A Sudden Separation
Author: Rizwan Ahmed Memon
Author: Rizwan Ahmed Memon
It
was March 25th, 2016. After a long time, Rashid approached his chair and table,
where he used to write. For the past few months he hadn’t been able to touch
the notebook on his writing table, owing to his involvement with the classes he
used to teach. That day, he was particularly sad because his close friend,
Waqar, had passed away just the day before. His beloved friend had drowned in
the Indus River in his village, Akil. He was 23 and single. Waqar was swimming
with his classmates, when one of them got into a whirlpool. Waqar managed to
get him out of the whirlpool, but he got himself within it. He sacrificed his
life for the friend.
Rashid
took his notebook, and cleaned the dust on it with his hand. He grabbed a pen,
held it in his mouth with his teeth and hand, and began to stare at the Neem
tree outside the window. The leaves were inevitably being shed from it. He
thought that these leaves didn’t know which of them would fall next. Like those
leaves, we humans also have no idea as to who will perish next. Rashid opened
the notebook and commenced writing.
“I
had read novels and stories about separation before, but I had never felt it so
deeply until I lost my friend. I feel there is a void that can never be filled.
It is a lifelong sorrow that tends to persist. Every sorrow has its share of
intensity. While this intensity does fade with the passage of time, it is never
obliterated completely. Even after decades, whenever we happen to remember any
moment spent with our past friends, we take a deep sigh without any intention.
There is always the grief of separation from our loved ones that pricks our
hearts.
It
is painful to write about the friends and loved ones that we have lost.
However, one way through which we can provide succor to our saddened hearts is
by recalling the moments that we had spent together. No doubt, we all have to
go back to our Creator, but the sudden separation of our loved ones really shakes
the earth under our feet. I too lost my friend recently, a friend I had spent a
lifetime with – a long period of time.
It
was 2006 when Waqar met me for the first time. I was in grade 9, whereas he was
in grade 8. He came to my class accompanied by his friend, Muhammad Bukhsh. “I
have heard that you are good at English,” he said to me. I never knew that he
would end up being my student as well as a very good friend with whom I would
spend half of my life!
When
I reached grade 10, I had started teaching English. Waqar came to learn English
at my institute. I found him to be a very obedient, helpful, and intelligent
student, who would always score high on the tests due to being regular and
punctual. He had become my pet student. After about eight months, the course
had come to an end, and new students arrived. Occasionally, Waqar used to come
and see me. On one of my birthdays, he brought me a gift early in the morning.
“This is a very old and torn book, but whatever it might be, if it is given as
a gift, it has its own special value,” he said while offering me the book.”
Rashid
went on writing and writing. As if he would write for centuries. It was as if
all his pens would cease to write and yet, his memories would not end. Some of
his final lines he wrote were: “Physically you are not with me, but you will
always remain with me spiritually – in my heart and mind. No matter how long I
write about you or talk about you, your virtue can’t be defined in words. Your
premature death has not only made me lonely, but it has made me, in fact, a
poor man.” Rashid had a history with his friend. Whenever he went out, his mind
would remind him about the times that they sat and walked in the streets of
their village. He couldn’t believe that his friend was no more. Whenever he
entered his writing room, he thought of how his friend sat there and read his
stories, helped him with his college work, and how he joked. Whenever Rashid
did anything, the memories of his friend would start occupying his mind.
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