When a child's soul blessed me

Originally written on FB on 2nd June 2015 when I had not yet become a full atheist:

I don't know why this memory just came up and why I am even writing about it but when I look back, I don't think anything I have been called upon to do or allowed to happen through me, comes this close in terms of leaving me overwhelmed and humbled in my life.

I've had my fair share of run-ins with authority, rebellion, ups and down, use of curse words and cuss words and yet to be chosen like this, makes me feel overwhelmed that the divine doesn't judge people. It's people like us who do it with and to each other - judge.

It reminds me of what Judson Cornwall wrote in his book 'Give me, Make me - Teaching on the Prodigal Son' that 'God does not need resolution with mankind. It is men who need it with each other.'

The one other time when I was overwhelmed like this was when I felt chosen, again, in 2011, to participate in a three day blessings training course and then to actually be set up to bless the elderly residents of AKSHAYA TRUST in Madurai two years ago.

Coming back to the memory, back in November 2000 when I was working in the prison reforms programme of CHRI, I had to visit the Tihar jail in Delhi for some official work. I had to meet the Law Officer there - Mr. Sunil Gupta. Two interns with me at that time - Neha Naqvi and Lubinisha Saha from NALSAR university requested if they too could come along.

The permission came through from Mr. Gupta that they could visit the women's wing and they promised me not to ask uncomfortable questions to the inmates in the women's wing.

We were on our way and after my work got over with Mr. Gupta, three of us were escorted to the women's wing where Lubi and Neha interacted with the inmates and were shown around the various rehabilitative programmes in the prison.

Being a male and being aware of the awkwardness the women inmates might feel in my presence, I stood back at the entrance and just watched the motions.

There were few children also in that section - children who either came in with their mothers or children who born inside the prison. Of all these children, one child - hardly one and half years old - white as butter but with immense sorrow cast all over her face, stood quietly in one corner.

There was no energy or emotion one would usually associate with children of that age. Just plain sadness, loss and sorrow. It was as if her face had dried up of all emotions. Just plain expressionless. However her eyes conveyed a lot.

The lady officials inside the prison shared with us that her mother was in prison for killing her husband when she could not bear his torture anymore and that the child neither spoke to anyone or nor ate anything much.

I didn't know what to say or do but my crossed arms opened when, without any warning, the child quietly walked towards me and stood near me.

She didn't say anything but just stood there quietly, looking down all the time.

I was no longer slant on the wall with crossed legs. I bent down to be at her height and we both spent long minutes in silence when she quietly extended her small, tiny arm towards me.

She didn't look at me or talk to me. She was just there.

Slowly, I sat down on the floor with folded legs and gently made her sit on my right folded knee and we started talking. It was mostly me, asking her questions. I don't remember the questions now but somehow the child seemed getting comfortable in it all.

The lady officials nearby told me that the child hadn't eaten properly in a long while.

Without putting on any unnecessary haste, when I thought the child was relaxed enough, I requested them to bring me a thaali. They quickly got me a thaali of the regular prison food - roti, rice and daal.

I gently fed her and she obliged.

I had never fed a person in my life other than my brother a couple of years before when he was hospitalised for a couple of weeks. And least of all I had never fed a child before.

But in that moment, on that gently cold, sunny November afternoon, inexperience didn't seem to matter. It seemed to come naturally, so long as I was feeding her slowly and after gently blowing the food to make it cool before I put it in her mouth.

After a while she got up and walked away. There were smiles all around but I happened to also sense the gentle sob of the child's mother coming from close by. She had covered her face in her duppatta as was customary of the place she came from.

For a person of 24 years of age, undergoing treatment for a particular form of non-pulmonary TB back then and on an emotional roller coaster ride at that time of his life, the child came like a waft of fresh, hopeful, liberating air - asking me to buckle up and not buckle down.

Being chosen by the divine through that child back then, was the first of indications that God had still not given up on me.

All that I remember of her little face is all the yellow daal that got smeared around her tiny mouth.

I wonder where she would be now and if I could catch up with her and contribute to her life as much as I could invite her to be part of our lives all over again.

As I look back, I regret not having thought of hugging that child to my heart.

I realise, I didn't change her life. She changed mine; forever.

Wherever she is, I bless her from my grateful heart and wish her well.

Sohum

_/\_

PS: Image is only representational.