Unexpected Philosophizing or Crisis and Resolution

It started off as one of those seemingly harmless, meandering conversations with the kids:

D: So now I'm six and going to first standard. Do you think I can keep having birthday parties as long as I live?

Me: Sure, but don't be surprised if I don't intend to invite anybody for your birthday after you turn 10. If they happen to turn up by themselves, that's fine. But don't expect a party with balloons and return gifts and stuff.

A: You mean I can only have 2 more before I stop everything? 

Me: Yep. Sorry... have you seen any older kids blowing candles and cutting out cake and playing party games? Nope. After some time, people just get older and they have private celebrations at home. I'll still buy you cake and you can still cut it, if you would like. But I am not going to throw a party.

D: Did I have a party when I turned five?

Me: yes

D: Did I have a party when I turned four?

Me: yes

D: Did I have a big party or a small party?

Me: You had a humongously big one when you turned 3. That was the first one we celebrated in India and a whole ton of people came.

D: What about when I was a baby?

Me: Yes, even if you were too young to really know any difference.

D: What about when I was in your tummy?

A: No, nothing for you then. Only for me. 

D: You mean you weren't happy I was in your tummy?

Me: I celebrated by eating chocolate. You went wild inside- you kicked up a storm.

D (satisfied): Ok. What about before you had Ani- when you were in school?

A: Appa and mummy weren't even married yet. Why would they celebrate your birthday?

Me: You were only a distant idea to me at that time, baby. I was too busy celebrating my birthday at that time!

D: Where was I then? Was I with God? 

A: No, you would have been someone else's kid. And your Appa and Mummy would have been different. You would have been different too... maybe you were a donkey. 

D: Mamma! Is that true?!

Me (completely taken aback, responding to the easiest part first): huh.... It's possible, I guess. Baby donkeys are awfully cute though. They have such long eye lashes and they are very smart and very stubborn. They know exactly what they want- just like you!

Inside, I was reeling. It made me lose my breath for almost a good minute while my brain raced through the buried ramifications of Ani's statement. 

My kids might have been someone else's kids. Someone else in the world might be grieving for their lost ones and I got them in some kind of cosmic musical chairs.

My parents might be someone else's kids now! When I think of my parents, I think of them bobbing around in heaven somewhere, gossiping, thinking, arguing... actually, pretty much the way they were when they were alive, but surrounded by clouds or something. And always, always aware of what I or the kids are up to down here. Sort of like those Hogwarts headmasters.

To think they might not actually be there, but have started lives elsewhere, is horribly weird.

Maybe they might have left some parts of their souls sitting around in heaven doing all of the above... Sort of like having a post box with a forwarding address to collect all the thoughts that go up their way and then direct it to the "right" entity which look like my memories of them.

This reincarnation stuff is a lot more complicated than it seems like at first glance. Hey, maybe my kids weren't really human earlier... maybe they were, I don't know, ants or something and had easy deaths and came back as humans (because they were such good ants?).

And maybe my parents, because they were such evolved people, aren't really back on earth in some different avatar but are truly merged with God... maybe they learned everything they needed to learn. Though, well... my dad was pretty short-tempered and my mom used to get super-stressed and broody about stuff sometimes... so, perhaps they weren't as evolved? Maybe they are back on earth after all? Then again, isn't the time in heaven supposed to be really really slow compared to Earth time? So maybe they have actually only been there for about a day, and it might take them a while to leave again, during which time I would have become older and more prepared for them not to be hanging around where I expect them to be hanging around.

Jeez... this is too, too complicated.

One thing my parents did teach me. When in crisis, seek help. Where else would I look but the Bhagavad Gita for matters of the soul? I know very little of the BG (actually, the kids know way more than I do, since they learn it in school... A and D can recite a couple of full chapters, isn't that crazy?), but I do know these sentences:

Nainam chindanti shastrani

Nainam dahati pavakaH

Na chainam kledayantyapo

Na shoshayati marutaH

नैनं छिन्दन्ति शस्त्राणि नैनं दहति पावकः । न चैनं क्लेदयन्त्यापो न शोषयति मारुतः ॥

Nothing can destroy the soul- no weapon, no fire, not water nor wind.

Don't ask me which chapter and which verse. God knows... haha... literally.

I'll find my relief where I can. As the BG says, it does not matter what the body is. The soul remains eternal. It doesn't matter if my parents are up or down or look different. The body is like the clothes we wear and discard. I should stop making my monkey brain jump all over the place and trust that my parents' souls are intact and no matter where they exist, they feel the strength and love in my thoughts. Similarly, I should trust that my kids' souls also feel the same and that they may be feeling the strength and love from people and other souls that I have no clue about. 

That is simultaneously frightening and awe-inspiring.