Amolika

 Amolika

Khoka stared at the console recording the fetal heart rate. There was something amiss. Just then the nurse entered the room. Khoka asked if all was okay. She looked at the machine, examined the wife and immediately rushed out. A few minutes she came back accompanied by the doctor. “We need to shift your wife to the operation theater (OT); could you please go with the nurse and sign the consent form”?

“What is the matter, doctor? Will someone tell me”? Khoka did not realize his voice had risen. But the doctor was not there to explain. As the attendant wheeled his wife to the OT; Khoka did not know what had hit him. He wanted to cry.

This would be Khoka and his wife’s second child.

The first one did not survive!

With both of them over thirty and the wife recuperating from the earlier trauma – both physical and mental - the news that she had conceived again brought a glimmer of hope in their almost barren lives!

Without an iota of doubt they knew it was divine grace.  All that was required of them was trust and faith and to simply play their part in the plan.

Easier said than done!!!

Pacing in the front of the OT anxious for the news; he felt his nerves would snap anytime unable to bear the pressure. Tottering he sat on a bench and did not realize when he dozed off.

The last few months had been very tumultuous for Khoka. Weekly visits to the doctor and test laboratories, collecting reports to assisting his wife with the laundry, grocery and in the kitchen; his days were almost chock-a-bloc. He also had to manage work without taking too many leaves. You never know when an extra leave might come in handy.

The doctor wary of the wife’s previous history wrote numerous tests and prescribed scores of medicines. This pregnancy was precious and she was very clear of not taking any chances.

Instructed by the doctor Khoka had to inject his wife a daily dose of heparin – a blood thinner. His wife’s blood had the tendency to thicken and had prevented the fetus to draw nutrition during the last pregnancy.

Oh! the day he had to take his wife for amniocentesis. Remembering that a cold chill ran down his spine. This is an invasive technique and the chances of miscarriage are 1 in 400. That day Khoka spent the toughest one hour of his life – the time his wife was in the doctor’s cabin undergoing the test.

The reports were all normal and the wife was responding well to the treatment. And then, at the onset of the ninth month of pregnancy her hemoglobin count fell below the mark. The doctor altered medicines however even after a week when the count did not increase; she added another injection. Poor Khoka! Imagine his plight. His wife now had to take two injections daily.

Khoka, O Khoka – get up, the doctor is asking for you. The faint sound of someone calling out his name shook him out of the reverie.  He almost sprang to life! Realizing his surroundings he recognized the doctor standing at the entrance of the OT.

He crossed the distance in a leap. If he could he would have crossed an eon for this moment!

What Khoka saw cannot be described in words – they fail here like they always have...

Wrapped in a pink towel was a bundle of joy in pinkish hue; staring at Khoka with beautiful eyes! (Days later he would lovingly taunt his wife that his child recognized him the moment she was born...)

You had to be there to partake in Khoka’s joie de vivre. He said lot of things but his words were very incoherent. It is like when you see something which the senses cannot comprehend – something of the nature of unspeakable joy and eternal bliss. In fact such a sight makes the senses redundant.

Miracle of miracles! Did he hear what the doctor said? The delivery was normal and he has been blessed with a baby girl. Girl or boy Khoka did not know but when he wrapped the angel in his arms – he knew for a moment he held eternity!

Standing there – he realized one thing for sure – the Gods still loved him!  Cuddling his sweetheart, he gently lifted her to his lips and whispered in her tiny ear:

“I seem to have loved you in numberless forms, numberless times...

In life after life, in age after age, forever.

My spellbound heart has made and remade the necklace of songs,

That you take as a gift, wear round your neck in your many forms,

In life after life, in age after age, forever.

Today it is heaped at your feet, it has found its end in you
The love of all man's days both past and forever:
Universal joy, universal sorrow, universal life.
The memories of all loves merging with this one love of ours -
And the songs of every poet past and forever.” (Rabindranath Thakur, Selected Poems)

Khoka and his wife decided to call her Amolika.  Of Sanskrit origin it means “priceless.”

Amolika

Epilogue :
Amolika was born on 30th April at 04: 30 p.m. Khoka is now even more busier. The entire day he cannot help but steal glances at his little wonder and become full of love and joy for her.  When not doing that the father is busy changing nappies...:)