Leaving Shady Grove

The house still stands where it always did,
along a quiet road,
holding within its walls
the echoes of a lifetime.

The laughter.
The moments.
The photographs hang silently on the walls.

The footsteps that once moved from room to room.
The morning light still falls through the curtains,
and dust gathers softly where your laughter used to shine.
Shadows stretched further on Sunday afternoons.
Two plates sit at the table, just as before.
But silence rests between them.

Two empty chairs remain,
holding the shape of those who once filled them.

I still find myself glancing towards them,
expecting a smile,
a gentle question,
a familiar voice.

I gave you my heart.
I gave you my days.

Karl and Chitha.

A love story not written in grand declarations,
but in ordinary days, repeated faithfully over a lifetime.
The kind of love that asks for nothing,
yet somehow gives away everything.

When illness came
and the years grew heavier,
my father never stepped away.
Night after night.
Year after year.

I watched him hold my mother's hand
until she fell asleep.

As though his touch could carry away her fears.
As though love itself could stand guard through the darkness.

And perhaps it did.

For in that simple act,
repeated thousands of times,
he taught me more about devotion
than any words ever could.

Not through promises.
Not through speeches.

But through showing up,
again and again,
for the person he loved.

My mother taught me different things.

She taught me wonder.
The courage to look beyond the horizon.
That every stranger is a friend in the making.
That every journey begins long before the first step.

I have crossed mountains and oceans,
walked through deserts,
stood on frozen ground,
danced beneath the Northern Lights,
and shared meals with strangers.

Yet every journey began here,
in Shady Grove.

Most of all, she gave me something else.

The colour of her eyes.
A part of her spirit.
A part of her personality.

She called me her "Ranti Putha."
Her golden son.
I hope I have lived up to that grace.

Even now,

I can still hear her voice.

The name remains warm
in places where grief cannot reach,
where the heart has reclaimed what sorrow could never take.

Today I leave this house.

Not because it is no longer home,
but because now home travels with me.

Shady Grove disappears behind me.
Home does not.

My father's steadfast love walks beside me.
My mother's adventurous spirit leads the way.

Every road I travel,
every story I tell,
and every kindness I offer
carries a little of them both.

And somewhere beyond, you are still together,
walking hand in hand with Him who created this world.

Smiling.

Laughing.

Free from pain.

As you always were.

As you always will be.

And if you can hear my thoughts,

know that your son still loves you,

in his own quiet way.

31st May 2026
Shady Grove

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