Stories of Loss 2

Once upon a time, there was a framemaker. One day, when he opened his tool drawer, he saw a snake. It wasn't big, its length was just about the width of his shoulders. Instinctively, without much thought, he pulled out a hammer and hammered at the snake. He hammered it until it bled and died.

Shortly after, his wife got pregnant and his son was born, in the year of the snake. The boy grew up to be a lovable son and brother to his siblings. His siblings had said, he is one person in the family whom nobody could get angry with. He was filial, bright and talented. He loved cycling, music and excelled in his studies and in the armed forces.

However, his mother has not been well since he was born. She suffered emotionally and psychologically ever since his birth and only started getting better as the boy grew older and became a filial and loving son.

At the age of 21, the boy passed away. His father was there at the hospital when the doctors were trying to revive him. He witnessed how the doctors used the defibrillator to try to restore his heartbeat, until at the very end when the boy started bleeding.

The father then understood what he had done. When he saw what was happening he remembered years ago when he encountered the snake. He had thumped at the snake until it started bleeding, like what was happening to his son now. He felt that what happened to his son was a result of what he had done years back. It was karma, he believe. And this is how he made sense of what was happening.