I was reminiscing about my grandparents who are currently in India and I ended up recalling one of my grandfather's most memorable actions with equal parts love and exasperation. I had been fortunate to be selected as a finalist in the MLK Voice4Youth Contest this January and as you can imagine, my entire family was extremely excited at this development. In fact, I have no words to describe my grandfather's happiness and anticipation at the prospect of me participating in MLK finals.
My Grandfather would patiently listen to my speech every day over the phone while providing feedback and keeping me relaxed at the same time. I called my Grandparents before leaving for the finals and even then, my Grandfather told me to drive slowly, to just relax and enjoy the experience. He was paradoxically the most relaxed as well as the most excited person in my family.
At the finals I had the opportunity to hear all of the incredible presentations of my fellow finalists. Eventually the results were announced, and I was incredibly elated to be recognized as a second-place winner.
What I didn't know at the time, is that my grandfather had live streamed the entire event on Facebook. At first glance this doesn't seem so unusual, except the fact that it was the middle of the harsh cold winter night in India. Without waking up my Grandmother, my Grandfather had manged to sneak out of bed and logged on to his computer around 10 pm or so in India. He then stayed awake throughout the entirety of the bitterly cold Indian winter night till 2 am wearing just his night suit.
I only found out about my grandfather's inadvisable late-night activity after the event, when my mother informed me that my grandfather was online and had live streamed the entire event with all of its performances, and speeches.
My first reaction was worry and anger and I immediately asked my mother as to why she didn't ask my grandfather to go and sleep, even though I knew it would have been futile. Still, I did message my grandfather scolding him and urging him to sleep in and relax. When my Grandfather did catch cold following his late-night endeavor you can be certain that he received many scoldings from all of us, particularly my Grandmother for not taking care of himself properly.
Despite my exasperation at my Grandfather's carelessness with his health, his actions still make me smile and reassure me that he will be there for me even when he is thousands of miles away from me. I always joke that my Grandparents are more excited for me than I am for myself and more stressed regarding my stress levels than I am actually stressed.
I know that no matter the situation, my grandparents will always be there to support me and love me when I need them. Even if I had completely messed up my speech, my grandfather would have still responded with a laugh, a smile and a clap on the back and told me I did just fine. I am not very adept at expressing emotion or dealing with emotion, but what I do know for certain is that my grandfather's actions cannot be categorized as anything but love, a pure unconditional love.