Growing old is inevitable, growing tired of life isn't

Hindustan Times

16-06-2025

As aisles of gift shops were flooded with Father's Day cards last week, I found myself thinking of Nachattar Uncle — the man we lovingly called 'Caretaker Uncle'. The name wasn't just a label; it was a testament to the quiet way he held a space in our lives and in our home. When my father was transferred to another city, he worried the house would grow cold, forgotten. Nachattar Uncle promised he would keep it alive.
Each morning, he'd unlock the door, call the maid and the helper, and sip his tea in my father's study, a book resting in his hands. He tended to the mail, answered the phone, and greeted anyone who dropped by with his warm smile. In the evening, he would call my father to share how the day had gone, and then gently close the house again — never hurried, never distracted.
My father and he shared a deep belief: A house should never feel abandoned. 'Home is heart,' they would say. And so, in our absence, he cared for the heart we had left behind.
When his wife passed away and the walls of his own home grew quiet and still, without complaint or sorrow, he moved into an old age home — not because he was broken, but because he understood a profound truth we often forget: Clinging to emptiness is not the same as truly living.
I remember visiting him one cold winter afternoon. My mother had received a call — not for help, not for money, but a simple, gentle request: 'Send me some saag.' That was Uncle, never asking for more than he needed, yet filling every small moment with meaning. He greeted me in his usual style — crisp white shirt, perfectly ironed trousers, silver hair combed neatly, and always wearing a watch.
As we sat together on the bench outside the old age home, I found the courage to ask the question weighing on my heart. 'Are you happy here, Uncle?' 'I am content,' he said, without hesitation. 'I've lived life on my own terms. I have no complaints.' There was peace in his voice — a peace that only comes to those who have truly lived, not just existed or endured.
Even at 97, long past the age when most surrender to stillness, he remained in motion, riding his old bicycle from place to place, a quiet messenger of communal harmony. Where others saw division, he wove threads of unity. Where others grew weary, he pedalled on. Even in those later years, he was a voracious reader. Every visit, he had a list of books waiting for me to find.
Then came the cancer diagnosis that devastated my father as in Nachattar Uncle, he'd quietly found the father he lost too soon. Watching them move from hospital to hospital felt like witnessing one heartbreak lean on another.
I remember my last evening with Uncle. His eyes were tired, but still held a flicker of fire. Softly, he said, 'I don't want to die. There are so many things to do.' I asked, 'What things, Uncle?' 'I haven't read that book on the Industrial Revolution. I'm still waiting for it,' he said. I didn't know whether to laugh or cry. A tear escaped before I could decide.
So this Father's Day, I didn't reach for a card. I reached out for a book to remember the man who showed me that while growing old is inevitable, growing tired of life never has to be.
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The writer is a Hoshiarpur-based freelance contributor