POST DATED

January 2, 2062

I am yet to recover from the shock.

My friend for more than half a century, Sri Vivek Joshi, left this world a month before.  He was the first person to greet me on 2061 Diwali.  When I neither received his New Year greeting message nor a reply to mine yesterday, I got suspicious and called over the phone.  His grandson and his namesake picked up the phone and passed on the shocking information to me.

I first came across his name in 1990, when I started my career as a trainee.  My first assignment was to assist the HR Manager (then known as the Personnel Manager).  I had to sort all the important papers bundled and stuffed into cardboard boxes over a period and file them in the respective “personal files” which were supposed to be confidential.  Young and creative I was, left in a large air-conditioned room alone with a few boxes and several files for company, I started drawing imaginary pictures in my mind, of the persons whose files I was handling, based on their names and handwriting and cross-verifying with their photographs in the files.  On reading the name “Vivek” the first image appeared in my mind was that of Swami Vivekananda, but since Vivek was then working in Gujarat, I thought he would resemble a stereotype “Sethji” in Tamil films and zeroed on a combination of Swami Vivekananda and Devan Verma, the Hindi actor and with great curiosity opened his file.  I was shocked.  There was a black and white photograph of a 16 or 17 year old resembling an undernourished   jawan.  Probably, he had sent the photograph taken for his hall ticket during his college days.  I didn’t dare to discuss this with anyone.  My training got over and I became very busy with work and I had forgotten about this episode.

In 2002 October, I met him in person for the first time.  He was promoted and was about to head a Zone and had come to Chennai to attend a training session in a hotel.  Another colleague and my best friend, who was also attending the same training session sneaked out of the venue and came to our office to meet me and congratulate, as that was the day my programme was first aired on All India Radio, Chennai.  Vivek accompanied my friend to the office and we were introduced to each other.  “Congratulations” I said enthusiastically, referring to his promotion.  He said a formal “thank you” sans emotion.  My first impression of him was certainly not a good one.  I felt he was very reserved and timid.  He came back to office the next day and sought my help to get a ticket to travel to his hometown, as his just born daughter was sick.  This was the reason for his sadness the previous day and I cursed myself for being judgmental.

Two years later, I again met him in a residential training programme organized at a resort.  I was the only female participant in a group of thirty.  He was very confident, cheerful and humorous; very different from what he was the first time I met.  He cracked jokes every now and then.  He was very protective and chivalrous and escorted me when I went for my morning walks.  I started addressing him as Bhai Sahib and our friendship had begun. 

The Company we worked for was liquidated and we were all shattered and got scattered.  Though I never met him after that, technology helped and we communicated through phones, mails and networking forums and never missed wishing each other on important festivals.  Bhai Sahib had a good sense of humour.  Once by oversight, I messaged “Happy Diwali” on a New Year and he replied “Happy Holi”.

Both his daughters did well in their studies and made him proud.  Their careers took them to several countries and Bhai Sahib traveled with them to every place and except Antarctica, he visited every continent in the world.  He lived a fulfilling life with his wife, daughters, sons-in-law, grand children and great grand children.  The nonagenarian died in his sleep peacefully, smiling.  Probably he was cracking a joke in his dream!

Bhai Sahib, we miss you and your messages.  May your soul rest in peace!

P.S.  What do we do when we have to make a payment and don’t have enough bank balance, simple – just issue a post dated cheque.  When I was asked to write an obituary and I didn’t have a heart for it, I just followed the same principle, wrote a post dated obituary.