Wrapped in a white polythene bag at the back of a cupboard, I found small rectangular notepads with crumbling yellow paper. They were filled with things my grandfather wrote when he was my age. His handwriting scrawled across the page, the loopy y and the hesitant punctuation. He had written things that he must have read somewhere and liked enough to document; things that he wanted to tell someone but had no one who’d understand. The writing was progressive and the thoughts travelled way ahead of his time.

There are some things that I immediately and unknowingly associate with him. Brown sweater vests, ochre coloured walking sticks that make a clacking sound, coconut ice-cream in a small glass bowl.
My grandfather told us, on more than one occasion, that long fingers indicated an artistic bent of mind. I couldn’t even colour inside the lines in school and I decided at age 8 that my long fingers weren’t taking me anywhere. He then told me, in a rather cryptic fashion, that being an artist doesn’t restrict itself to painting. I didn’t really understand it.

I started noticing people’s hands to check for fingers. Without realizing it, I started remembering people by their hands. I remember telling him this and he laughed a clear laugh that I still hear sometimes at night. Those are the nights I read his powerful thoughts with vehemence.

He wanted us to become doctors. My sister did become one. I notice hands and write a little bit. He’d have been proud.

It’s been exactly 12 years since he passed away. If he had been alive, he’d have been 100 this year.
He’s still around, though, in our writing and our interest in poetry. Every time, we read a good book and discuss it, I imagine him sitting on his bed, a copy of A Tale of Two cities covered in newspaper resting on his lap.