The beginings....

1948 Empress Garden Canal

Life plays some dreadful games with us, and we're not permitted an appeal. Every day I mourn him. My Life began and ended with him.

To Rocky, I was all spirit & fire, but inside there was such peace with him beside me.

Lord, I wanted to reach you, but I needed someone to help me along the way... There were so many who offered to take me along... Then Rocky casually stepped beside me and we walked and walked and talked- through the streets of Poona... Stopping for a quiet togetherness on the ledge of the Bund Garden wall... dangling our legs in the air high above the water rushing over the rocks below.

...Just for a little while the world was ours...Then a slow trudge back to bitterness and enemity... So much discord and strige... Just because we wanted to be together for the rest of our lives...

I could feel the throbbing vibration of your love while I walked beside you... yet you were too shy to declare it, for fear your love could not nuture me. Oh! Rocky could i have asked for more from heaven itself? Tremmulously I took the initiative to tell you that I love you. Our two little fingers barely touched and our lives were entwined for ever after that into eternity.

12-4-83 Dosha

1948 A B.O.C. Picinic at Khandalla

Every body was around us sitting on the rocks, but Rocky and I were happy to drift along the current of the water- carefree, happy and safe while he guided me to float on the river. He was a good swimmer- I was scared of water.

I heard him talk in many difference ways- There had been the mocking tone, when I was at the butt end of his rivbaldry. And the light hearted banter which had both of us laughing. There had been the disturbing tenderness which haunted my dreams. There had been his life in the war years when he was overseas in headquarters. He spoke of his dreams and ambitions for the future. We used to talk about music and books.

It was quiet up there on the parapet walls of Parvati Temple. So far from any signs of life. The only sound- the twittering of the birds, the rustle of the long grass in the wind. The far distant sound of the traffic from the streets below. The sun grew warmer as we revelled in it. We had never known such peace, such tranquility. We were million miles away from civilization. Rocky unpacked the basket and we began to eat cream crackers & cheese paste washed down with beer.

-D-

"To find existence of another person who was dear to me re-woke a long buried joy for life and the desire to give myself to whatever life, through her, had to offer. I had the feeling that something in the universe clicked when I met her. I wanted to let everyone know. I wanted to give. I wanted to share. "

His Pedigree was Impeccable!!

9/12/84

His was an ancestory that blended into his mould, the affluent Goans of yester years with the dignified peasantry in which circumstances not caste threw their lot- the result- a man pleasing to God and man.

He was all the things a woman basked in- strenght and personality and intelligence- marvellous in someone who was for you, liked you, wanted to help you.

A marvellous listener who didnt talk much, who leaned more about other than they leaned about him.

I much learn to be gentle like Rocky. He kept me as I am and nurtured me so lovingly the way I am- always there to cosset and coddle me when I turned to him to lik my wounds of my own misdeeds. Never a reproach- only a look of pain that I was hurt.

Even to the end he patted me and smiled so sweetly- He just slipped away in the midst of all of us. When he barley closed his eyes to sleep- so unobtrusively leaving no painful parting from his beloved family.

The violin

Dec '77

At this time of fear, anxiety and deep sorrow! So he took up his fiddle and let the river of tears run its course, accompanied by the fluid notes he created on his violin!

6-2-84

Oh Rocky, I am so deeply in love with you. You played the violen and poured out your love and expressed your deepest emotions in the tunes you played. 

"Oh play to me Gypsy! And when I am gone, your songs will come haunting me and linger on"

Yes, Rocky every gesture, every look you gave me is a song that haunts me and lingers on.

You never told me you loved me but I could ride the high crest of every wave in the calm and in the rough seas of life, secure in your love.

With his quiet faith, Rocky assured me. I saw the worry in his eyes. I knew that his very human fear for the children's safety was just as great as mine. 

"I will put all my energy into your work. I promise dear God!"

With Rocky it had not been a high standard of living, but knowing HOW to live. He lived deeply, passionately, and knew was it was to feel vulnerable. He carried suffering, humiliation and set backs as badges of honour won in the battle fields of life. - Dosha

"He poked gentle fun at the world in general"

"Many other err and accomplish little or nothing becuase they try to become learned rather than to live well" 

- Thomas a Kempies- 

Freedom

Where the mind is without fear and

the head is held high;

Where knowledge is free;

Where the world has not been broken up into fragments by narrow domestic walls.

Where words come out from the depth of truth;

Where tireless striving stretches

its arms towards perfection;

Where the clear stream of reason

has not lost its way into the dreary

desert sand of dead habit;

Where the mind is led forward by thee into ever widening thought and action

Into that heaven of freedom,

My Father, let my country awake!

-Tagore- 

One year of wedding life and Reggie makes three!

Xmas '52

28-9-50

But why should we be dejected? We've got to show that we can take it as it comes. These vissitudes in life are common place and we are not the only ones to succumb to them! If we brave these frequent storms now, later on come what may we'll be able to shoulder them like passing showers. So 'Dorable, chins up and smile- yes, both of us.

In the meantime let us bow down to circumstances. The going will be hard- but it shouldn't be so very hard as we both are sharing it. Besides, have we not a firm conviction that our torch of love has been enkindled by a celestial fire and as such, need we ever fear that this flame will be extinguished? If you harbor even a show of doubt against this conviction it'l be best to part our ways and quickly now. Don't you think so?

If two people are climbing a mount, both look up towards the summit. It is fruitless for one to lag behind and the other trudge along alone ahead. Both can, however, pause halfway together to take breath, dress the bruises and cuts encountered en route uphill and smile; maybe at the road already traversed; with even firmer determination to reach the top. Do you get it?
- Rocky-

33 years later...
15-4-83
The going alone without Rocky is heart rendering. His mantle of responsiveness he gently paced on my shoulder and I know we will guide me right, - D-

Self Discipline (The Beatitudes)

The Bliss of the Disciplined Selt

-W. Barday-

Rocky withstood the test of time as far as I can remember trusting God

1. When he was overseas during World War II, he was away from loved ones for almost 6 years- enough to make many go beserk. But he used his aloneness to embibe an intellectual and spiritual education and store an inner strength which helped him to take the vessititudes of life and yet remain sweet, gentle to the end.
2. To Rocky, there was a time for prayer, time for work, time for play. For 38 years I observed that he followed a regimentation in his daily living- early morning rising, toilet ablutions, setting out to work- everything clock precision. So much so, the neighbouring onlookers felt his absence on days when he was taken ill.
3. At one of Mummy May's birthdays, someone mixed his drinks, which made him stone drunk. At thee end of the party he insisted that he reach everyone home in the Morris Minor. Lastly he took Coryl & fly home and Mervyn followed him in his car taking us all with him. On reaching home, Rocky was sleeping properly undressed, his clothes, slippers, car keys in the proper place. Next morning he asked us who put him to bed!? A habit of self discipline helped him to stand the test well!
4. There was much objection to our marrying each other and so to avoid emotional upsets, we met each other only on Thursdays to walk miles and miles of the lonely streets of Poona. Yet there was not a waking moment of our lives that we were not conscious of each other. 

1952- Rocky's mother asked him to leave 442 Centre Street. He did so, quietly, leaving all behind- just taking the bare necessities and his wife who was with child.

When Reggie was born we left 508 Centre Street for 1980 Convent Street. What a come down! That was in complete contrast to his life style. Yet he took this living with grace and made the most of his talents renovating 1980 and putting in bits of pieces to improve  the house- A love birds cage- A beautiful aquarium.

1953- Rocky took his mother to Dr. Borges for her final check up for cancer. The doctor gave her such assurance that she would be quite  well again that she asked him to put the deed of 508 in her name. Knowing her end was just a month away he took her to the collectors office and signed off his deed. - Not a twinge of regret- happy that he made his mother feel more secure in her final days.

1959- We got the boot from 1980. Rocky's job prospects were bleak! The two of us left home early in the morning for Sambhaji Park and sat on a bench there the whole day long, holding hands and comforting each other- Yet were so aware of each other. Sensitive spots- we laughed and cried- nothing mattered but that we were together and we had our 4 daughters. But first round the corner- a new job at St. Josephs- and a year later our cottage- 

If I marry Dosha without the family consent- Rocky-

9th Dec 1951- 6th March 1983

Rocky and Dosha on their wedding day

1. My parents are agreived but before God I do no wrong in pursuing my ideals
2. Will I be able to stand on my feet? having no name, degree or money. Take also into consideration my present improspective job. Will there be any status or security for both?
3. Much will be showered down from the school of scandal and that favourite indoor sport- gossip.. Will we weather this malicious scorn?
4. I'll have to start from scratch- and keep on scratching perhaps only dirt resulting in :
• Continually eating humble pie- making Dosha share it
• This continual menu will be both impalitable and unstomachable in as much, Dosha will be called upon per force to perform various house hold chores which she does not now partake (or need to) in her present environment
• There will hardly be a full larder, finery or social engagements or entertainments.
5. Would forgoing the above listed in 4 result in: "Tis not loves going hurt my days, But that it went in little ways."
6. Would we both therefore be naturally and individually happy taking marriage not as a distinction but a life's journey, where there is no parting of ways, or a wayside shelter en route.
7. Would Dosha, in later life take my parents blessings with a bowed head despite the continual snubs. 

And above all is it fair asking my beloved to stoop down to share this lot???

To Record the/ your Unfinished Symphony

To my sons to carry on where their father left off. And my daughter to enrich the lives of their families
-Dosha

Times that have been lost to us
Return
and become present
As we seek them
In the quiet waters.
Events old and new
Fit together
As we look within,
Finding the path of our life
Finding the path of our life
- Ira Pragoff-

18-4-1983
     How gracefully you stood the test Rocky! you bowed to the inevitable...like a rock amidst the swirling seas you took the battering of hurt, insults, disappointments failures without flinching an eyelid. You just smiled sweetly at me, giving my hand a gentle squeeze.
     Your strength was dwindling day by day yet you walked with god across the stormy waves calmly. I should not be afraid- you are beside me- leading me to the top.
     What I see about you Rocky is your eyes lovingly encouraging to go on. The falters of life hold on you, you broke away long ago- unhindered to walk lightly to eternity- we well all belong.

Rocky must have been little more than a boy when he joined the army in World War II, and lived in a tent in the Iraqi Desert! He had adapted to the rigors of a tent existence to make it a home away from home. He accrued a large library- books parceled to the soldiers overseas and learnt his knowledge which would normally been acquired through a university education.
     The wilderness inherent in every boy of that age- nineteen- was tamed "only by the maturity that comes with age, and not by the discipline of any human hand".
     "He found affinity with men who were courageous free & unbridled, men with strange beliefs & even stranger customs-  his colleagues who shared his tents."
     Rocky learnt the art of manliness in his loneliness in the desert. He learnt to be sweet where there was none to see and brave without the spotlight & applause and honest in the secret unseen act. -Dosha

The purpose

"What is memory? Not a storehouse, not a trunk in the attic, but an instrument that constantly refines the past into a creative, accessible & acceptable to oneself"- Stanley Kaufmann

I started this blog to capture the memoirs of my grandmother.She handed me this old, worn diary from the past eighty decades with the hope that I would somehow translate the pages, continue the story, and share it with our family.

And so I begin...to transfer the stories, the life surrounding the 993 cottage through a modern day medium...

Doshama and I sampling her homemade wines...perfect anytime of day!