Gilded Days of Old

I was always a strange child. Never really fit in. For some equally strange reason, some memories keep coming back since the past few days.

School day memories. School was at around 30 minutes walk from where we lived at that time. We had tried school bus, it made me puke. We tried the good old "Indian school autowala". That overcrowded, scary commute from days of old. That was soon given up. I was around 10 years old and could walk back home on my own. Plus, there was company for around half the distance.

There were many different paths to come home. In the morning, my path was fixed for getting to school on time. Coming back was a different matter. Each day, a different route, some longer, some shorter, some roundabout. Dawdling, gaping, gawping, picking wild flowers, ferns, chasing butterflies (really, I did. It isn't a figure of speech here)...

There was one favourite path. It went cutting through a small hill. The soil was red. It was open land for most part and would be covered in green during monsoon. I feel transported there even as I write.

Standing on a little high ground, feeling the cool breeze on my face, watching the grey-white-blue clouds lazily float away. Land carpeted with green as far as the eye could go. Weeds, wild ferns, wild flowers, some plants with round shaped compound leaves, fragrance of the wet earth, distant mountains over the horizon...

Also on the way, was a bridge which passed over a stream. During rainy season this stream would flow with vigour. It was muddy, but forceful and frothing with the speed of excess water flowing away somewhere. I would wait here, watching this stream.

A little ahead, there were these unknown trees which bore miniscule red berries in clusters. A girl who used to walk home with me used to eat them but I was too scared to eat something unknown. There was a tamarind tree, some other flowering trees like jasmine and bouganvillea. In that lane was another school where my mother was a teacher for just one year.

Near our house, the road had some evergreen trees which flowered during certain season, maybe spring. The road would be sprinkled yellow and beige when they fell. That scene has stayed with me, intact over all these years. I didn't even know it was that affecting when I lived through it all.

Wonder why all this is coming back. It feels as if that strange kid is still lost in those sleepy lanes and hillocks. She hated that place and was happy to leave when the time came. But a tiny part decided to stay behind. Those places don't even exist anymore.

I never went back to that town. I don't want to go back. My memory of that place from 30 years ago is still intact inside my head. Let it be that way, I don't want to see what has changed.

It wasn't even as beautiful as my childhood mind remembers it. I am still wondering why I am wandering back in those old haunts. Dreaming about those old houses by the road. Remembering forgotten faces with no names. Remembering old names with no faces.

Hazy, misguided, gilded memories. Cloudy, like the clouds I watched. Colourful, like the butterflies, dragonflies, flowers...

Maybe it is this weird transition which is happening right now. Passing from one stage of life, into a new one.

I have changed in the past year. Good, bad, better - not sure. But changed for sure. How I perceive things, people, events around me is different now. Life has defeated me into submission and that has somehow made me into a better version of myself. More positive, more pliable, more resilient, something paradoxical yet pleasant. This is a new phase.

Maybe my heart is reaching out to something which was laid back, innocent, idealistic, dreamy - which got forgotten. Maybe it is part of some strange kind of healing from all the pain we went through in this past year.

However it may be, these are happy memories. Gilded and picture perfect. Rose-tinted. For a change, I don't mind, nor care. It is some sort of a happy place within to get lost in. A mind's retreat of sorts.

Lazy, irresponsible days of laughing summers. Palm trees, cool nimbu sharbat, playing cards, "exploring" new spots in the neighbourhood with a bunch of oddballs like me. Climbing peru trees, day dreaming in those branches, plucking half ripe fruit...

Making a makeshift puppy home from fallen red leaves of the almond tree. Giving a night's lodging to a stray kitten which followed me home. Red gum boots for monsoon. Or were they black?

Tiny rivulets of rain water. Making paper boats. Sending off a toy plastic santa claus floating in this rivulet. Don't know why.

One particular winter was severe. We used to be cloaked and gloved and wrapped from head to foot for school in the morning. We would blow in the air and pretend that we were smoking cigarettes.

Somewhere along the way, I suddenly grew up. Asked my parents to change my school as this one wasn't helping me learn. Dad arranged to get me into his old school. I loved it even though i went there only for the last 3 years of schooling. That's where I found out what I wanted to learn in college. Languages, especially English literature. My parents were also quite supportive and didn't try to force me into Commerce or Science either of which I would have gotten into easily.

That decision is the reason I am sitting here now, able to put these thoughts and abstract dreams into actual words. That was another phase. This one is a new phase.

Something wonderful is coming along. Silently, quietly, noiselessly. I am open to receive it. Calm and peaceful. Finally.

-Painting by Pascal Campion.