Our eldest son, Akshay Jonathan, went into a coma on 13 Dec after suffering from a brain haemorrhage, and passed away on 17 Dec 08. The doctors diagnosed the cause as a cerebral arteriovenous malformation, a congenital defect which must have existed since birth, but was not detected as there were no symptoms at any time.
Akshay was like any other normal teenager in many ways, curious, enthusiastic and bubbling with energy. We had to put in a lot of effort to satisfy his insatiable curiosity about everything he saw and experienced; he was never satisfied with superficial details. He was also special as he was brilliant and gifted – he was never happy with doing things by halves, and insisted on doing everything as well as he could. He always did extremely well in his studies, was fond of playing games, and was especially fond of music – he reached a fairly high standard on the piano in Western Classical music, after just three years of training. Like all parents, we had grand plans for his future.
Very often we tend to feel that we are teaching our children, but we soon realise how much they teach us, the more important lessons of life. When we looked at the world and at life, through the eyes of Akshay, we realised the beauty all around us. He would look at anything beautiful, like a distant snow-capped mountain or full starlit night sky in the clear environment of Jammu and Kashmir, and simply and eloquently point it out to us – “Its so good, Papa !”
The human mind cannot even begin to comprehend why a 14 year old has to be taken away from us. In the words of the poet Charles Lamb :
‘The economy of Heaven is dark;
And wisest clerks have miss'd the mark,
Why Human Buds, like this, should fall,
More brief than fly ephemeral,
That has his day; while shrivel'd crones
Stiffen with age to stocks and stones;
And crabbed use the conscience sears
In sinners of an hundred years........'
