were on the edge of losing a boy like me embraced me with tears in their eyes. I got emotional and hugged the boy with tearful eyes, who not only saved me but also gave me back yet another chance of viewing this beautiful life. Now, from a different perspective.

The news of my close shave with death had spread like a virus to the nearby vicinity which also included my own family. I was dropped home on a vehicle since it’s never easy to stand right on your shivery feet and with a soaring fever. As I stepped in I saw my mother weeping out loud. All she wanted was an assurance like her son was still alive and was home with absolutely no injuries.

I knelt down and hugged her. “You should never have gone so far, knowing that you cannot swim and the waters there were deep and the currents strong”, my mother scolded me furiously while I listened feeling hapless as a baby. “I’m so sorry Maa for being so foolish”, I apologized, blushingly.

I returned home with a sense of contentment on my face. Though several years have passed since the incident took place the memory is still fresh in my mind. I can’t forget the helplessness and misery that instance showed me. I had nothing. No skills. No expectations. No survival strategies to act upon.

All I had was courage, fortitude, and purpose. I am sure you all have it, somewhere deep within.

The next day I saw hundreds of people gather just to see me and feel dubious about my existence. Yes, for them it was not easy to believe the fact that the canal had a survivor. Someone who had come back home, no scratches, no wounds, up and kicking, for whosoever had fallen in there before had never come back ever again.

To this day, the incident is still etched in my mind. As the saying goes, “A burnt child fears the fire.” Whilst I still love water, I never stopped on that bridge. Never again …

I learned something that night. The devil preys on those who are weak in faith. You are as strong as any of us. Light versus dark; hope versus despair; these elements make the balance. Let us all take chances and fight our fears. For every moment you see the shadows of doubt creeping in. I always realize that it was never a fact but a fabricated opinion with no proof.

And sometimes, you need to trust your imaginary safety net and go about testing it, for each day is a gift; not a given right.