Lakshmi was an orphan. “Could you call a 38 year old woman an orphan?” she pondered. “Yes,” she decided in her internal dialogue. She had no mother, no father, and no grandparents. That officially made her an orphan. Her parents both died when she was two years old during the great Spanish flu epidemic that ravaged India and indeed, the whole world at the end of World War I. Her father passed away first, and then a mere day later, her mother followed to whatever heavenly abode they both resided in now. Lakshmi and her little baby sister Syamala both went to live with their grandparents afterwards. Their grandfather was basically absent and spent his days in the court of the Maharaja of Vijayanagaram. Their grandmother, who once famously locked their grandfather out of the house for coming home drunk, was so broken by the premature death of her only daughter, that she spoiled the girls and let them run wild. It was a very unstructured childhood, and Lakshmi was married off as a teenager and proceeded to have four children.

But that was then. Now, in 1956, post-freedom India was a modern country where women were educated, caste was no longer a barrier, and the sky was the limit to the Indian imagination. India was a proud and freshly minted country, and Lakshmi’s children would experience it in a way she herself never would. Vizag, also known as Visakhapatnam, was a modern Indian city. The beautiful beach road was now paved and had cars driving back and forth on it when just a few decades ago in Lakshmi’s childhood it was a sandy path with bullock carts riding up and down. Lakshmi lived in a big house right on the beach and cared for her own children as well as those of her deceased sister. This meant she was responsible for seven rowdy children with no conception of how to create structure for them given her own loosely governed childhood in her grandparents house. The result was chaos. The house was chaos. The kitchen was chaos. Indeed, Lakshmi’s entire life was chaos. 

Of the three older boys, her own boys were wild. One rode around on a motorcycle stirring up trouble while the other was a hot headed fool, God help him. Her sister’s son, bless him, was the one calm and compassionate boy in the group. The four girls were better, but just barely. Her sister’s older daughter was a depressed teenager who struggled to find her place in the world. Lakshmi’s youngest girl was a wild child who rebelled in school and had to have a tutor at home for biting her teacher and running away. Lakshmi felt out of control with all the children. The house always felt like a dormitory and there was never any place to find some peace and quiet. In recent months, Lakshmi had taken to hiding away in the music room for hours, playing her veena. The previous day, she spent five hours supposedly practicing her veena. The problem was Lakshmi had nothing else to keep her busy. She had little interest in mothering the seven children she was responsible for, and had a huge staff to cook, clean, and take care of the house. Her husband, who had inherited a lot of money from his father, rarely went into work, and he took over most of the household duties needing special care. So where did that leave orphan Lakshmi?

It was with these unsettling thoughts that Lakshmi went into the Pooja (prayer) room in order to ask her favorite gods for some guidance. On that day, Lord Krishna seemed particularly appealing. He was the one that held all of the wisdom to share with Arjuna, and this wisdom was revered by all Hindus in the form of the Bhagvad Geeta. Lakshmi could use some of that wisdom from the holy text on this of all days. She felt more like an orphan than ever. She had lost her parents as a baby. She lost her sister as a young woman. She had all of these wild children who never paid her any mind. What was her duty? What was the right thing to do here? Would there ever be light at the end of the tunnel? Would she ever feel like laughing again? Would she ever know romance? Would she ever play with a grandchild? Her whole life flashed in front of her eyes, and all she saw was more dark days ahead. 

It was with these dark thoughts going through her head that Lakshmi lit 2 oil lamps to worship Lord Krishna. She sat on the floor, cross-legged, as she decorated the altar with flowers. Then, she closed her eyes and started chanting the ancient Sanskrit mantras that she hoped would pull her out of this darkness. She took a deep breath in and sank into a deep meditation. She sat there for a long time, meditating and chanting in her mind. After a while, she felt a warmth next to her left arm. She thought she was having a spiritual experience, and chanted faster in her mind. What was previously calming felt more urgent now. She felt like she was running towards something, or maybe she was running away from something, but she didn’t know what. That’s when she felt a scalding sensation on her arm and her back. She finally opened her eyes to look, and found her sari had caught on fire. The fire had spread from the pallu (hanging portion at the end of a sari) to the body section of the sari. Lakshmi jumped to her feet, suddenly wanting to live after all. She loved her chaotic children, and the messy life. She didn’t want to run away at all. She started screaming, and tearing at the sari. She dimly heard banging on the door, as someone broke the door down and came inside. Her last thought, before she passed out, was also what she whispered to her husband as he poured water over her and then held her: “Take care of the children. They are going to need you.” 

The orphan was finally reunited with her beloved parents and sister. Decades later, she is still remembered by her great grandson in Arkansas.