Until Nirvana do us part!

Hindus are united in the belief that human life is actually a cycle – a cycle of birth and death until one attains “Nirvana” or eternal relief. Life on this earth, according to Hindu religion, is all about experiences which lead to the soul’s evolution, until it becomes one with God. And that act of becoming one with God, releases the soul from this cycle – called “Janma-mrityu” (life and death).

Ever since I was a child, I had heard mention about this life, the next one or the one before. Whenever something good happened in my life, I was told that it was the fruit of my actions in my previous life. And when something bad happened, for example, if someone cheated me of money, I was told that I probably owed money in my previous life and was repaying that debt off now. Thus it is, that I am constantly watching my deeds in this life, so that when I am reborn, I am that much closer to attaining Nirvana and hoping to be released from the “Janma-mrityu” cycle.

And as far as I can remember, people in India routinely cursed others who upset them by informing them that they would regress and be born a dog or a cat in their next life for their misdeeds in this one! Stands to reason that I inferred from those remarks that Hindus consider humans as the highest form of life, closer to God than any other being. For a very long time, I have accepted this edict, because it was inculcated in me as a very young child.

That was until we got Subbu, our cat. I am now forced to re-evaluate my assumptions. As I watch his life fly by, day after peaceful day, starting with early morning hugs, caresses, kisses and eternally full food bowl, I am starting to wonder: are humans really the superior beings? Are human closer to God than animals? Are we, indeed, born as humans in this life because of our past good deeds? Or could it be that we are born as humans in this life because we have committed sins in our past lives? Had I been good, and kind and compassionate and loving and grateful, should I not have been born as someone as peaceful, as serene and as happy as my cat?

I think Subbu’s life. more than mine, resembles that of the revered Indian sadhu (ascetic), whose meditations bring him close to God.

I’ll demonstrate with a run-down of his typical day:
5:00 am: It is wake-up time. If the ones who are fortunate enough to serve Subbu aren’t awake, no problem, he is happy to go the extra mile to wake them up so they can finish up their chores of taking care of him, before heading out to work to earn money to feed Subbu. He does that by crouching low by the side of the bed and pouncing on their toes jutting from under the bed cover. He does this repeatedly, all the while making mewing sounds until they wake up. Then he promptly flops on their feet and does a few somersaults to show them that he loves them. Because he looks so sweet when he flops on his back, Subbu’s owners forget to scold him for waking them up at an unearthly hour, in this fashion, and he gets a belly rub, many strokes and lots of kisses instead.

5:10 am: Stroking and petting done. It is time to refill Subbu’s food bowl which has been licked clean during the night. Subbu doesn’t mind having to lead them to his food bowl. He does this by walking a few steps, sitting down facing the direction he wants to lead them, and looking back at them, with his unblinking stare and eyes speaking volumes. As they follow, he’ll walk a few more steps and repeat performance, until he leads them to his empty bowl. Then, an indignant meow will let them know that while they have been remiss in letting his bowl get empty, he’ll forgive them if they refill promptly.

8:00 am: Time to see off the guy who goes out each morning to bring home the moolah! That’s the least Subbu can do. He does this by running down the stairs to the door to say bye and then running up the stairs and racing to the deck to wave goodbye from upstairs.

8:30 am: What is this other person doing? Shouldn’t she be petting Subbu, rather than being stuck in front of that screen? Oh well, Subbu drapes himself on his favorite black chair (the one that attracts the most fur) and looks bored. He spends the next hour or so, staring unblinkingly at the back of her head while he meditates on how wonderful his life is.

9:30 am: Time for a nap. Subbu retires upstairs to the master bedroom. The comforter is a dark red one so it is a perfect foil for an utterly indolent, beautifully soft, gorgeously gray and white fur ball. Subbu settles down for a nap, so his owner can come by and admire his killer looks and take pictures.

9:40 am: Subbu is now on his back, hind paws airborne, fore paws covering his eyes, pink little tongue sticking out, flesh reposing in utter stillness. Life is good.

4:00 pm: Wake up, stretch on the wall, fling oneself on human toes for more petting.

5:00 pm: Time to go out! Run down the stairs and mew loudly by the door until it is opened. Peek out, watch out for dogs, and run outside into the wilderness. Ah! the freedom to chase bugs, climb trees, watch birds and root around nature!

6:00 pm: Here is a strange human who’s walking towards Subbu. Subbu promptly does his “damsel in distress” act! Runs towards the stranger, flings himself at her toes and rolls on his back, all the while watching the human’s reaction out of the corner of his eyes. Predictably, she coos, ooohs and aaahs, stoops down to rub his belly and exclaims loudly about the cute cat! With one more feather in his hat, Subbu gets up, dusts himself off and walks away, tail in the air to resume his wilderness foray, while cruelly leaving behind a damsel in the throes of Subbu love!

9:00 pm: Subbu’s owners are being pests, scouring the neighborhood for him, calling his name loudly and disturbing the peace. Subbu comes bounding out the darkness, his beautiful eyes gleaming and promptly flops at their feet to indicate that he has no plans to go back inside.

9:30 pm: Back home. Its time to play. Subbu races up and down the stairs, pushing the torn cloth mouse and trying to get the lazy owners to work up a sweat. He tries valiantly for about 15 minutes and then gives up and runs up and down on his own, chasing many imaginary mice.

10:00 pm: Time to grab the foot of the master bed before those humans can come by and stretch out in Subbu’s space.

Life, as I said, is good. Peace, happiness, contentment, love, acceptance – complete acceptance of every situation that life throws at Subbu, and so Nirvana cannot be far away.

Now you tell me, my dear reader: is the cat’s life not one of complete surrender to God’s will? Is it not a life filled with positive emotions of love, (universal love, remember the demonstration of love for the stranger who happened to cross his path?), acceptance and peace?

Doesn’t it seem as though a cat is closer to God than man is?

Even a cat has Karma!

Barack Obama and I have something in common – Our “change is coming” theme! Resist it as we may, life is all about change. Good change, bad change – we categorize it, but change is just change. If there was no change, life wouldnt be as exciting, as fun, and the wild careening ride until death releases us to God knows where!

As I connected this in my head I pondered about Subbu, my cat. He is a gift from my son. As I delight over him every morning and literally every time I catch sight of him – lolling around, begging for treats, sitting by the french window but with his head twisted back to see if I would come by and let him out, digging up my carpets, lying all day with paws up in the air under my son, Karthik’s desk, I start thinking about how his life has changed in this past year.

Subbu was born as Sebastian, on a Wisconsin farm in the depths of winter. He was transported by Karthik’s friend to their college residence when he was just a few weeks old. As a kitten, he adjusted very well to the drive – sleeping draped around the boy’s neck for 3 hours.

Back in Madison, he was confronted with the dregs of an in-campus home – a deep, dank home filled with cigarette stubs, video games, dirty carpets, unmade beds, and dishes all over the place. His house mates consisted of another cat called Alistair and 5 young college males, who proceeded to pet him whenever they noticed him; feed him at a fairly regular schedule; but cleaned out the litter box only when even their friends who came drunk to their parties noticed the stench.

Subbu’s sole contact with outside air for those 6 months, was when he was let out into the tiny deck, once in a long while. The rest of the time, he learned to play with Alistair and meow outside the boys’ doors when he wanted to be petted.

When my son Karthik moved out of the house to live by himself, in the final semester of his college, Subbu was donated by Karthik’s roommates to a girl who also lived in campus. We know not how Subbu’s life was that semester; what we do know is that in a short span of a year, Subbu had moved 3 homes and had had 3 different set of living conditions – every change was out of his control.

When he finally came to me, he was again transported 8 hours – but this time, since he was older, we tried to put in a cat carrier. His fear of being locked up made him meow so pitifully and so loudly that we took our chances of being scratched and clawed and let him loose in the car. Cool cat that he is, he slept peacefully at Karthik’s feet for 8 hours, his gorgeous gray fur merging seamlessly with the gray car mat.

Now he lives with us and he has been rechristened Subbu – simply because I cannot pronounce Sebastian very easily. In addition, the name Sebastian doesn’t lend itself well to baby talk.
Subbu’s life has changed yet again – I think its his Karma! Here he has access to the great outdoors – we live in a single family home in a sparsely populated neighborhood. There are no homes on one side of ours. Besides, ours is a lovely neighborhood – we have the deer, the racoons, bald soaring eagles, and even the peacocks, visit us regularly. There is a lake in the neighborhood, so Subbu gets to revert to his roots and pretend he’s a tiger on a hunt! He crouches in the tall grass around the lake, seeking prey. He chases bugs around, and climbs on trees to pander to his true cat’s nature. He gets to stay out as long as he wants to and when he comes back home with his fur laden with wild flowers, leaves and thorns, he gets groomed and petted.

Now Subbu is also due for another change when we move. He’ll probably lose his great outdoors especially if we move into a more urban home.

So, what does this simple life story say about Karma?
Even a cat has his Karma. And that Karma drives his life in this birth. I guess the difference between a man’s Karma and a cat’s Karma is probably an element of free will that man has, that an animal does not. Beyond that, there’s something to be said for Karma!

The cat on the hot tin roof

Once upon a time, a long long time ago, I used to live in India. We lived in a land of plenty – plenty of love, plenty of teeming life, plenty of history, plenty of cultural heritage and plenty of religious beliefs. What we had as a country, though, was paucity of resources. Paucity of clean wholesome food, paucity of clean drinking water, paucity of electricity and paucity of educational opportunities.

In this scenario, a dear friend of mine came back home as a “foreign return” – back home with a US educational degree. As he regaled me with stories of US, one of the stories that stuck in my mind was about a cat.

America, he said, was the land of real plenty, where food was available to all, where you could drink water out of a tap without boiling it first, where schools were free for all, where you never had power cuts, and where you never saw poor people struggling for anything.

His favorite story about America was the one about a cat. His neighbor had a cat, a cat that usually slipped out the front door whenever it had an opportunity. It was an adventurous cat, an inquisitive cat and a fun-loving cat. One day, the cat didnt come back home when it got dark. So my friend and his neighbor went around calling and meowing and looking for the cat. After an hour of searching around the neighborhood, they finally heard a pitiful meow coming from the roof of the neighbor’s home. They found the cat on the roof.

Now how does one get a scared cat off the roof? The neighbor called 911 and lo, behold, the fire fighters came by in minutes and got the cat down to safety.

Now the moral of this story is the effect it had on me – remember “my land of plenty”? In India, then and I am guessing now too, there are no emergencies that are the business of the state. Even if one is sick, the ambulance takes about an hour to come, so its best to call a taxi to get to the hospital. And if I ever called the police to come get my cat off my roof, I’d be laughed out of my home.

So this story of America, where you could call someone to come help get your cat out of the roof had me listening with rounded eyes and wonder at this land of plenty where resources were so plentiful that even a cat was taken care of.

That was America then. As years passed, the good people of America seem to have lost all the good things they’ve taken for granted… food no longer seems “clean”, fresh and healthy – free from added chemicals and pesticides and free from being mashed, cooked and fried out of recognition; water no longer seems clean and potable; schools are so expensive that Americans can no longer invest in the future of their nation – their children and their youth; indoor air quality is so poor because building materials are laden with chemicals…

The trusting American people are now waking up to a nightmare, a nightmare that has ruined this beautiful country and their enviable lifestyle. The awakening is scary – every aspect of American life is contaminated with big business – basic necessities of food, water, shelter and education have all succumbed to becoming money-making ventures, where business profit is king. Every other consideration must fall on the wayside of making money.

Take the instance of contaminated water: According to the Environmental Working Group, drinking water in 43 states has been contaminated with Perchlorate – a rocket fuel. Unfortunately, the Environmental Protection Agency has reneged on its own mission by siding with big business to fight the regulation of ridding the water of this chemical.

Here is an excerpt from the Environmental working group about the dangers of Perchlorate contamination of water that is the result of testing done by the defense department:

Perchlorate, the explosive main ingredient of rocket and missile fuel, contaminates drinking water supplies, groundwater or soil in hundreds of locations in at least 43 states, according to Environmental Working Group’s updated analysis of government data. EWG’s analysis of the latest scientific studies, which show harmful health effects from minute doses, argues that a national standard for perchlorate in drinking water should be no higher than one-tenth the level the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency currently recommends as safe.

Americans are no longer thinking about their cats on the roof, we now have to think about our basics to survive: clean healthy food, clean water, chemical-free homes, affordable schools, invest in our youngsters so the future of this nation is safe…