Mohan Ariyaratne, 1946-2009

My friend Mohan Ariyaratne died yesterday, after a long struggle with cancer. He was in pain for a while but he’s passed now. His mind was sharp till the end and he was still teasing me about my pink iPod, telling stories about yachting around the world and hanging out with Jimi Hendrix. I was going to see him today but now it’s too late. I miss him a lot.

I don’t know anything else to say. He was a man of whom I only knew a fraction, of whom other narratives reveal so much more. I just knew him from a time when I was ‘growing up’, and I remember he used to listen. I used to make him laugh sometimes and he’d tell me something pithy and useful. Near the end he couldn’t hear much of what I was saying but I could hear him, so I think the relationship worked out well.

When I woke up yesterday I heard he was dead. Not that it was unexpected. After a busy day of messing things up in a funk I ran through the cemetery to the crematorium, but he’d already gone to the dust. So that’s the last of my friend Mohan. It was a good life and I wish he was around to tell me stuff. I wish I could have seen him today. I wish a lot of things but this life is what it is. May he rest in peace.

Posted on Saturday, November 7th, 2009 in Friends, death, indi.

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