Old King Cole

One's memory is a strange thing. I remember the exact moment this picture was taken, and always have, but I don't remember who took it, although I am fairly sure it wasn't one of our parents. I do remember that it was taken on a Polaroid camera.... the very first time I saw one; it was very exciting!

I am not even sure how old we were... it was taken directly after a school function (and we are standing next to the stage) and Dada played Old King Cole in some kind of an adaptation of the nursery rhyme. I, on the other hand, had the extremely glamorous task of playing 'another brick in the wall' quite literally. I, along with a bunch of other chubby kids, formed part of the wall of a princess's castle. Did not bode well for a career in the arts. Sigh.

Dada, however, was always effortlessly good at everything to do with academics as well as extra-curricular activities. I remember a few years after this picture was taken, he was the Master of Ceremonies at another event. (It was some kind of a cultural show, and I had by this time graduated from being part of the set to being one of the dancers.) I was standing out front in the audience at the beginning, and there he was, this small boy on a huge stage in front of a sea of people, but there wasn't a hint of nervousness as he so beautifully spoke about the programme ahead of us that evening. He couldn't have been more than 11 or 12 years old at the time, and I was completely in awe of him. It was not the first time (and certainly not the last) that I felt so incredibly proud that he was MY brother!

Now what?

So I 've spent the last week or so trying to figure out whether this blog is a good idea or not. This is of course ridiculous, and I do realise that... I finally make a decision to do something I've been wanting to do for a while and then I agonise over whether I should have started it or not. Writing the first post was an interesting experience. It felt good writing about Dada, but I also spent the next week on the verge of tears, which is not a state I am fond of. I also wondered whether this blog defeated the purpose of my telling people I am an only child (I mean, I really don't want people reading it and thinking, "Oh poor thing"), but then again it's not supposed to be about me anyway, is it, nor is it really designed for people who don't know about him (ironically, the first 3 people I did send the link out to never did get to meet him, although I wish they had)... so maybe I should just quit being so self-centred and just send out the link to people so that they can start contributing if they so wish. So yes, the blog stays on. I also know that the first post was fairly intense and a little sad, and while I hope that that does not get to be the general tone of the blog, I have decided it is ok if some posts do get a bit low. Nothing wrong with that. Or so I think. For now.

Photos

Ma and Dada

This is one of my favourite photos, and just one of many baby pictures we have of Bozo... he was a cute kid after all. I, on the other hand, must have been a supremely ugly baby, because apart from one lone photo of Bozo and me when I was a few months old, all other pictures of me are age 3 or so upwards, which I assume is when my loving parents thought I was cute enough. Bah!

Why now?

This blog has been a long time coming... my brother, my Dada, would be (is?) almost 34 now... and I have been wanting to write about him for a while now, but unlike my far more talented parents and cousins, I am not good at this. This blog, I think, will take the pressure off me though, because it won't be "my" blog... with some help from family and friends, I hope it will be a forum where people who knew Aditya (Bozo) will talk/write about him, share their memories of him, good, bad, funny... and even if not many people come across it, I want to be able to just put down my thoughts, about life with him, life without him... I want to be able to remember him, however corny that may sound.

Why now? I decided to finally stop procrastinating, as simple as that, I guess. It's been almost 13 years now, and I have moved around so much I hardly ever meet (nor am I in touch with) people who knew him too, apart from family of course. And even rarer are the occasions when a bunch of us (family or friends) are together and actually talk about him. Which is fair enough of course, it has been 13 years after all, and to be honest I rarely think about talking about him myself.

In fact, hardly any of my friends/colleagues here even know I had a brother. And that is because of the conscious choice I make when asked the usual "do you have any siblings" question, in order to avoid the awkward silences and the obvious discomfort caused by the "whole" truth. And I am fine with the simple "no" that I respond with, except that I cannot help but cringe everytime I get the inevitable "you must have been spoilt being an only child" comments. I bite my tongue though, and let them pass, sometimes with a "hah, you didn't know my mother!" (no, not really, Ma, I just think it ;-))

But then there are times when you do want to talk about him, this incredibly smart and funny clown of a brother that you had, who loved you completely and unconditionally, who could be overly protective but was always unduly proud of your smallest of achievements, who just died without any warning before his 21st birthday and what do you do then? And then of course there are times that you want to talk TO him and those just catch you completely unawares and what do you do then? Well apparently after 13 years, you start a blog :-)

Enough of this mushy business... let's get this blog started.