Dog Days of Summer

Dog Days of Summer

In English parlance, there’s an expression, “dog days of summer”, to signify the hottest days of the year. In Sri Lanka, we do not have 4 seasons in the English or European fashion. Instead in our Wet Zone, there’s the Wet Season, the Mild Dry Season, and then the Mild Wet Season and the Dry Season – the Idoray – which to us, spans the months of late January, February, March and the first part of April before the dawn of the Sinhala New Year. In the Month of May that follows, comes the lashings of the South-West Monsoon, bringing in its wake, storms, lightning and wide swipes of deluges of rain. Then comes July, August, September – a time of mild drought, hardly warranting the title of Idoray. And finally, the mild relatively gentle rains of the North East Monsoons, bringing in its wake for us, the start (and sowing) of the Maha Paddy Season... And it’s the Maha Sowing of the Paddy, that gets harvested for our Sinhala New Year.

In the Dry Zone, the intensity of the Monsoon Rains are reversed, and in some areas – the Arid Shushka Zones – one hugging the South East Coast, and the other the North West Coast , the South West Monsoons are hardly felt at all. But to them also falls the joy of bringing in a big harvest of rice – milled paddy – in time for the Sinhala New Year.

And it is in April, that we now get our longest school vacation, the schools being closed first for the New Year, and then for the holding and marking of scripts of the Advanced Level Examination.

And it is in April, immediately after our Sinhala New Year, we wend our way to my Father’s ancestral home – Maha Gedera in Kuliyapitiya, – to pay our respects to his old parents – our grand parents, and spend a couple of weeks away from the hurly-burly of the city, where my father works as a company executive, while my mother keeps home for both him and me. She had been a schoolteacher before her marriage, but had given that up, as she could not cope with the demands of teaching with that of looking after a home and two children – my elder sister and myself, for a man who worked till late in the evening.

So to Kuliyapitiya, we wended our way, to unravel troubled care and awake refreshed from the worries and demands of a busy city life... And my father drank deep of the founts of his youth and childhood, and returned ‘home’ invigorated and refreshed. I don’t know how exactly my Mother felt about those visits, worrying as she did of snakes and centipedes and other ‘creepy-crawlies’. But she looked relaxed and calm enough, when we ‘returned home’.

I myself thoroughly enjoyed those visits. For one thing there was old Pedris Singho and his widowed sister (20 years junior to him) Jane Nona, to fuss over us, particularly me. They looked after our grandparents, Pedris Singho having been there from the time he was boy of 12 years or so. And when Jane Nona was widowed young, she too moved into the Big House to help out old Yasawathie (who had acted as the cook there), with my Grandparents’ blessing, bringing her whole family comprising of 2 little boys and a little girl of my own age... And it was to this Muthu Manike, that I owed a large part of my affinity to my Father’s and his old parents’ Maha Gedera.

Yasawathie was a crusty old soul, but not so, Pedris Singho who would indefatigably pluck us fruit from the garden, push us on the swing, and so on. And Jane Nona would oblige us with little titbits from the kitchen, and Kewum and Mung Karal and Kalu Dodol hidden way on tope of the wood stove – the Messa built specifically for the purpose.

Amma of course would never address Jane Nona as such, simply shortening it to plain ‘Jane’, while she in turn respectfully addressed my Mother as Kolomba Nona Mahaththaya, as distinct from Amma’s sister-in-law – the Kalutara Non a Mahaththaya. Our Grandmother herself was to Jane, simply Nona Mahaththaya or when the occasion demanded it, stretched to Loku Nona Mahaththaya.

Similarly, Pedris Singho was simply old Peduru to my Amma. She certainly never deigned to honour him with the appellation ‘Singho’ – which surely she was aware, as I am now – derived from the Spanish/Portuguese ‘Senor’ and linked to the Italian ‘Signor’. Our Amma always believed in keeping servants in their place, and enjoined on us – my sister and myself – to do the same.

But with Muthu Menike, she never succeeeded. Try as she would, she could not get me or my Akkie to shorten Muthu Menike’s name to a mere ‘Muthu’ as she would have us. The fact is the appellation Muthu Menike sounded so sweet to our ears, that it rolled off only too easily off our tongues.

So, those halcyon days of summer were simply glorious days of joy and romping for us three, my sister and myself and Muthu Menike – when we romped and played catch and hide-and-seek in our Seeya and Aachchie’s garden, not to mention countless village games like ‘Gadu’ which our little friend had taught us. And the sun rose and set, rose and set, in a seemingly never ending array of days of sunshine and gladness, a riot of colour and sound, till all too soon, it ended too soon, with us tearfully making our way back to the dull drab dusty city which my Amma considered her home – her one true heritage – where she felt truly at home in a milieu all her own.

Sometimes Muthu Menike’s brothers, Amarasinghe and Wijayapala would join us in play, but mostly they kept each other company. They were scamps, both of them, as Pedris Singho would remark sadly, throwing away their schoolbooks in favour of tree climbing and bird-nesting, and will one day have to be content with being mere hewers of wood and drawers of water themselves. Muthu Menike was different, always eager to pick up a few ‘Ingiris’ words from us, asking us help in her schoolwork, and trying to imitate us in matters of dress and style as best as she could, though of course she had to make do with what her mother, Jane Nona could afford. Sometimes, my Mother would take our old clothes and present them to her, which she would accept gleefully. And she would wear them, and show them off to us, saying, “Look Baby! See how well your dress fits on me!” Envy was not part of her vocabulary or inherent nature.

This April too had been just the same as all the others, except there was a new addition to the Maha Gedera ménage to complete our cup of joy. It was Tarzan – a brand new puppy, with liver spots on an otherwise white body, and four white socks for his four legs.

My father took one look at him, and remarked, “Must be a Dalmatian or Dalmatian-cross. Don’t know where or how or they got hold of him!”

But my mother was concerned with weightier matters. “Is it vaccinated? Especially against rabies – you know mad-dog disease?” she asked Pedris Singho, who in answer threw back his head and guffawed. “What mad-dog disease here, in these parts, Nona?” he asked in his turn. “Such a case hadn’t been here for miles around, not since I was a wee boy child, younger than Muthu Menike here... Aye, as far back as I can remember.”

My father said mildly, “Well Amitha, if there had been no infected dogs for miles around, as far as Pedris Goiya’s memory goes, you have no cause for alarm...”

But my mother pursed her lips, and said, “A dog can get rabies from an infected fox or even polecat, or so have I heard.”

My father pooh-poohed the idea. “I myself had grown up here with dogs running around us, all the time, and never worried about hydrophobia or distemper or anything remotely like that. Dogs roaming roundabout are fine healthy specimens of their species. All they want is a bit of love and attention, and some rice soaked in gravy three times a day – morning, noon and night. And if in addition to all that, you throw in an occasional bone, they will be in seventh heaven, and follow you right upto the very end of the world. You city folks don’t call them rice-hounds for nothing. They are hardy, sturdy and absolutely independent. Don’t meddle unnecessarily.”

My mother sucked in her lips still further, making a low sound as she did so, but otherwise said nothing, but gathered up her sewing and went inside. Once safe inside the parlour, out of earshot of my father, she whispered hoarsely to myself and my sister, “Keep away from that wretched dog!”

But she might as well have poured distilled water on the oiled back of a duck’s feathers.

For how could we two stay away from Tarzan, when he was such loads of fun? Not simply a load of fun, but loads and loads, tons and tons of wild exuberant fun? Days and nights sped away in a wild haze of enchantment. Both sunrise and sunset were entwined with Muthu Menike and her Tarzan. Only time we were away from them were at mealtimes, when we were fast asleep, snug within the folds of the coverlets and snowy sheets that Grandmother provided for our beds under her care!

Our poor dear Mother remonstrated with us, as often and even more as she got the chance. But in vain. Her words of distilled wisdom seemed but that of bigoted narrow-minded pettiness to us. Tarzan was not mad – Our eyes and ears and every other sense told us. With the gay, carefree abandon of childhood, we abandoned ourselves to his charms. Summer days were with us, and we thought they would never end.

But end they did, all too soon. School-time approached, and with it the closing of our holidays. At the close of yet another of those golden halcyon days, at dinner-table, my parents announced our imminent departure. As usual, I went into tantrums, while my sister looked cross and sulked, but depart on the morrow we did, after many tearful huggings, especially of our Grandparents, Muthu Menike (in spite of the fixing of a beady eye upon us my our Amma) and of course that bundle of mischief Tarzan, who gave us a farewell accolade right upto the crossroads leading to the Negombo Road.

Finally, he too had to take farewell of us, and my sister and myself pressed our faces to the rear windscreen and watched till his tail became a tiny white string and finally vanished ... in a matter of seconds, or so it seemed to our woebegone selves. For awhile we remained transfixed silence, while an occasional car or lorry sped past us in the opposite direction. And if we didn’t speak for sometime, neither did our Thaththa and Amma... Especially our Amma, almost right throughout the journey back home!

“It’s a blessed relief that we wouldn’t be seeing that wretched dog for some time. I hope that at least your parents would see some sense and get Peduru to take it to a vet, and get it properly vaccinated. I think, I’ll write a long, firm letter in that regard to your esteemed parents.” was her only comment, to which my did not care to reply. When she spoke in that vein, she meant business, and woe-betide anybody who crossed her!

To this very day, I don’t know whether that letter ever got written. Or if she did, her esteemed in-laws attitude towards rabies shots for their servant’s children’s dog, was any different from their son – our father! What I do know, is that a few days later, close to nightfall, there came the ring of the Telegram Boy’s ring. Now a telegram those days were like a bit the cry of that mythical devil-bird – ‘ulama’. Certainly it was in that context, that day to us...

The telegram was from my Grandmother, addressed to our father. AAchchie’s message was brief and to the point. “Muthu Menike gravely ill. Expecting the worst. Come immediately, the first thing in the morning.”

Amma was annoyed at this pre-emptory summoning to the possible deathbed of a servant’s child, and was all for ignoring the telegram, and pretending that it never came. But we were aghast. So was our father. Thaththa took his duties towards family retainers very seriously. For once in her life, Amma was completely over-ruled...

We set off the first thing in the morning. Already the monsoon rains were upon us, and the sky was overcast. Soon the car and everything else around us outside it were enveloped in blinding sheets of rain. There was thunder in the air, and a deep pall of gloom within the car. Amma was distinctly annoyed, and kept her mouth firmly shut. We two too in the back of the car were almost wholly silent, wrapped up in an envelope of sadness. Only Thaththa kept up a mournful dirge – to keep himself from falling asleep at the wheel, he said, having got up at 4 o’clock in the morning, while the wind kept him company.

It was not far from 10:30 in the morning, by the time we arrived at the old Maha Gedera. As we approached, we could see tiny white flags on poles adorning the roadside on both sides of it. Approaching the house, Amarasinghe and Wijayapala were seated on an upturned trunk close to the gate, their usual devil-may-take gaiety replaced by a sombre mood. One was engaged biting his thumb, while the other rested his face between his cupped hands, gazing pensively towards the road. On seeing us, they raised a shout, and ran indoors. By the time we had turned in at the gate and gone down the driveway, our Grandmother and Pedris Singho were at the doorway from the veranda to the hall, looking out towards the road for us. When we turned in at the open gate, they slowly moved out into the veranda and then onto the topmost step to greet us...

“How is she?” I whispered hoarsely from my Grandmother. Poor old Pedris Singho brushed away a tear, while my grandmother answered, “She’s dead, and is now already laid out. She died within half-an-hour of Pedris Singho returning from the post-office after sending out that telegram on my behalf.”

I set up a wailing immediately, while my sister followed suit. Our crying brought out poor Jane Nona to the door. Her eyes too were red with weeping, and now she started out afresh. My mother bade Jane Nona a polite greeting of condolences, while my father raised his palms clasped together in salutation, and uttered some awkward words of sympathy. His voice was unusually gruff.

My Grandfather was seated inside with his walking stick across his knees. He rose painfully with its aid to greet us. Almost overnight his rheumatism had grown much worse. It was not so, the last time we had seen him. “What’s to be done, Son?” he said sombrely, “It’s her karume. No, it’s not Karume alone, Putha, but our folly in not getting that dog properly vaccinated.”

Pedris Singho nodded. “It was my folly and foolishness that made me not listen to Apey Colomba Nona Mahaththaya. Nona warned about mad-dog disease. My foolishness and my poor sister and her daughter’s karumay! Now both she and Tarzan are gone.”

Our faces would have shown bewilderment. “Tarzan bit Muthu Menike while at play, a week ago. At first, she was a bit angry about it, but then declared that it was a love bite. That he did it just in play. So we thought too. Then the night before last, he began frothing. We became alarmed, and I went to the Inspector Mahaththaya’s house and asked him to come with his gun. He came and shot Tarzan, and poor Muthu Menike cried and railed against us. Inspector Mahaththaya asked us for a strong piece of rope and bound Muthu Menike, and took me and her mother and Muthu herself in his car, straight to the Base Hospital in Negombo. They gave her the first injection straight away, but a couple of hours later came over to us, and said that it was too late. She was already showing signs of water madness. I left Jane Nona by her bedside, and went with the Inspector Mahaththaya back here to tell your grandparents, and take my sister, some clothes. They told me that they could manage by themselves with Yasohamy to help a bit, and for me to go back to the hospital. So I went back to hospital with clothes for myself, and my Sister.... Loku Nona Mahaththaya had said firmly, that if needs must be, she herself can cook for once, and for me to stay right throughout with Muthu and Apey Nangie. And so I did.... And I think it was a comfort for poor Jane to have me near, though of course, I had to sleep in the corridor, it being a girl children’s ward... But the nurses allowed me in again as soon as it was light, for as they said, she was dying, and it would ease her pain to have her uncle – her own Māma – besides her mother... and as I said, it was such a consolation for our poor Jane... It was horrible to watch Muthu raving and dying like that. She kept asking for water, and to satisfy her we held a cup to her lips, but she couldn’t swallow a bit of course. The Missie Nona came and scolded us. ‘Are you mad?’ she said, “If she bites you, you too might get the infection. And the doctors will scold us nurses.’ Yes, it was horrible to watch her die...”

Tears started pouring down his cheek. “In the evening, Loku Dosthara Mahaththaya came up to me and said, that it won’t be long. That she would die before the night was over. Then I returned here, and begged Loku Nona Mahaththaya to send that telegram. That she loved the two Baby Nona-s most of all in the world, except her mother herself, and perhaps her two Aiyas and myself. That you two Baby Nonas must be here for her funeral. On the way, I had taken care to stop at the post-office and buy a telegram form, though as your Aachchie said, there were enough forms in the house... But I wanted to be sure... And your Grandmother (may she one day be a Buddha for five thousand years!!!) was kind enough to write it out in her own name, so that Colomba Mahaththaya and Nona would not think twice even of coming at once.... I took it back to the post-office, and returned to to Muthu’s bedside in the hospital where Apey Nangie was keeping watch over her. Though beds are always scarce even at the Maha Ispirithalaya in Negombo, they had given our poor Muthu a bed, so that she would have at least that last comfort in the final hours of her life! By that time, Muthu was no longer raving, but lying still with here eyes closed. I think they had also given her something to forget her pain and go to sleep. For by that time she was no longer crying or shouting, but stayed still with her eyes closed tight, and only the rise and fall of her chest under her dress told us that she was still with us... Praised be the Buddha and the very Heavens themselves for that. For Muthu not suffering from pain at the very end... May the good Vishnu-Katharagama Deviyo bless the Ispirithalaye Nonavaru and Mathwaru for that! Particularly the Dosthara Mahaththaya-s and the Nurse Nona-s... As I said, we watched over Muthu till the vey end, and this night the Missie Nonas did not ask me to leave and stay in the corridor... Soon it was all over. Our poor Muthu was no more in this Bhavaya. If she has not already taken conception elsewhere, her Vignanaya is only waiting to collect some pin – merit, and Loku Nona had kindly agreed to hold the one-week almsgiving and also the three-months’ one and the first years’ one, here in this very house itself, and bear all the required expenses.... May our poor Muthu’s sojourn in Sansara be brief and happy! And let her never again suffer such a fate!”

He fell silent, and I tiptoed near the little open coffin, and peered inside. Muthu lay inside. But it was not the gay, laughing Muthu Menike I had known – the dear companion of my childhood. She did not even look like my poor fair Muthu. The corpse was already turning livid, and the white uniform in which it was dressed, only made the contrast starker. Perhaps they had not embalmed her. Or perhaps the embalmers were scared, and done only a half-hearted job, not doing it properly. Whatever it was, what was inside was not my poor dear Muthu Menike...

I felt as if my head was swimming, and the next thing I knew was opening my eyes to find myself lying prone in the bench in the veranda, being fanned to by my poor anxious mother.

I sat up, and ran my fingers over my eyes. “What happened?” I asked timidly. “You fainted.” answered my father softly, “Here, drink this.” and held out a glass of Thambili, while my mother stroked my head...

The cold king-coconut water revived me a bit. But I did not want to go back inside to see that stranger lying in that unfeeling coffin. It was Muthu Menike I wanted, but she was simply not there. What was left there was simply a cold empty husk devoid of all feeling...

I felt numb inside myself... I did not want to go inside. I did not want to leave. What was it I wanted? What was there left for me to do?

My mind was numb with pain and terror, at the thing that lay inside that coffin, and the fact, that I would never walk nor laugh and play with my poor dead Muthu Menike again. That small candle was snuffed out, not to be lit again, as long as this life of mine lasts… No, I could not go in there again!

Instead, I looked at the sky. It was leaden-grey, overcast with clouds of May. Death which had hitherto loomed only in the distant horizon waiting to snatch my grandparents some far-off distant day, had grown impatient with waiting, and stepped off his mark, and snatched away my poor dear hapless friend... Away from me forever and for ever – as long as I live! Summer was gone, taking with it, all its joy and laughter, leaving my childhood bare and desolate, devoid of joy. Instead, the Dog Days had come upon us, hot and humid, reeking of thunder and rain, thunder and pain ... yes everlasting pain ... Full of sound and fury, yet signifying nothing.

Priyanthi Wickramasuriya
(Written in early 2005, polished up into this form: 18 May 2006)