My friend lost his father 4 days back. He was in his seventies and was fine, and this happened all of a sudden at the evening. By the time they took him to hospital, it was all over. I got the message at 9 pm and unfortunately I had a critical call going on which finished by 11 pm and then I just closed everything, and went straight to their home. But they already took him for the funeral by then.
Being an elder son, he has got all the responsibility on his shoulder now. It's often said that, the elder son takes the role of the father for the joint family. For this reason, he has to follow lot of practices as well when the father is alive. The elder son will not cut hair or even shave on the same day as father. The elder son will not shave his head in his life time, only except when the father dies. He will never give his shoulder for anyone else's funeral. And there are quite a few others as well.
As I have shared in my earlier post, the entire extended family follows the rituals, but the elder son has the main role. He has to do several rituals for ten days as you can see. Today morning we joined him at the ritual place - a place at a nearby pond, where he went through these rituals. He has to cook the food and then do the offering to the father to feed him. It was a very sad moment and he broke upon and started crying like a child. After all, we all have that emotion towards our father.
The role of a father is definitely felt more by the elder child. Being the first child, I often see, fathers love the elder child most. And the very presence of the father gives that strength - whatever old he may be. As long as he is there, the responsibility is less. It's a great loss to my friend and the family. It was good that, he decided to quit his job and came back and stayed with the family since last few years. At least his father was able to spend his last life happily with them, especially his grand son. He was so happy few days back with the result of his grand son achieving more than 99.5 % in CBSE board that he ordered to distribute sweets for Rs 5000/- at the school. Some good moments......
I was asking my friend, how all of this happened suddenly, and he was telling, he was doing all right, and most likely a recent change in some drugs probably caused this, imbalance his chemicals. Before they realized, it all happened.
He definitely was a great soul. Personally I feel, those who die suddenly are great soul. He was a very jolly man, very soft spoken and always helpful for others. We have been friends since our college time and going to their home, is like being in our home. Whenever we go, he will call and ask about everything, offer snacks /tea. We could ask for anything we want, freely. We are definitely going to miss him a lot.
You will see the elder son in this outfit only once in his lifetime. If you see someone in this outfit, it must be that he lost his father and is doing the rituals being the elder one.
The ritual place is covered to be continued tomorrow and it will go on for ten days. And after that, the house will be painted fresh, and there will be a Prasad Seva - food from temple will come. First brahmins will be called in and offered with food, clothe, money and bless the family. Afterwards all the near and dear ones will be invited to come and accept the prasad. We have been trying to give all help that we can do in this difficult time. Hope this difficult time will pass on. May the soul rest in peace.
Some photographs above from that place - good to see there has been lot of development to this place.
