Lizzie is not there when I need her the most in my worst time. Its 5 years since YOU went to the Heavens.
I remember the day you came home. Though I cant remember the date. February 1999?
I had a year back,1998, returned to Calcutta. Every night I would return home to a empty home tired but happy teaching. The Day's hustle bustle at the Institute, the incessant interaction with students:
I have always had man's best friends bow-bowing around most of my life before engineering studies when I had to leave home for the first time. They were the best friends for a person whose uncaring father had left home in school days, whose hated mother had been rebelled against by age 17, and whose religion had been dispensed with before adulthood.
Pinky, a brown terrier,
was the first best-friend coming in my life in middle school days and
has been the most intelligent one of them all without any training. Once
She stood at guard for 15 hours at the house door, left mistakenly open
by us on departure, and didn't allow anyone to come close till we
returned. And she was just 1 year old. She could sense my father's car
returning and start barking excitedly when we had not even remotely
heard or seen the car. She was loving, caring and part of all games and
masti my sisters and I did at home or out. She was very jealous of the
injured pigeon I adopted to take care and would have killed her for
getting my attention. For years she was mine best friend and even though
she hated my suffocating hugs she condescended to have them. And then
my family decided to move to Bombay.
I had to stay back with my aunt's family as I was in class 9 and would have my ICSE next year. I was the first batch of India of the new 10 + 2 + 4 education format. My Aunt's family had never kept pets so Pinky was sent to another Uncle's home to stay with his dogs. I went to Bombay after ICSE for class 11 and Pinky went to the heavens at my uncles. R.I.P.
For class 12 I returned to Calcutta knowing that we will not be a complete family any more and as a gift got a white Pomerian best-friend, from my uncle, whom I named Django! He was the most trained friend of mine. In the age of no internet, just by reading some books in the British Council library I taught him a lot of tricks. The cutest one which brought the maximum applause was the one where he would roll over and play 'dead' on the command. After a year or so I had to leave to do my Bachelors in Engineering and in those 4 years our interactions became lesser and then became zero when I graduated and went off to Bombay to work. Never got to meet Django again. R.I.P.
After another 4 years of work I decided to again, in moments of personal downtime, turn to man's best friend. In the Bombay home of a unemployed textile worker, whose old wife had been ill-advised to start a dog breeding business to earn some money, were about 10 ill-cared Doberman pups looking very uncared and not in best of the health. As I approached the creche most of them stood up and wagged their tails hoping I will choose one of them, if not all, to take home. But one black pup sat unmoved and sick in the corner not even trying to come closer. It seemed resigned to the fact that one of his more fitter siblings was going to get a father. I TOOK HIM. He was Mad Max who turned out to be active and healthy with the vet's help. 6 months later I resigned from my secure good job for personal reasons with no idea what I will do next. I left / sold a lot of personal things, including my new Maruti car, but took Mad Max with me back to Calcutta. I stayed again with my Aunt.
And here Mad Max
soon grew,in a couple of months, to be a strong and BIG best friend whom
I, a footballer & a sportsman, had much difficulty in escorting on a
leash when we went for a walk. But he was the least trained one as I
was busy looking for a living and had just started working in a
interesting new job. One day I come home to see a mother's magic in
action. Mad Max had not been home-broken properly. That eve my cousin said look what Aunt has done!! A little later Mad Max
gets up, walks down to the bathroom, nudges the door open and does the
necessary inside. I am both amused and surprised how this training
happened. The matriarch of the house had done what she does so well with
any small child's potty training. She caught him by the ear when he
tried to be indisciplined in my absence, gave him some earfuls and took
him to the bathroom. As simple as that!! Mad Max knew where to go henceforth when I was not around to take him for a walk.
And
then a problem happened. My aunt had not stopped me from bringing a dog
along, that too a Doberman. But now a new baby was born in the family
and the family feared Mad Max's presence. With a heavy heart I decided to give away Mad Max.
A animal-lover bengali bachelor who lived nearby all alone with snakes, dogs,
cats, birds.... became his next father. And I never ever went after that to look
into the eyes of Mad Max, the sad pup whom I had picked when he thought no one would.
10 years or so after that I was alone without the best friends' company while evolving as a teacher, among many more things, back in Bombay. A lot of topsy-turvy things happened in life, I making the mistake of mixing my personal problems with professional commitments, some totally hatke job opportunities, some miracles, and mostly troubled by the so-called educated & professional middle class. The most dangerous class .
Back to the new Kolkata, 1998 .....The day's business & adulation, the night's return home: the TV always open, the mind always fatigued and the mandatory glass always filled .......
Based on my desertion of Mad Max I didn't want SIZE to become a issue for a Single parent! I decided to go for a laptop version of a best friend. A daschund pup. A doctor's ad for such pups made me take off from that day's classes and taxi it from North Kolkata to far off Behala. After surviving a maze of cacophonic traffic, I reach a old traditional Bengali house , in a narrow, convoluted lane , which is actually a 'bungalow'. As I open the outer garden gate and walk in, there comes barking a thin but active black pup. It is so small that I take care not to step on it as it happily sniffs my trousers and happily wags its tail. The host takes me over to the creche - 5 happily sleeping obese male pups are tucked in oblivious of the visitor with only this slim and active pup around my shoes.
I had come clear in my mind that I wanted a male child and not a female one who may end up with others' buns in her oven! Not that the idea of multi pups in my home was a unwanted image, just that as a single person it would have been a disaster for me to take care of them when I could hardly take care of myself. I am one of those Single persons who can't cook. My last 33 years or so the food has been purchased all the 3 times of a day.
The host on realizing that I wanted a male pup started highlighting the advantages of the only female pup (the one near my shoes wagging her tail and barking happily). I realized his game. Males will be sold easily and with a premium! He desperately highlighted lots of reasons for a female pup, but I willingly got conned by the real reason of all of them. While the bulky males were all lying stoned in the warm mattresses, she was the only one up and very active. I took her home and named her Lizzie (after Shekhar Kapoor's then in news Movie 'Elizabeth'. It was winter times, Feb 1999?, as I took my daughter home in a cab. She sat snuggled in my lap and wagged her tail every time I coochie-cooed to her. She took all of my life ever since. In the early years she had to be fed 4-5 times in the day. I would cab it back home between the classes to do so and then rush back in time for the next class and even get to scream at the late-coming students!. She very early realized there was no one else at home and her father would be out 'hunting' most of the day. She never complained and like me became a independent child -- when in India humans cling to their parents even after 'adulthood', under the pretext of family values , when the truth is they are spoiled kids most of them.
Lizzie is the most endearing, loving and loyal live-in companion of my life . The only one who stayed with me her entire life. She was with me in my best times; she was with me in my worser times; she was with me when my lovers came home to 'make love' to me. Her demeanour would be a disdainful one towards them knowing very well they wont be there in my life too long; that most of them were to use me for their needs than fulfill mine. And that after the 'bitches' were gone home She would get the best hugs & kisses!!!
She also was there when the 'Chosen One' came home to live-in with us. The Chosen One could not be in Kolkata all times but Lizzie loved it when it happened, feeling very happy in the get-togethers, over almost 5 years. First time Lizzie chose somebody else's lap to snuggle in and snooze on. Then Lizzie's intuition told her that not only the 5-year fairy tale won't last but that soon AFTER a Black Witch will attack this home of her father in December 2009 onwards.
Lizzie, a true daughter, a true life-long companion and a true well-wisher LEFT this world in July 2007 refusing to watch the future. The Chosen One moved ahead in 2008; the Black Witch entered in December 2009.
I LOVE YOU LIZZIE. My Best Friend, My permanent Live-in Companion, My Daughter. Thanks for the fatherhood You gave me to experience. Even though I was a bad father. I am sorry I let you down even after the sacrifice of your life you made in 2007 to try and protect me from the coming Doomsday 2011-12!!!!!
Lizzie is not there when I need her the most in my worst time. Its 5 years since SHE went to the Dog Heaven.
© Rajan Kapoor 2012
I remember the day you came home. Though I cant remember the date. February 1999?
I had a year back,1998, returned to Calcutta. Every night I would return home to a empty home tired but happy teaching. The Day's hustle bustle at the Institute, the incessant interaction with students:
- explaining the concepts
- listening to their problems ( I had no choice... the problems ranging from Permutations to their Love-life to their non-understanding parents...)
- relishing their adulations, flirtations & crushes (I am not boasting.... just a fact of my life. As a male teacher it is a not bad thing for his ego to get a bonus: flirtations & crushes from young women, but after having seen more than 45 Summers in one's life, one also knows to TRY not to take them seriously.....)
I have always had man's best friends bow-bowing around most of my life before engineering studies when I had to leave home for the first time. They were the best friends for a person whose uncaring father had left home in school days, whose hated mother had been rebelled against by age 17, and whose religion had been dispensed with before adulthood.
 |
| 1974 |
I had to stay back with my aunt's family as I was in class 9 and would have my ICSE next year. I was the first batch of India of the new 10 + 2 + 4 education format. My Aunt's family had never kept pets so Pinky was sent to another Uncle's home to stay with his dogs. I went to Bombay after ICSE for class 11 and Pinky went to the heavens at my uncles. R.I.P.
For class 12 I returned to Calcutta knowing that we will not be a complete family any more and as a gift got a white Pomerian best-friend, from my uncle, whom I named Django! He was the most trained friend of mine. In the age of no internet, just by reading some books in the British Council library I taught him a lot of tricks. The cutest one which brought the maximum applause was the one where he would roll over and play 'dead' on the command. After a year or so I had to leave to do my Bachelors in Engineering and in those 4 years our interactions became lesser and then became zero when I graduated and went off to Bombay to work. Never got to meet Django again. R.I.P.
 |
| Django doing a stand-up show while I doing a "Judwa" effect with my TLR camera before the world had access to computers and Photoshop! (1977) |
After another 4 years of work I decided to again, in moments of personal downtime, turn to man's best friend. In the Bombay home of a unemployed textile worker, whose old wife had been ill-advised to start a dog breeding business to earn some money, were about 10 ill-cared Doberman pups looking very uncared and not in best of the health. As I approached the creche most of them stood up and wagged their tails hoping I will choose one of them, if not all, to take home. But one black pup sat unmoved and sick in the corner not even trying to come closer. It seemed resigned to the fact that one of his more fitter siblings was going to get a father. I TOOK HIM. He was Mad Max who turned out to be active and healthy with the vet's help. 6 months later I resigned from my secure good job for personal reasons with no idea what I will do next. I left / sold a lot of personal things, including my new Maruti car, but took Mad Max with me back to Calcutta. I stayed again with my Aunt.
 |
| The 'Debonair' Centre-Spread! |
 |
| 1988 |
10 years or so after that I was alone without the best friends' company while evolving as a teacher, among many more things, back in Bombay. A lot of topsy-turvy things happened in life, I making the mistake of mixing my personal problems with professional commitments, some totally hatke job opportunities, some miracles, and mostly troubled by the so-called educated & professional middle class. The most dangerous class .
Back to the new Kolkata, 1998 .....The day's business & adulation, the night's return home: the TV always open, the mind always fatigued and the mandatory glass always filled .......
Based on my desertion of Mad Max I didn't want SIZE to become a issue for a Single parent! I decided to go for a laptop version of a best friend. A daschund pup. A doctor's ad for such pups made me take off from that day's classes and taxi it from North Kolkata to far off Behala. After surviving a maze of cacophonic traffic, I reach a old traditional Bengali house , in a narrow, convoluted lane , which is actually a 'bungalow'. As I open the outer garden gate and walk in, there comes barking a thin but active black pup. It is so small that I take care not to step on it as it happily sniffs my trousers and happily wags its tail. The host takes me over to the creche - 5 happily sleeping obese male pups are tucked in oblivious of the visitor with only this slim and active pup around my shoes.
I had come clear in my mind that I wanted a male child and not a female one who may end up with others' buns in her oven! Not that the idea of multi pups in my home was a unwanted image, just that as a single person it would have been a disaster for me to take care of them when I could hardly take care of myself. I am one of those Single persons who can't cook. My last 33 years or so the food has been purchased all the 3 times of a day.
The host on realizing that I wanted a male pup started highlighting the advantages of the only female pup (the one near my shoes wagging her tail and barking happily). I realized his game. Males will be sold easily and with a premium! He desperately highlighted lots of reasons for a female pup, but I willingly got conned by the real reason of all of them. While the bulky males were all lying stoned in the warm mattresses, she was the only one up and very active. I took her home and named her Lizzie (after Shekhar Kapoor's then in news Movie 'Elizabeth'. It was winter times, Feb 1999?, as I took my daughter home in a cab. She sat snuggled in my lap and wagged her tail every time I coochie-cooed to her. She took all of my life ever since. In the early years she had to be fed 4-5 times in the day. I would cab it back home between the classes to do so and then rush back in time for the next class and even get to scream at the late-coming students!. She very early realized there was no one else at home and her father would be out 'hunting' most of the day. She never complained and like me became a independent child -- when in India humans cling to their parents even after 'adulthood', under the pretext of family values , when the truth is they are spoiled kids most of them.
 |
| Wish I had done her 'Kanyadan'- (2000) |
I would go to Bombay, now Mumbai, once a year or so in off-season time. I would take the train always not only because it was cheaper than air travel but also because I loved those 2 nights travel sitting near the window seeing the different regions of India as the train hurtled by. The sounds, the smells, the ambience. But to take Lizzie by the train was a torture for her. Ever since She came into my life, I always travelled by air . I would tell her many times, ".... who says a dog's life is bad. You have travelled your entire life by Air , unlike me...". Lizzie would appreciate and lick me a couple of times extra as a Thank-You!!
Lizzie is the most endearing, loving and loyal live-in companion of my life . The only one who stayed with me her entire life. She was with me in my best times; she was with me in my worser times; she was with me when my lovers came home to 'make love' to me. Her demeanour would be a disdainful one towards them knowing very well they wont be there in my life too long; that most of them were to use me for their needs than fulfill mine. And that after the 'bitches' were gone home She would get the best hugs & kisses!!!
She also was there when the 'Chosen One' came home to live-in with us. The Chosen One could not be in Kolkata all times but Lizzie loved it when it happened, feeling very happy in the get-togethers, over almost 5 years. First time Lizzie chose somebody else's lap to snuggle in and snooze on. Then Lizzie's intuition told her that not only the 5-year fairy tale won't last but that soon AFTER a Black Witch will attack this home of her father in December 2009 onwards.
Lizzie, a true daughter, a true life-long companion and a true well-wisher LEFT this world in July 2007 refusing to watch the future. The Chosen One moved ahead in 2008; the Black Witch entered in December 2009.
I LOVE YOU LIZZIE. My Best Friend, My permanent Live-in Companion, My Daughter. Thanks for the fatherhood You gave me to experience. Even though I was a bad father. I am sorry I let you down even after the sacrifice of your life you made in 2007 to try and protect me from the coming Doomsday 2011-12!!!!!
Lizzie is not there when I need her the most in my worst time. Its 5 years since SHE went to the Dog Heaven.
Very well written & nice emotions...Waiting to read more ! :) Take care.
ReplyDeleteThanks. As always You are there to make me feel wanted. I appreciate.
ReplyDeleteAnytime! :)
ReplyDeleteIts so well expressed...it hurts deep within...
ReplyDeleteThanks for the encouragement. You appear familiar. Have we met before?
ReplyDelete