Coming home is a great feeling! Specially when you have been out for a long time and haven’t met all those with whom you have grown up. Childhood is special. Although this realization comes once it ends! It’s desirable to loose oneself in the present when one is young. Time never leaves you alone to stand still and enjoy your moments forever.
I was thinking of writing something new as, finally, after a long gap of about a year, I have finally got some time for myself! Although funny and incomplete ideas keep coming I realize it’s better to leave them alone for the time being for aging, and hence, unfortunately, am left with no plot that can be put up as a story in a blog (barring one short story that I am going to put up in Symmetry shortly). The last year has been hectic. My dreams and ambition have taken me to a place where I was a complete misfit! I tried and tried and after all this time have made nominal progress, though, have managed to adapt to the place finally. For the whole of last year I had to forget all about myself, my moods and desires, and solely concentrate on work -- a lifestyle which was, in no way, familiar to me! Never before in my life have I worked this hard. And never before did I get so less results out. However, it is a refreshing break now that I am here. Although, I also carry the feeling of stopping suddenly. It appears as if the world has continued to speed past again leaving me immersed in my childhood dreams.
The time I spent here once now seems strange! I have always disliked my childhood. It was, from no angle, what I wanted to start my life with. But today, coming back, I don’t feel that desperate or frustrated anymore! I remember all sorts of things. Breaking window panes while playing cricket, cramming the nights before school exams, narrating my written pieces to my dad and grand-dad, smoking my first cigarrette… Within each of these memories I also carried the wounds of self-hatred. I wanted to run away. I wanted to be free. I knew I was not living a proper life and I prayed that my lifestyle, on which I otherwise had no control, wouldn’t affect what I wanted to become in future. I knew I wronged each day. And I was so sure that once I start my new life, those days of childhood would remain as the worst days of my life. Today I am free. And today I have come home. I realize why those days were and will be the most beautiful days of my life. I had somehow spent those days doing nothing! I don’t know if I should repent! Today, the very realization of the fact that I had once spent my time doing nothing gets me thinking. Is such a thing possible at all?
I lived a hundred lives. To my parents I was a decent student always trying to improve on his exam marks. They loved me. To my mates with whom I played cricket, I used to be an under-hand leg-spinner who could bat a bit. I often ended up opening the innings. To my uncle I was a chess player, often a card player who could also gamble... He loved to play bridge an 29 and I often partnered him. Many loved to hear me singing. And Satadal Sir believed I had a real chance to become a painter! Not to mention that I started writing stories at a very early age. (And god knows what I am doing now with Physics!) In short I was a jack-of-all-trades. I never made out what I would grow up as. In fact I liked every thing! Unlike many, I never had fights. Very few disagreements either. People in the neighborhood loved me. And I enjoyed it. Today, now that I have been restricted to one or two arenas in life – now that I have started to work – I feel to have died in many zones in which I once lived! I have always been unable to decide which remains more painful: these days of having a direction but missing out on so many other things, or those days of living so many lives simultaneously and lacking a proper direction.
Many things have changed back here. Some of my friends have gone distant. They have grown a separate identity just like me! My grand-dad is older and leaner. My father has become quieter. The uncle with whom I used to play cards has married and has concentrated more on his business. As soon as I came home, I saw a twinkle in each of their eyes. They were so happy to see me! It gave me satisfaction. It’s a pleasure to know that there remain some who go on loving you no matter wherever you remain. They have aged and I have grown up too, but the bonds that once bound us still remain – unmodified with the interference of time. And there are some things that haven’t changed at all! My room remains just the same! The same sky I get to see out of my window, the same raindrops wet my bed when it rains today. The posters of my favorite cricketers are still there on my wall. The terrace is just the same! The orange sunrise that could be seen from it remains just the same!
Am I the same person? My attitude and lifestyle have changed significantly. My reactions have become more controlled. My words – more formal. I have learned to become socially correct. And I feel like having a separate life beyond all this. The life back at Bangalore, that makes me me! I don’t feel to restart the journey that I have left incomplete here one year back. I feel like continuing the one that I have started last year! I don’t feel those moments of nothingness anymore. Somehow those restless hours of hollow dreaming seems to be childish and meaningless now. Since I have come here, I have watched over ten movies. To kill time…
I don’t know if my disinterest or inability to relive those lazy moments of nothingness makes a difference to me! And I am still to find out whether this ignorance makes me happy or sad!
