Compassion!!!

For the past two days I have been watching two cockroaches peeping out from below the sink in my kitchen and beneath the washbasin in my bathroom. But any move from my side and they vanish. I have never been using insect repellents like Hit as I came to know that they not only harm cockroaches, but also the ants that feed on them and it is also harmful to the environment. Broomstick was my weapon.

Yesterday, my ten-year-old son came running from the bathroom at the sight of a cockroach. Arming my weapon, I was on my quest for the little trouble maker and finally spotting him, I targeted by weapon just on time for the little creature to be left motionless. Feeling happy to have finally waved goodbye to the cockroach I went on to prepare hot dosas for dinner.

My son was sitting with the plate of hot dosa and sambar with intense pain on his face. When I went near and patted him he just burst out with incessant sobs. I was clueless, on what had gone wrong.

 Then in between his sobs he announced, “I don’t want dinner!”

 I sat next to him, held him close and ask him what happened. With even louder sobs, he said I can feel the pain of that cockroach, Amma!”

It took a while for me to pacify him with reasons like the diseases the cockroaches might spread and if I had not hit it on time the number of coackroaches should have increased…. All the while I had started feeling guilty.

 I could then see my little one offering prayers for the departed soul … I too sat down before the altar asked forgiveness for my act and prayed for the soul of the cockroach!

 I saw and felt compassion in the tears of my little one.

 When he snuggled close to me at night and dozed off to sleep with an empty stomach I felt a lump in my throat, drops of tears, trickled down my eyes, and I felt blessed…