Once upon a time..

It is one of those days when I am feeling very nostalgic. I don’t know how normal “smelling” the past is, but I smell it quite often these days. I don’t have any other word to describe that longing for the past. Everything looks and feels, suddenly, like the good old days. Even the air smells exactly as it used to then. But then there is no one around. The sudden realization that time has flown by and that there is nothing remotely close to my past today makes my heart ache.

How good it was when the biggest worry I used to have was to clear an examination. How simple life was when the greatest pleasure was to talk to my best friend over phone. How easy life was when the only expenditure was on petrol (which used to cost Rs 22/- per liter), greeting cards and cassettes and the pocket money (Rs 50 /- per month) I used to get was sufficient for all my needs. I think I now agree that school days were one of the best and brightest days of my life.

I felt like a bird then driving my red TVS Champ. I would always take the longest route possible to go practically anywhere. I would gladly go out to buy household stuff to the market close by because mom would allow me to keep the change. Even inside the house, I would never walk. I would run and then jump and try to touch the upper rim of the door. I never realized how soon the “jumping” was not required because I was now tall enough to touch it and how soon I forgot this activity. I still remember how I would wait for Sunday evenings to watch Spiderman and later Mowgli with my brother every Sunday morning. The Sunday afternoons were devoted for Mahabharat and mom would make us sit and watch it. I distinctly remember those days when I would wait for dad to return in the evening. I would know the sound of dad’s scooter so well. And then he would drive me around our locality, a daily activity which we used to call “round lagana”.

The magical summer vacations would comprise of Rasana, Mayur Park, ganne ka ras every night and nani ka ghar. I would stay there and play and fight with my cousins. It was so wonderful to stay awake and talk till my grandfather would grumble about the new age kids! I still remember going to parties (usually wedding receptions of some uncle / aunty or their distant relative) with mom dad and have a good time eating pani puris and ice-creams and in the more lavish receptions we could have “baraf ka gola” as well.

The school teachers were wonderful human being (agreed some of them were nasty). The punishments and penalties for talking would range from kneeling down to cane beating. Or the class monitors would write the names on the board. In my case, my name used to be beautifully underlined with some stars around it – a penalty for talking twice, thrice or non-stop. The teacher’s day celebrations, the practices for annual function or sports day were the most awaited events of the year! It was all so great and wonderful then.

I don’t say that the present is bad. Probably, 10 years down the line, the present would also be a part of a glorious past. But sometimes, past is all that matters. Sudarshan Faakir has penned it beautifully in the following lines:

Yeh daulat bhi lelo,

yeh shoharat bhi lelo,

Bhale cheen lo, mujhse meri jawani

Magar mujhko lautado bachpan ka saawan

Woh kagaz ki kashti,woh baarish ka paani

I think it is just one of those days.

Kya likhun main?

Of all the things I have lost, I miss my mind the most. A certain UFO has taken my last post very seriously and as promised I had decided not to write anymore. But then, well, I could not stop myself. So here I am back again. 

Now what do I write about. Dada is back on track, infact the only one on track, Reshamiya is still rocking, reservation will happen and I have not been kicked out of IBM till now. The small piece of code I wrote has been deployed by God’s grace and it is working; only God knows how. And they are trying very hard to keep me away from computer so I really don’t have anything to tell you anything about anything happening in office. (err..anything wrong with the last sentence I wrote?) 

OK. I can tell you a couple of things though. I have changed my flat. The ek kamare ka ghar has now given way to a proper 1 BHK flat. The old flat was so small that it was getting impossible to fit Varsha in, I mean her stuff in. You know, she has this big wardrobe and I reckon she has some kind of a database where she keeps track of all the tops and suits she has. I have been sneakily wearing some of her tops and I thought she would not recognize that they were one of hers, but then I could never fool her. And it still amazes me how she remembers how she acquired all her tops and the long story associated with each of her suit. Smart girl she is, no doubt! My stuff has been far less than hers as far as wardrobe is concerned. That I have more books (novels and stuff which I never read!) than her tops is a different matter altogether. Shifting the stuff was quite an ordeal. And thanks to Shalabh and Nitin(yes we needed some manpower for the shifting ;-)), things are settled now. Though there is still a little difficulty in getting Varsha’s wardrobe in. 

But then she did a fine job in keeping things in place. So much so, that my mom liked my flat for the first time in 2.5 years. Infact, she was ecstatic. Mom and dad were in Pune for 3-4 days. It was refreshing to have some authentic rasam prepared by mom. I had almost forgotten how it tastes because whenever I try my hand in, it tastes anything but rasam. Do moms do some magic trick when they are in kitchen? Thankfully mom did not do any of her “jawan ladaki ki ma” roles and so their stay went off very peacefully. Probably she understands me now. Or maybe she agrees with my brother that I need time to grow up. Whatever be the case, it came as a relief. 

The New Year weekend was very boring. We had nice Chinese food in MG Road. I was made to stay up till 12 after which Varsha and Ankita wished me and allowed me to sleep. I broke some New Year resolutions on 1st and that was how New Year was celebrated. 

Well this post has been longer than I intended. But then, you see I could not help myself. But I can assure you I did not use brains to write this. The brain’s gone for good to a certain alien and he/she had a good Xmas dinner of it.