Flash Post 223!

Button, every few months, this plant in our terrace garden blooms, spreading a beautiful fragrance throughout. The flowers are small and white and beautiful. The sad part is that they shed most of their petals on the second day itself so we have to wait for those many months to be able to smell their fragrance and appreciate their beauty. When the petals are shed, it seems as if the plants have laid out a white pathway for us to walk on. Or, could it be for the gods! Incidentally, Dost informs me that this plant or tree, rather, is a Jasmine tree.

Could well be for the creator.

While this is beautiful to the eyes and senses, the passing away of Sheru yesterday, was an extremely sad moment for this family.

I now understand why there are tears in your eyes when, just a moment back, you had a smile on your face when you were describing the flowers in the garden.

Some of the stories surrounding Sheru are so touching. The community living in chawls where Ghetto, the nightclub stands in Mahalaxmi, are a wonderful community. Didi and I found Sheru there one day when we went to feed some of our family of strays living around that area. The two of us spotted this exquisite chocolate-brown dog sitting in that lane majestically and we took to him immediately. We didn’t know then that he was called Sheru and named him Chocolate because of his colour. From that day on, Chocolate got a food packet from us when we went to feed our other babies till just about some 10 days back when he refused to eat or drink. It took us a couple of days to report the matter to the Welfare of Stray Dogs, the team headed by Abodh, that tends to sick and ailing dogs. Chocolate was administered saline for two days running but was too weak to pull through as he hadn’t eaten for almost a week though we tried to feed him. We had hoped that he would be able to pull through this time when we found him actually walking around just the day prior to his death. Perhaps, he gave us false hope so we would not feel sad or pity him.

What were you saying about the community living there?

They are a wonderful lot of people. There’s a boy called Kunal who first came and reported about Chocolate going off food and water and he, together with his brother Omkar, took ample care of Chocolate and even tried rushing him to a hospital when they found that he was having difficulty in breathing. An aged man there was telling us stories surrounding Chocolate but the two that touched me most was the one where, every year, for the last 5 years that Chocolate made this place his home, he would accompany those who went to Parel to bring home Lord Ganesha and walk back all the way. This was the first year when he failed to accompany them because of failing health.  And the other about the time when he walked to Sion on some occasion and got lost. The community looked for him high and low. Sheru or Chocolate returned to Mahalaxmi from Sion after 3 whole days.

What a coincidence that he should pass away during this time!

RIP, Chocolate.