Miracles

Opinions may differ but miracles do happen. It will not be an exaggeration if I say my life is full of instances which baffle, relieve and fill me with a sense of awe and  fulfillment at the same time. How humbling these moments are ! We can call them by many names – Miracles… Blessings….Divine Intervention. Choose whichever you may. They are simply extraordinary eluding definition!

Frequent incidents of drop in my mother’s saturation level prompted me to buy an Oxygen Concentrator. During her last hospitalization doctors had told me her entire body was infected. Medical treatment had its limitations. “There was no point in giving her the trouble of getting admitted to the hospital again and again. Medication can do little for her now.”

Instead, I converted her room into a hospital ward with all the requisite machines. Some I bought. Some I took on rent. Soon after Covid paralysed our lives. Oxygen Concentrators became the most sought after medical equipment hard to get, their prices sky rocketing with increasing demand. I thanked my lucky star that I had purchased it at the nick of time. It was an impulsive decision. An expenditure which bore a hole in my pocket. But I was so relieved I had one.

However, what the seller did not tell me was that the Concentrator required an additional power backup during load shedding. Had he informed me I would have made provisions though in our area power cuts were very very rare.

But one bleak black thunderous night the lights suddenly went off. I had to switch off the Concentrator for the time being thinking the power supply would resume in no time. It was always a few minutes affair if at all the electricity supply was cut off in our Block.

But that night was an exception. The sky roared and  thundered and poured like never before. The home inverter had stopped functioning due to overload because I had run the Concentrator for some time on it. I did not even have a candle at home. Only the flashlight in my mobile which was going to shut off anytime now because of low battery.

I kept on checking mother’s oxygen on the Oximeter and each time it showed a decrease in the level. As the hours ticked by from 99 it dipped to

98…97…96…95…94…93…92…91…90…

Given my mother’s condition the ideal level of  her saturation (oxygen) should have been between 90 and 96.

My heart beat faster as the level dipped below 90. I distinctly remember that stormy night sitting in the dark the only tormenting question that niggled me was how to save the situation. How to make amends. How to give my mother relief. I knew I was fighting against Nature… against Time. It was an unequal battle and my chances of survival (forget about winning) were an undisputed zero.

In that epiphanic moment of realising human vincibility the last conversation that I had with God was : “Is that it then?”

Holding my breath I checked the Oximeter one last time. It flickered between 87 and 88. I knew it would soon touch further below. It was at this point that my mobile breathed its last. I held my hand near my mother’s nostrils The lukewarm wisp of her shallow breathing was a thread of hope so fragile. I put my ear to her chest. The pulsating rhythm of her heart rose from some deep cavernous hollow.

I closed my eyes helplessly listening to the howl of the wind and the mad dance of the rains. Every passing moment was choking me.  The night sounds became more and more ominous. I covered my head in my hands and whispered, “Please Help!”

And it was the very moment that the lights came back.

I rushed to put on the Concentrator.