my father

Fathers day thoughts make me too nostalgic and emotional..
I have a father whose whole world and dreams revolved around me.. the son right from the day I was born.. I could realize that much later.. He would go to any extent to justify and highlight whatever I tried to do well. He has never found fault with me for anything I did, any time when I blundered and cause hurt for many.. And such episodes were too many..
But he cheated me almost thirty years ago.. He just died. left his body.. and departed.. and that was when I was away from home..on a training.. and could rush back to say goodbye to him after only 24 hours.. Maybe he could not have left that way had I been with him at that time.. But that was the only thing he ever did to hurt me..

He was not a scholar or philosopher and perhaps not  a significant person in any way that the society conceived..
But he was a staunch devotee of Muruga.. the Pazhani Andavar..
He would not refer to the Lord by His many names.
Pazhani Andavar according to him was always Namma Swamy.. our own God..
And he would always repeat, when things were not at all rosy.. Namma Swamy .. our God will solve our problems anyway... He may put us to test , but would never give us up..
But he had some real spiritual wealth with him..
He had come by certain mantrams and certain special ways of worship during his long bachelor life..
He married at 40 and I was born one year later..
And he was planning to teach me all those mantrams..
But I could get only a small percentage of it..
I have to confess that I did not approve much of his spiritual ways and blind faith in Namma Swamy when he was alive..
And I know he was waiting for the time when I would turn around with full faith.
But then death intervened..
Of course I did turn around much later.
Now my faith is absolute and unequivocal.

And he was very particular about one point..
Whatever may be the situation, the poojas and the mantrams should not be appled after taking any Dakshina or other benefits.

He was named as Vaidyanthan but because of his craze for Ganapathy Homam, he got a second name Ganapathy.. and this name stuck so much that most of the people knew him only as Ganapathy..
Only the records of the Government where he served would show his original name..

People used to call him to perform Ganapathy Homam at their homes.. usually he would decline but has performed that in some houses of very close friends..
But then he would not take any dakshina..
I learnt Ganapathy Homam from him..
He used to perform ganapathy homam at home every friday, all days during Karkitakam, all days in navaratri and on every birthday of any family member..

We had often felt skeptic about his craze for that ritual..
He believed that when the fire was in full vigour, and when the God was invoked, and when the Homa dravyam.. essentially a sweet mixture of coconut pieces, jaggery, ghee, and any other permitted edible material was r3ady and if the God is called sincerely with the moola mantram. he believed that Ganapathy appeared on fire with his trunk held up and mouth fully open to received the sweet material..
I remember him, working up his devotion with many chants of moola mantram. and offering the homa dravyam to fire believing in simplicity that Ganapathy was eating..
I really do not know whether his belief is rational or correct, but his faith was beyond any limits..

Yes, I can think of my father only for his blind love for me and for his blind love for our Swamy, and Ganapathy..

And within a year of his departure, I became a father of a Son.. my only possession in this world..

I am a proud father, a very proud father,, because of my Son.
.For me he is the best in this world.. Because of him, it is a very happy fathers day for me..
Pranams to the hallowed memory of my father, who, though left his physical body three decades ago lives with me and lives in me always..
And sweet thoughts for my Son, my only son, who just has the same name as my father.

And when I talk of Krishna I have not doubt that that Krishna is just Our swamy and Ganapthy too..

FATHER FORGETS

a very touching article I found

FATHER FORGETS

W. Livingston Larned

          Listen, son: I am saying this as you lie asleep, one little paw crumpled under your cheek and the blond curls stickily wet on your damp forehead. I have stolen into your room alone.  Just a few minutes ago, as I sat reading my paper in the library, a stifling wave of remorse swept over me. Guiltily I came to your bedside.

    

            There are the things I was thinking, son: I had been cross to you. I scolded you as you were dressing for school because you gave your face merely a dab with a towel. I took you to task for not cleaning your shoes. I called out angrily when you threw some of your things on the floor.

    

            At breakfast I found fault, too. You spilled things. You gulped down your food. You put your elbows on the table. You spread butter too thick on your bread. And as you started off to play and I made for my train, you turned and waved a hand and called, "Goodbye, Daddy!" and I frowned, and said in reply, "Hold your shoulders back!"

    

           Then it began all over again in the late afternoon. As I came up the road I spied you, down on your knees, playing marbles. There were holes in your stockings. I humiliated you before your boyfriends by marching you ahead of me to the house. Stockings were expensive-and if you had to buy them you would be more careful! Imagine that, son, from a father!

   

         Do you remember, later, when I was reading in the library, how you came in timidly, with a sort of hurt look in your eyes? When I glanced up over my paper, impatient at the interruption, you hesitated at the door. "What is it you want?" I snapped. You said nothing, but ran across in one tempestuous plunge, and threw your arms around my neck and kissed me, and your small arms tightened with an affection that God had set blooming in your heart and which even neglect could not wither. And then you were gone, pattering up the stairs.

   

        Well, son, it was shortly afterwards that my paper slipped from my hands and a terrible sickening fear came over me. What has habit been doing to me? The habit of finding fault, of reprimanding-this was my reward to you for being a boy. It was not that I did not love  you; it was that I expected too much of youth. I was measuring you by the yardstick of my own years.

     

       And there was so much that was good and fine and true in your character. The little heart of you was as big as the dawn itself over the wide hills. This was shown by your spontaneous impulse to rush in and kiss me good night. Nothing else matters tonight,son. I have come to your bedside in the darkness, and I have knelt there, ashamed!

        

        It is feeble atonement; I know you would not understand these things if I told them to you during your waking hours. But tomorrow I will be a real daddy! I will chum with you, and  suffer when you suffer, and laugh when you laugh. I will bite my tongue when impatient words come. I will keep saying as if it were a ritual: "He is nothing but a boy-a little boy!"

         

       I am afraid I have visualised you as a man. Yet as I see you now, son, crumpled and weary in your cot, I see that you are still a baby. Yesterday you were in your mother's arms, your head on her shoulder. I have asked too much, too much, yet given too little of myself. Promise me, as I teach you to have the manners of a man, that you will remind me how to have the loving spirit of a child.

Happy father's day

आत्मा वै पुत्रनामासि स जीव शरदः शतम्।
उपजिघ्रन्ति पितरो मन्त्रेणानेन मूर्धनि।।
aatmaa vai putranaamaasi twam jiiva sardaH satam,
upajigranti pitaro mantrenaanena moordhani,,
(the first line is found in all vedas and many upanishads and puranas.. so to pinpoint any reference is superfluous)

My son, you are my own soul and life born as my child. may you live for hundred years, with this mantra a father breathes on or kisses the top of the head of the newborn child as a token of supreme love.. This is a Vedic rite.
From this moment a father becomes a different man, with every child born to him he simply multiplies himself, his own dreams, possessions, and he is prepared to do any sacrifice for the child, he keeps the interest of the child far ahead of his own interests..There can be no exception.. Every father is like this.. My father has left me quarter of a century ago.. I do not know what my son feels about me..I am proud of my father..And I am proud of my son. And I am proud as a son and also as a father  

Happy father's day