That One Time I Soaked My Leg in Hot Rasam

 

One of the fondest memories I have is a memory of me putting my leg inside a pot of hot Rasam. I couldn’t be older than four when that happened. The memory is so vague now but I remember the gist of it. It went like this: I put my leg inside a pot of hot Rasam. There was a lot of screaming and crying, panicked parents, uncles and a scary doctor who had to give me a shot.

These are the pieces of memory that I can recall in a vague manner.

My mother gave me a clear version of this vague memory. So, this blog is about my story narrated to me by my mother.

My mother said that I was walking with my eyes crossed and because of that everything must have appeared in doubles to me. She supposed that I confused the real pot with it’s double and must have put my foot inside it.

I was not surprised at all. I was a crazy kid. I used to spin until I collapse. I used to ride my scooter around the house and knock off my great-grandfather’s cane, much to his annoyance. The thought of me almost burning myself because I walked cross-eyed was not surprising at all.

But what surprised me was that my father – who was wearing a lungi – grabbed me and rushed me to the hospital without even bothering to change his attire. It was pure panic for him. We ran into our uncle on the way and he took us to the hospital in his car.

It was heart warming when I heard it.

To drop everything and rush to aid of the one you love without thinking is love at it’s purest form. It might seem trivial because almost all fathers do it but still it is something to admire. It is something that must be appreciated.

Human beings are creatures capable of being nasty but they are also the ones who can express such an unadulterated form of love. It is something that must be celebrated no matter how mundane it is.

I wrote this blog today because I want to appreciate my father and share his love with my readers.

This Rasam-incident is something I’ll remember until the end of my life. I might have almost burnt myself but it is the one memory which would forever remind me of how much loved I am.