By: Peer Faizan Bashir
Listening to stories of sufferings makes life seem like a daunting task. While some are able to live unscathed, there are few who toil with scars that refuse to heal. However, sometimes, innate immunity shows them the light at the end of the tunnel.
The Kashmir conflict has wreaked havoc in an uncountable number of families and mine belongs to that list too. It rendered us homeless and everything we had was destroyed in what could be termed as a random act of arson.
My family lived in a large house built to accommodate the Kashmir version of a joint family. But after the life turning inferno, we were left to stare at rubble, trying to make sense of our irredeemable loss.
As a result, my family was demoted to living in a rented space and soon insidious profiteering caused us the loss of familial ties and an unfair splitting of assets. My aunt, to our dismay, occupied the ancestral property and dealt out monetary scraps amongst her siblings. The paltry sum my immediate family received was exhausted in no time wherefore we were on the verge of destitution.
As I was just an infant at that time, when these catastrophes occurred, it seemed that the incident had hardly any bearing for me and affected me the least—I had made mental peace with my family. It was my family’s love and devotion that I didn’t come to feel the sufferings they had been collectively undergoing. But, alas, the abrupt passing away of my mother, a year after, leaving my father and his children in utter misery, was the most tragic, unfortunate day of our lives.
In those melancholic times, my grandmother and aunt extended their motherly affection to me and my siblings, giving us the attention and love that we were in dire need of. But, regardless of how much I tried to cheer myself with their consolatory actions, my mother’s untimely departure from the world had left me feeling hollow and numb!
Tragedy upon tragedy visited us, but our only faith in the Almighty helped us pull through! In my entire life, I never tried venting my charred feelings vis-a-vis my mother to any of my kith and kin, and I don’t intend to. The only channel I will use to obliterate my hardships will be the one that does well to my society. I am determined to spend my energy helping people and preventing the catastrophe that fell upon me and my family from happening to them.
In life, vicissitudes are bound to occur, but keeping hope and goodness alive in our hearts is the only key to survive and remain happy and humane.
Faizanbashir170@gmail.com
