George Menezes

Believe it or not I have just celebrated my seventy-fifth birthday. Somehow, for reasons that I am not clear, my wife and I have never celebrated our birthdays or our anniversaries.
I rejoice that my friends and relatives celebrate their birthdays and their anniversaries every year. I am too lazy to get down to doing the same. My wife and I go to a nice restaurant and have a dinner by candlelight. Most often we invite our son and daughter-in-law who live on the floor below us to join us. Sometimes we even invite our two lovely grand-daughters who have the ability to draw the attention of the entire restaurant to themselves and make the evening a memorable affair.
My children tell me that completing seventy-five years is a milestone. What with friends and colleagues popping off like skittles knocked down by an expert player at a bowling alley, seventy-five years is a milestone indeed.
So the family said to me “let us celebrate your birthday before it is too late”.
My daughter and her husband came down from London and we had, what is known, as a “bash”, I took the opportunity to invite the many people who have touched my life and the lives of my loved ones. I also decided that I would publicly acknowledge, before the deadline of putting off the sound system, their immense contribution to my life.
Somewhere, during an emotional moment of the bash, I realised that my seventy-five years amounted to nothing. I am a zero and not a hero as the saying goes.
Despite the big noises I make, I have never contested an election although I had once joined a political party in a moment of cerebral weakness. Looking back, I realise that I fit several sporting descriptions. I do not have the “killer instinct”. I am what cricketing circles call “a choker”. I am not even a “runners-up”. I lose in the semi-finals.
Let’s look at it dispassionately. I am not a film star although I once, very briefly, acted as a Goan judge condemning Nasserudin Shah to death in Vinod Chopra’s movie called “Sazaye Maut”. It was so boring, I fell asleep watching it even the first time.
In the last few months I started to mention my role in the movie to several political bigwigs, but I have not been invited to campaign for them.
Regrettably I have not designed any clothes except popularising the wearing of crumpled shorts and ridiculous looking hats. Nor have I in all these years ever walked the ramp. My ramp walking has been limited to going to the Betim ferry in Goa and walking up and down the ramp, munching peanuts, waiting for the boat to arrive.
Come to think of it, I have not been involved in any scams. I have neither leaked examination question papers nor tried to manufacture counterfeit stamp paper.
Oh yes, I have written a book or two, which I was forced to distribute free of cost to friends and enemies alike without any discrimination of caste or creed.
All this is the sum total of my seventy- five years on this planet. All the education I received from excellent schools and colleges and all the values I was taught by my wonderful parents has not helped me to develop into a person whose mug appears every other day in the newspapers or on television screens.
Therefore, as I write this column, I feel I must reflect on the direction my life is taking and commit myself to a few things before I receive an urgent call to appear before St. Peter to give an account of myself.
First, I have been a difficult and lousy husband. I’m going to be different from now on. Instead of reading the newspaper I will spend my time at the kitchen sink washing dishes. I shall praise the Lord every day for the gift of a wonderful wife.
I have been a dead loss of a father and grandfather. I will spend more time with my grand-daughters and take them to picnics and circuses even at the cost of losing my sanity and my wallet.
My children, whom I have neglected, I shall extol and praise them, and above all, patiently listen to their many joys and sorrows.
I have been a lukewarm and indifferent Christian. I will pray more. I will thank the Lord more often for his abundant mercy and love. I will respond to the needs of my neighbour. Perhaps more to the needs of my neighbours’ wives since I live in a building where most of the men are out at sea.
Finally, I have been an unpatriotic citizen. Since I cannot rejoin the Indian Air Force which I served in my 20s, I shall do other patriotic things. I will vandalise shops that are selling Valentine cards and burn books that have any negative reference to ancient Indian heroes.
I guess this is a pretty good agenda for the years to come. If God be willing.