A feeling called Love

The whole world seemed so distant all of a sudden, as if it had ceased to exist altogether. My otherwise always-filled-with-thoughts mind had become silent, as if no other thought seemed imperative right now. As my bare feet continued to move ahead and make those little imprints in the sand, Nick slowly held my hand. Still looking down, I smiled. Every moment with him seemed so precious and yet so normal, just like breathing, like it had been happening since forever, keeping me alive all this while.

Nick and I were meeting after a year. Even though we had made sure we kept talking and updating each other about our lives, there was so much I wanted to tell him. I wanted to look at those eyes as they twinkled every time he was excited about something, those lips part when he smiled, and those hands move when he spoke. I wanted to capture all that I saw, lock it all up in a chamber of my mind, to be able to go through them all those times when I missed him.

After walking in silence for some time, we found a clean patch and sat down. It was a wonderful morning, the sun had just risen. We began to talk. He told me about his new friends and how weird he thought they were while I told him about the hard-to- catch-up-with city life. With Nick, it was so easy to laugh at my own silly problems and yet know that he understood how I actually felt. I was happy. I remember resting my head on his shoulder and looking at those ships in the distance, wondering if the people in the ship could see us. How every time I saw a couple my mind would build up a love story of its own, I wondered when the sea farers saw us, what were the stories that their minds weaved around us.

After what seemed like infinity, the sun took its place higher in the sky. I got up, pulled his hand and led him towards the sea. I saw him bending down and picking up a tiny pink sea shell for me. I smiled as I took it and put it in my pocket. As the cold water touched our feet, we kept walking further, letting the waves wash us down. When we stopped, we were wet till our knees. There were kids playing in the water around us. I saw him looking at them, took my chance and splashed his face with the salty water. Nick was laughing. I saw his eyes twinkle, his lips apart and realized how much he meant to me.

And then all of a sudden I heard myself saying, “I love you Nick”. His grip on my hand tightened. “I love you more Anne...So much more” and I knew he meant it, he did.

The Old Ships Draw to Home again

 Its a little past midnight. A sheet of cold drapes the night air. I can hear the soft drizzle of rain outside, clouding up my window. Other than that it’s quiet, so much so that I can hear the sound of crickets through the tightly shut windows. It’s the kind of quiet that I am only getting used to. Not being one of the brave hearted, I tune into John Mayer and cling to my blanket a little tighter for warmth and safety.

A few minutes, and I am fine.

It’s been four days since I got home, after killing away time in Mumbai, only to kill some more here. In the hours before my flight took off, I had qualms about wanting to go home. For a while it appeared to be a specious thing to do, going all the way home to unwind, when I could do so in Bombay. Yes, my thoughts all the more prove how dim-witted I can get at times. Now that I am here, I couldn’t possible compare the two places.

In the interiors of an already geographically isolated state Assam, is our house or rather aptly, Home. It is surrounded by tea gardens, and neighbors that I know nothing of. The down fall of studying in boarding schools being I am more or less friendless here. This is where my little parrot comes in picture. I would rightly use the noun “brat” for him, but my sister would defend him and say he is adorable. So I say he is an adorable brat. Considering his sudden love for me, after 14 years of only being loyal to the maids, I am never without company. He follows me all around the house, even to the washroom. He very gentlemanly joins me for every meal, not for once complaining about the bones in the fish or number of cashew nuts in the sweet dish. So yeah, I wouldn't be sincere to him if I whine about being lonely.

My mom, well she is the kind of person you see in a party who sits smiling and listening to all the ladies tittle-tattle, not interested to talk too much, chipping in a few expert opinions every now and then. However at home, she is the one who does all the talking; filling me in about all those things she could have anyway told me over the phone but saved them for when we meet up. I might not be very interested in the people she brings up, but it’s always a joy to hear and watch her talk.

My dad, as he takes me for my afternoon driving lessons, confides in me like I am a grown-up. We drive, resolving his dilemmas and mine. It usually feels like I am out driving with an old friend, taking up the road to avoid the world for an hour and leaving it behind while we drive on.

And a little out of picture right now, but still always there, is my sister. I couldn’t possibly write of home without in the least mentioning her. She is rarely ever here when I am, but she makes the small flat that we now share slightly closer to home.

Perhaps my parents are like all parents, my home like everybody else’s. However after years of being away from them, I have realized that no matter how I am or what I am doing, at the end of the day it is home that I want to go to. It’s not my room, my bed, the weather or even the good food, but the love. The kind of love that I doubt anyone can ever outweigh.

And when my parents remark at how thin I have become or how I never ride the bicycle anymore, I know that they are looking back at a part of my life that probably no one else remembers.

So in spite of the PC borrowed from the dinosaur age, moody cell phone network, the dead parties I am dragged to and civilization being miles away, I LOVE HOME.

- Link for cartoon here 

Riding Through the White Clouds

Posting a poem I wrote back in 11th std.

This is the most plainly that I could ever jot down my thoughts, a jumbled mess in my head. 

A mile above the ground

I flutter my red wings;

My friends, my foes I left down

just flying as I sing.

All white and blue, the setting sun

that’s all I can see;

None behind, none ahead,

no one flying beside me.

I look down to see the world

so small… so far from me

As if it knew not who I was,

being carried by the breeze.

Those tall oak trees, a speck of green

The tiny river flowing by,

The sight of high standing mountains

only make me sigh.

I know not where I am heading

Perhaps, I’ll never know.

Through the blue sky, white clouds

He’ll tell me where to go.

Morning glory

Come vacations and I turn into an owl. My day never begins before 3pm (wake up struggles included) and when it finally does, I can skillfully keep myself from yawning till 7 am the next morning. 

My record remains unbeaten at 9 am. Just saying.

The repercussions to my health aside, the best part about pulling an all nighter is that I can witness the city awakening to a new day. By now I am aware that the birds start chirping by 4:30 am; the building watchmen change shifts at 5 am with a loud whistle; there is Uncle cool -pants who goes for a walk at 7 am everyday without fail; and then there is this group of old ladies who gather in the gazebo to meditate immediately after the sun rises. Sitting by my window in the morning, rapt by the first rays of sun and the slowly breaking calm of the night, all I do is smile.

Nature is my refugee. When I have no one, I turn to it. And it never fails to appease me.

  

http://www.flickr.com/photos/abhijeetrane/5428622024/

What the sight of the breaking dawn also does is that it reminds me of home.

The crisp and fresh day- breaks that the city offers are, for me, a little replica of the countryside mornings that were a part of my childhood. It reminds me of the mornings when I would wake up early and drive thirty kilometers to school, feasting on beauty on my way. It reminds me of those mornings when a walk in our garden and the sight of blooming flowers were reason enough to make my day.

Sometimes I want to go out of the flat, into the park and feel the grass beneath my feet, but the sleepless nights leave me tired and lazy. Minutes pass by while I try and remember how it felt the last time I walked with earth below my bare feet and nature around me.

And while the gazebo fills with the chants of Om and uncle is perhaps walking his third lap, I shut my eyes to the distant thoughts and slowly fall asleep.