If we thought that we the siblings were in charge and carried out the last rites for our mother, I realized that we were wrong. It was Agathiyar coming as the eldest who saw through the whole rites. I saw his hand in every moment, how he charted the course, swept the unnecessary meddling and interferences, rituals and customs aside to precisely carry out God's will.
When I received the news on Sunday that my mother was admitted to a private hospital on Saturday night, 26 November 2022, my wife and I headed for Ipoh some 206 km away. Our children joined us later. Upon arrival, my brother who was a Medical Assistant briefed us on the updates. That night my mother spoke to each of us who came by and stood at her bedside in the ICU. She told us that she wants to sleep. I knew that she had meant that she wanted to sleep and never awake. I told her, "So be it."
The next morning at 6am as she was not responding we were all summoned to the hospital. My brother wanted her to pass away at home but the eldest was still considering having her monitored at the hospital. That is when Agathiyar came and told him not to delay the process as another birth was awaiting my mother. Only then he moved to have my mother move to my sister's home with whom she was staying. As arrangements for an ambulance and the relevant papers were readied for her discharge my mother passed away. We now arranged to have her body taken home to be cremated. As my mother wished that she should be cremated, the undertakers told us that the two crematoriums in the vicinity were booked to the brim and suggested that we cremate her body the traditional way using logs. This was god sent. It was akin to cremating in Kasi.
The undertakers engaged a priest from the transgender community to carry out the last rites at home, at the funeral pyre, and at the riverside. This was god sent too. We saw her as Ardhnarishwar. She carried out the rituals to our heart's content till the end explaining all the finer details as to the purpose, reason, etc of doing them. She carried out many radical changes to the usual norm that others would adopt, dropping many rituals, or setting others straight and returning to tradition. The moment she began to sing the Tiruvasagam Agathiyar came and announced the arrival of Shiva and asked all gathered to abstain from talking. Agathiyar turned to my mother and announced to all gathered that she was his mother. I knew then that in worshipping the Siddhas, besides coming as a deity, and god, and a guru, and later as a companion, they stand as a family member among us. He was there to do his last rites for his mother, the body that housed her soul or Atma. Later at the cemetery the priest told us that he would not want to place the logs on my mother and instead poured ghee on her. This was an act of the divine too. This reminded me of how Pattinathar knowing that his mother's body was to be cremated rushed to her side and had them remove the wood and instead have them place banana plants and light the flame singing hymns. We saw her cremated in full view which otherwise would not be possible if it was done at a crematorium.
My participation was deemed sufficient as the priest released us to attend our daughter's convocation the next day.