Short story: Sleeping with Weeping Thoughts

  •   Thu, Sep 15 2022
  •   By Ajai Rodrigues

September 15, 2022

Walking is good not only for health but also to clear writer’s block while creating writer’s blog. That day too everything was usual. To kick start my walk, I wore shorts with a tick mark, T-shirt showing a tattoo of crocodile, and a pair of metro man’s branded shoe. At least this is must for city men to leave their comfort zone of concrete jungle and start walking. Speeding steps raised heart beats, pumping extra blood to the brain, firing neurons for creative ideas as my eyes gazed around in panoramic mode. Good times took me on a ride, while bad times came from the rear side. A car with a distracted driver behind the wheels knocked me down on the road. My seat of wisdom got badly hurt, bleeding from head lead to loss of consciousness.

As I opened eyes, I was on the hospital bed of an intensive care unit. The good looking medical team kept me partially numb with their sedative medication in order to mask the severity of medical torture. The tubes at every orifices blocked physical movements. I couldn’t speak with a large wind pipe placed inside mouth. Graphs with hills and valleys on the monitor screen displayed signs of my life to the outer world. Except my wife no one was allowed inside in this sophisticated medical jail. My wife couldn’t control her tears seeing the helpless state of her energetic husband. In fact I was happy to see her mindful presence during this challenging time. The tragic story of most of the lives in modern world is that we are busy with endless tasks and hardly find any free time to be fully present for our loved ones. Suddenly I heard men shouting, “cardiac arrest in bed number 7”. That was me!!!. Vigorous chest compressions, electric shocks, and life-saving medications delivered to revive me from cardiac arrest. The efforts turned futile and they declared me dead following 45minutes of intensive resuscitation. I was alive, but for them I wasn’t. My immobile body was wrapped tightly in a white cloth and carried by medical attendants to the freezing mortuary. Adjacent to me in those narrow compartments multiple other bodies were resting. I shouted, God help me, I’m alive, take me out of this horror, I can’t stay with these dead bodies. I remembered reading a news mentioning that a doctor erroneously declared an alive man dead. I decided to sue my doctor for his grave mistake.

Dead bodies never speak. But in this mortuary bodies without layers of ego and status shared their stories of regret with me. “I wish I had the support of my loved ones and community….”, uttered a young man, a case of suicide, who took extreme step of ending his life due to stress from meeting the unreasonable standards set by society. The old man’s body spoke, “I wish, I had worked less and spent quality time with my family”. I could hear other sad voices expressing their regret- “I wish I had spoken what I truly wanted to say rather than following others. I would have invested in experiences instead of accumulating things, chose to go easy in life without being busy, cared less about trolling comments, chose happiness over helplessness, prioritized passionate work and compassionate action towards all”. The teenage man who died from an accident regretted for being lazy to follow road safety measures.

“God, give me a chance to complete my bucket list of desires”, I continued bargaining and begging with him. “Ajai, it’s 4PM now, don’t you want to go to school parent teacher meeting”, a familiar voice woke me up from afternoon nap. Now I was glad for two reasons, being still alive and learning new lessons on living. It is impossible to die without any regrets, but it is possible to reduce them. Take life playful, follow your passion, stay curious, accept change, invest in experiences and nurture quality human bonds. This is the only limited time to work on our unlimited desires.

“This is your life, and it’s ending one minute at a time.”- Chuck Palahnluk.

 

 

 
By Ajai Rodrigues
Ajai Rodrigues is a healthcare professional working in the Middle East who loves to speak, enjoys writing and likes to inspire minds.
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Comment on this article

  • Divya, Dubai

    Fri, Sep 16 2022

    This story makes one think on the value and purpose of life... Short and nicely written !!!

  • Vijay, Bangalore

    Fri, Sep 16 2022

    Very well articulated Ajay. “To live life to the fullest and being grateful for what one has and avoid regrets in the end by living life completely and doing what you love!

  • Alika Rodrigues, India

    Fri, Sep 16 2022

    It was truly amazing poem. It inspired me to value my time alive. Keep the good work. Good job.


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