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On 25th December, Sushanto, sent me 2 photographs.
Photographs of our homes.. the homes where we were born. The building where we were just next door neighbours and spent so much of time growing up together.. playing together.. playing pranks together,.. fighting, patching up … just to fight again … even better and stronger.. and not speaking to one another … for the sake of revenge !!!
Looking at those photographs, I wished I could re-live those days once again… or at least go back to those days once.. just to feel the innocence.. to feel the pure hearts walking around.. the super positive vibes..
The photograph took me back to those days for a while.. the nostalgia hit me so hard, .. the memories were so real and vivid… even as I am writing this down, I can see ourselves playing in the ground in front, which stands broken now.. but the two Sal trees still standing tall.. the twin trees ..
Whenever I uses to look at them, it was always in awe… they made me believe that the tree has two trunks.. like two legs we have.. when I grew up a little, I used to think they are friends… childhood friends.. or ... just like eternal lovers .. a bond so strong that almost nothing could pull them apart ... not even time…
Till to this day, they stand tall. ….
Witness to thousand changes..
Witness to changing seasons …
Witness to lost childhoods of many….
Witness to happiness …
And,
Witness to tears..
My memory was and still is so vivid, that I can see the soft mornings.. feel them.. hear the birds.. see those Sal flowers twirling down the ground with their fantastic dance….
They never seemed to just fall.. they never fell… they sometimes remembered that they have wings.. and they used to fly around… maybe to mock the gravity… and show the courage to defy the gravity… they made the entire falling so stylish… I used to always be amazed by their happy dance.. they actually used to make me happy.. it was a different realm..
As I write this down, I can see them dancing in the eyes of my memory.
I can also hear … the familiar sounds… my friends calling me out to play.. or calling me out to go for a cycle ride.. to the bigger ground … the ‘BORO-MATH’ …. And glide up the small dent the ground had at one side… it gave so much of a feeling of mountains… yes.. that’s what it had always seemed to me when I was a small child…
The mountain started to lose its sheen and fantasy and height as I grew up.
The photograph flooded me with emotions which no longer the eyes could retain… I felt the warm droplets and my eyesight hazed… yet, the memory was too vivid… not a single bit fogged..
I saw myself as a child ... in lovely frocks, the light lavender frock with dark lavender flowers… running around with the empty click-III camera case around her neck… the short hair and the green flip flops… chasing Sal flowers and helping them not to fall on the ground… rejoicing the dance against gravity… and laughing around….
The most fashionable girl to explore all the latest fashion that came around at least a year later to her friends… just because her father got the latest from BOMBAY…So, the girl in a purple divided skirt… and an obnoxious pink and black and yellow TEE shirt speeding her bicycle along the boundaries of St. Xavier school … way beyond … to the Boulevard of ABL Township… defying the small speed breakers … and a mysterious smile ..
The Sal flowers knew it was for them… and the defiance was an honour to their Dance of joy and glory… I can hear the clinging and clanging of the cycle… and remembered of making a mental of note of oiling it once back to home.
I remembered the joy of the furious free soul and the stolen freedom and cycling past my friends bunglows… hair flying… just to defy the caged feeling and the mandatory tying up in a braid… it was arrogance maybe.. to show them that I was enjoying the speed and wind while they were restricted to play badminton inside their confinement !!!
This girl … was confident.. was furiously free.. was undaunted.. an out and out sports person.. a painter… free from pain… a superb creator… bubbling with ideas,… played with toys only… and danced in rains…
She played all her childhood games… and smiled free..
She smiled and meant it ...
Still does though; ... and held so much of naïve innocence in her eyes..
Her soul was allowed to dance and sing ..
Her heart allowed to breath..
She tapped her feet to music which no one listened to…
in her tape recorder.. in super low volume…
taking the pains to rewind a particular tune every time it ended …
With no responsibilities, she watched the sun setting every single day …
sometimes with wonderful hues, a roit of pink, orange, blue yellow…
Oh ! How she loved the colours..
Without responsibilities, she watched the seasons pass…
the winters.. the summers… the autumns … the flowers …
the grass… .. the trees letting go off their yellow and red leaves…
who says letting go is painful . .. No ... its full of colours …its very colourful …
and it is the promise of a new season .. new leaves ... new flowers … ..
NEW BEGININGS.
Little did she know that a time will come when everything will be just a vivid memory and she would never be the same soul again. !!
This second sight .. is a wonderful gift.. which was all triggered by a single photograph.. it has put me in a place between sleep and awake… the place where I can be alive .. and wild … without a dash of fear. ..
The place which will always be there as a soft cushion to fall back upon..
The place where a small girl will always be waiting for me with the fresh smells and feels ... of torn leaves.. of the sal flowers.. of the wet mud… of the foggy mornings.. of the charred sunsets… of the freshly baked cakes in my mum’s kitchen … or the aromatic tea in the evening … …. Of the childish laughter … of the cricket games and the cheering’s ….
A part of me will always be waiting there for me… for ME.
As I walk ahead… I feel the pull … of the hands of time.. to see the shadows of the past … the music.. the memories… the sharp pain of the anaesthesia injection and the glaring lights… the agony of the plane crash… the survival … the distant crying… the minutes without oxygen.. the struggles… the colourful sunsets … the gut pain of missing school bus… the sickening smell of apple pieces inside the tiffin box… the clamour and roars of tiffin breaks … the mixed smell of different food … the joy of winning a basketball match … the wind on my face …. The care for the new cycle … the lost tunes … the roughness of jute carpets ... the warmth of the sun on a chili winter afternoon, ... the wool vendor on a cycle with the huge overload of colourful softness tied on the small carrier... .. the smell of an elderly lady chewing beetle leaf with aromatic masala ..nonstop .... the ladies sitting in circle knitting colourful varieties... with intermissions of gossips and tea ... the community dinner .... the load-sheddings and the sudden profound joy with an instant sudden increased decible..the games of hide and seek ... and the imaginary caves behind the trees with the camauflage of darkness... the lul of a lazy sunday afternoon... the definance of the scortching heat on gossip of ladies over the fence ... the storing of the rain clouds in the distant corner of the sky... the clouds and sky changing its colours... the different mysterious kalboishakhi... the storm rising and the rains and hails lashing ... releasing the sal flowres once again... twirling around.. dancing.. defying.. flying.... little did the little rebel soul know all would be a memory one day !!!... and the dance of defiance, .. a distant... never to be able to touch ... vivid memory... with the smell lingering on.
Everything …. I feared … ; and
Everything I cherished for …
The never ending wait for that .. ONE DAY ….
The stories I’ll never live again…
The love I’ll never meet …
The nostalgia of the lost land ….
The furious denial of the painful present …
Maybe .... following me till the end.
Will have an ending too...
ONE DAY.