Angels in Cancer Ward

A friend of mine shared The Starfish Story the other day on WhatsApp. The young girl in the story is seen picking up starfish left on the beach by the tide one by one and throwing them back to the sea. An old man approaches her and says, “There are thousands on the beach….you cannot possibly make a difference”. The girl walks to pick yet another star fish and throws it back to the sea and then says: “It makes a difference for that one”.

Even as I read the story, memories of an incident in RR Army Hospital, Delhi came rushing to my mind.

A friend of mine was admitted there to undergo spinal surgery. It was a sunny Sunday and I was staying just across the road. My wife made something for the friend for lunch and so I just walked across to call on him. He was in good cheer and we chatted for some time before I took leave to go home. Instead of taking the lift, I decided to walk down all the three floors.

As I turned into the corridor of the floor below, I noticed three ladies standing by the side wall. Well dressed and holding themselves so graciously, I couldn’t help lingering my look a little while. Just then, one of them turned and happened to catch me looking at them. And, she smiled as graciously.

I bowed my head and said, “Good Morning”.

“Good morning, how do you do?” she said.

“I am fine, ma’am. I am Wing Commander Srinivasan. What are you doing here? Is everything alright?” I said.

“Oh, I am Mrs….. My husband is a Colonel. Well, yeah, actually things are not pretty okay for someone. So, we were just wondering what next?”

The chivalrous soldier in me rose to the occasion. Stepping forward, I said, “Can I do something, ma’am?

 She looked at me for a few seconds and then said, “Perhaps not. But you can come in and have a look”.

She led me then into the Ward with the sign board – Terminal Patients.

The ward was full of young and old, with everyone apparently having the messenger from the Maker standing at hand. Notwithstanding the life support or other medical equipment that surrounded their beds, each one propped, waved, raised a hand and smiled looking at the three ladies. Many of them called out “mai” (mother) in voices that were laced with love. Their eyes glistened and wherever the ladies stood, hands reached out and held to them.

The ladies in turn sat by the bedside, holding hands, placing their palms on cheeks and simply ruffling the few curls still left on those pates. Their eyes were also moist but they poured out a compassion that ran like a river, immersing everyone in the ward.

Even I stood there watching, my eyes welled. It felt though my chest was caught in pincer, squeezing a strange emotion that I knew not the name. I cried.

The Colonel’s wife came over to me and placed a gentle hand on my shoulder. Led by her, I went over to a bed where a patient was cocooned in a plethora of medical equipment. Ironically, it looked as though the plethora of tubes running around and through him were actually sucking the juice of life out of him. The scrawny, skeletal body screamed a song of pain, though his lips hardly moved. There was not enough fluid in him even to moist his eyes with misery. I was immobile, both in body and mind, even to think what he must be going through.

She looked me into the eye and guided my sight to a board that hung by the bed. The patient was on Chemo for over six months. And, now the light of life was exiting him, anytime. He was just 23.

I stood frozen in a cocktail of emotions.

All our life, we spend every neuron of our energies into controlling things around us. We seek constantly to embolden and fortify our lives with money, material comforts, power, position and accolades. We crave to bring newer vistas under our power, seeking them not only in planet Earth, but also in the Moon, Mars, and the universe beyond.

We have everything and have the power to possess anything that we set about to want. Yet, thins fleeting thing called life refuses to bow down in front of our colossal might. It enters and leaves our beautiful bodies at will, sometimes devastating this cage of bones and muscles in ways that no human eye ever wants to see. At least, never want to imagine affliction with one’s own body.

What use is that power which conquers the mighty oceans and mountains and vales, yet remains so vulnerable to a thing that eyes cannot see? What use is that power which conquers worlds beyond, yet is bereft of the power to understand the world within?

The Colonel’s wife gently touched my shoulder again. I turned and walked slowly towards the entrance door. As I stood there, she patted me gently, not needing words to communicate. Both of us remained quiet for some time.

As I turned to look at her, she said quietly, “Please pray. He will be gone any time now”.

I bowed my head and nodded as I left.

I pray every day, even though I know he is gone long back.

There are thousands of starfish on the beach. You may not rescue any of them. But when you pray, you do not know to which when you are making the difference.

PS: I have come to believe that there are angels on Earth, especially in Cancer Wards.