‘Hello’… I miss you!!!

It has been a complete year and a month that I last heard that warm and special ‘hello’ over the phone.

His voice always carried the charm, warmth and happiness whenever I spoke to him over the phone from the time I have been away from home to pave a ‘career path’.

And when in person, I needn’t mention the warm hug that followed.

Today if I crave for something several times in a day is that phone call from home, from Dad.

For 2 years when he was keeping unwell, I remember rushing home every long weekend to be at home, to be with my family and it’s been pretty some time that I last felt like before.

Each time I left home to catch the train back to Kolkata, I used to wake him up to say ‘good bye’ and each time then, he bid me ‘good bye’ with damp eyes and a ‘not-so happy’ smile.

It made me feel like a guilty, every time; to chase a life at such an irrecoverable cost and I succumbed to it so well.

I still recall the Sunday, when I went to see him in the hospital. The first man of my life, whose stature I looked up to, was lying down on metal framed white bed, facing the window outside, helpless & captive.

This time when I confronted him, I confronted him along with his tears. Tears that expressed his helplessness of let his life gradually slip by without his consent & those that told me how badly I was missed.

When all the while I was away paving the ‘career path’ that I owed to him, he so easily explained that his recovery was not with the doctors but with me. Wish I knew why he trusted me so much.

For all the ten days that he was under medical supervision, I could feel how helpless he was feeling.  For every bed that had somebody discharged in person or otherwise, had his hopeful eyes on it.

All that he wanted from me was a ‘good night kiss’ and what he called as ‘good night reiki’. J

Simple request and difficult execution!!!

For the first time in these 2 years, as I was again leaving home to come back to Kolkata, after his discharge, I did not wake him up.

I was somewhere afraid that, if I wake him up I would see his soggy eyes again and I chose the easier way.

Each phone call, that flashed on my phone that read ‘home calling’ was no more a joy thereafter. Sleepless nights and worried mornings were all they could denote to me.

4^th July, at 11.40pm; my phone flashed again. Dad was no more. I had to rush home again but this time to see him in a reformed form.

As I managed to reach my ex- vacation spot, I see the white glass car & so many people in front of my gate.

I see him lying down on the floor in our bedroom, all calm, composed and with a smile of peace. He looked so much alive, may be because he was really alive then.

I touched him to re-confirm and he was hard with a soft skin and a strange coldness. Yes, he was cold to this part of ‘life’ now.

From that day onwards, I wish I hadn’t seen him make a journey in the white glass car.

I wish I could have been there with him to hold his hand when they were warm.

I wish I had taken the effort to wake him up to say ‘good bye’ before leaving for Kolkata.

I wish I could hear that ‘Hello’ again….

Caught up in Traffic!!!

Since yesterday I feel so caught up.

Caught up just like I feel everyday when I am late by just 4 mins and am running to get hold of THE yellow cab that would ‘oblige’ me by driving me to work that would in turn drive my day.

Caught up just like the way my blessed cab gets caught at every possible traffic signal and I am like “oh no, not again”. Yes, I say this to myself almost every day with a meager light of improvement.

Stranded at the lane that is JUST 2.5 minutes away from my office cab pickup and where I can save on the next 24 bucks and then it so normally happens to slip off my wallet. I miss the office cab again... Sigh!!!

That’s exactly how my mind is breathing and frantically looking for that ‘meager light’.

My, is this my life...Welcome myself to the rate race. Yes, I am so much part of this now. I was trying to save myself all this while and here I am.

I have been trying to motivate myself all day long, thinking of the best and the worst times I have been through and I don’t believe that I am in the spider web.

I have been so mindless to over sit at my workplace, trying to sort an issue that should not have deserved the time I gave it from my life span.

As I motivated myself back home, I saw a rickshaw crossing me with a girl and her crutches along with her. My situation was way better than how she could have been feeling each time using it and I felt a little better.

Once I finally got home I realized that my mother & a cup of tea were more eagerly waiting for me. She was happier to see me than anyone else in the world would have been then. Her hug did the magic that my intensive thinking for hours failed to do. The soothing light of my bedroom was such a haven and I was trying to sort silly issues beyond this. This is why it is said ‘home sweet home’. Now this was awakening.

Around 2 hours later, my dear friend calls up to say ‘hi’ with a patient ear and I was back to the normal ‘me’ and with a better capacity to allow to let go of, my so ‘called’ issues and initiate to fix them as nothing could be more important than the time my life was allotting me to spend, that needed more of my attention. J

Though I still feel a little caught up, I am also a little soothedJ.

Another Journey

I have been travelling since childhood days. Not that I have been on regular holiday trips, but yes each time I have boarded the train with a new reason and objective.
In the good old days, it was for summer vacations. This distance was not much-- tatanagar to howrah. But the excitement was always in leaps and bounds.
In the student years, it was for entrance tests and for college hunting sessions. And here a new journey begins. Hostel lives, leave forms, weekend plans to rush home, excitement and anticipation, mom and dad waiting to receive you at the station. Simply memorable. A journey that kept me away from home and connected me each time I boarded the train.
I have been always observing these small peculiarity of passengers loving the window seat, the items that hawkers have been selling since historic times, quick magic shows, spiced rice puffs,singing beggars and nevertheless the man in the black cloak signing off boarding tickets.
The general compartment is always packed with passengers and hawkers. People are loud in there. They begin conversations with you within the 1st hour of the departure that can continue till you actually arrive at your destination. There are mixed discussions on politics, socio- economic concerns, children's future and ofcourse the ruling government. I never enjoyed the fact that people want to use a 3 seater seat as a multi seater. And if you are near the toilet, you will automatically learn Pranayam without Baba Ramdev.
In contrary, the ac compartment comprises of passengers who are cautions about the polish on their shoes. They mostly speak english, the person sitting next to you is either an alien or a stake to your sophistication if you happen to start talking. The hawkers are like waiters in proper uniform and the man in the black cloak is a little happier than the one in the adjoinin
g compartment.
Today, I am again in this train, from Howrah to Tata, sitting at the window seat. I still love the lush green feilds, the farmers reaping the paddy fields, kids waving you off,the bridge that runs over the Ganga and making a quick wish. The special tea and spiced rice puff.
But today, I can measure the years and the journey am still leading.. I began it here in train with my parents and today I travel back to my roots to part take in a ceremony which I have to mention as my "father's death anniversary".
I seemed to have another journey today.

Then and Now...

So many thoughts racing on my mind and plentiful of feelings looking up and seeking for direction. I sit back and think how lives have changed and so have thoughts. I live in a racing world with no definite goals. I tend to look up for paycheques and not the people who make a difference in my life. I don’t forget them but yes fail to acknowledge that they are remembered. Its just a matter of years, I guess that life has changed so soon.

I miss the simplicity of those days. My grandma’s warmth, doing home works, packing my school bag according to the next day’s routine, the lunch box that my mother made for me every morning no matter how sick she felt, the report cards and the following treat, all now seem like a distant past. From school to college and now to the office desk has been a long journey with a lot of trials, losses and victories. I wish at times, that if we had a time table for everything and planning about our lives would have been as simple as arranging our school bags, what would like be like? From letters to emails, phone calls to sms and albums to ‘Facebook’ updates is now our current lifestyle syndrome. Today I seem to have everything but a lot of nothings as well. Just don’t know where and how to figure out the questions that refreshes with the end of each day.

I went to watch ‘Guzarish’ today morning. Nice movie enclosed with the entire Sanjay Leela Bansali larger than life image. As I watched the movie, all that I could relate to was the time, now like an era to me, when I was recovering in bed for 10 long months. That was one kind of a time for me in my lifetime. I still can’t forget the frustration that I went through each day at least once every day till I accepted it as a part of me. I remember how I used to crave to even turn sides and watch out of the window to see the greenery around but all that I had were concrete structures that made me stronger and keep alive in me the urge to recover. I would look at the clock to strike 4 in the evening and gaze at the door to know who would come to see me today and some days just prayed to be alone. Sleepless nights and sleepy mornings. I would be contented every night just to know that a day had passed. White walls, white bed and the stereo checked patterned uniform made me feel like a prisoner. Medications and medications were all that piled on me.

 But I had some of my most amazing days too. I never would have had a better chance to know what I meant to others and what others meant to me. I would never know what freedom meant even if you had the best of all comforts. I had the best birthday party ever. I realise today that life is just too short for sorting out differences and strategic planning. I missed life and my loved ones just in those 12hrs when I was completely sedated. I feel the pain when u want to live when you don’t have a chance to with the ones you foresee your existence. Strange that what I could not have understood consciously, I was taught the entire gist of it without conscious. No wonder, they say that the subconscious is stronger than consciousness. Can’t thank life enough for endorsing me with a new one in a single chance.

The Rat Race……..

The commonest race that is organized by life on no special occasion like the ‘Sports Day ‘at school or the ‘Republic day ‘or the ‘Independence Day’, but the special occasion called ‘The Life’.


The most interesting aspect of the rat race is having human participants.

From the time you enter the premises of the school you ought to excel in studies and you learn the preliminary steps of how the participation criterion begins. After gasping for those scores at the board examination, life begins to begin at the long student trails trying to enroll for the best colleges of the country with anxious parents hoping for a brighter tomorrow for their children. Level 3 begins when after the glorious and the most happening years of the youth begin to take shape, HR people of top notch and ‘not so top notch’ companies, arise at the gates of the college to make you consciously feel that ‘my dear friends you are about to be professionals now’ and subconsciously you welcome the ‘Joyride’ that invites you ahead.

I still remember the excitement on the thought of my first day in office like the dream of every youth churning out to be a professional. But in due course I realized that it’s much more than just a churning out process. Apart from the happiness experienced from the first pay cheque , job designation authority and financial independence, it calls for waking up everyday putting the alarm into snooze every time it rings, thinking when is the Saturday arriving and looking up to calendars only for holidays. What a Life!!!

Knowingly or most cases unknowingly we participate in this rodent race which in no case is as tiny winy as the name sounds with the entire universal acceptance. But the one question that I am always infested with is “what is the final destination?” Where are we all heading towards? What are we heading towards? Is it a better salary, a better position, a higher status or an extraordinary and unmatched identity status?

Young adults think and show off themselves as the most eligible bachelors or spinsters but then what is the’ most eligible’.

I often think as I see many people from varied walks of life that what is their driving force as I still search for mine. The eligibility with a big E is a big question mark too, I guess. The demarcation between what’s right and what’s wrong is so thin that we so conveniently just miss it.

But I’m sure that I will make my way through this mind boggling maze and make it a bit different from this rat race. I’m glad that at least I know this part of my driving force and will take a successful attempt in giving myself a much better direction.

WHY?

'Why?' , a three letter word that transforms the world around us. A word for which we spend our entire lives searching for an answer with a very moderate success rate.( i think so).

• Why was the world created?
• Why were we created?
• Why do we love someone?
• Why do we fail to protect the love?
• Why do we expect things which we can't fulfill for others?
• Why do we see n judge by what the person appears and not by what the person feels?
• Why do we age and fade away into time n still fight for material existence?
• Why is it that when the soul is hurt our eyes act as a vent?
• Why don't we care for the one in front of us but pray with closed eyes to the ONE we can't actually see?

Strange, n my mind hovers with many more 'Why's' and endless questions with a hope that i would be able to conclude to some questions of my inner world by what the outer world teaches me before a final good bye and with a sigh of relief and satisfaction that i could learn something from this unversity.

Friendship Redefined

11th January 2009

The one thing that excited me from within after such a long time was the apprehension of how would it be like to meet my all time buddies who were on their way all the way from Gurgaon to Panipat.

That one whole year without them, my college seemed nothing more than just a building to me. I could not even imagine that my life could become so tuff without them. The craving for a company, those afternoons when I had to have my lunch alone made me go red in the face. In spite of being in my last years of college I felt as new and as weird as a new comer. My friends redefined the meaning of friendship to me each day but then I had no one to look around to.

Didn’t even know, how I got accustomed to this but I always felt a space within me which I tried to fulfil by those who were around me making them even more upset. Sorry for that but it just happened.

That morning I woke up with a new enthusiasm. The moment I saw my dear ones in front of me, it was like a joyride taking inside my heart. All the gossips (girls love to do it), the tragedies, the fun n frolic, everything wanted to come out at the same moment.
All we wanted to do with loads of excitement were to click pictures and upload them on orkut the very next day. Some times we click pictures to capture happy moments and some times to see how happy we actually are.

Those old time ‘PJ’s’, long walks and sunny winter afternoons were all renewed. I did then realise how lonely I felt all these days and how I had got used to it.

The height of stupidity was the ‘Haunted house’ where we paid to be scared and exhausted our lungs proudly, fed ourselves at Mc Donalds and as it always happens it was time to get back to routine.

A nice Sunday after such a long time and will want to enjoy more. I love my friends who gave so much meaning to my life and make me feel so blessed. I love each one of you and will always do come what may.