June Chronicles

As life moves on,

I pause to cut off the string that troubles

and tighten the one that once went lose.

June has been hectic but a satisfying month. I traveled more than half of the time and the rest went in writing exams, watching Game of Thrones, sleeping and all that stuff you do when you're bored. Some old relations got renewed and I feel so good about it and some not so old ones got buried deep within the crust of past and I feel good about that too.

The highlight of the month is my visit to my childhood place Kanpur. It was overwhelming to walk on that old aisle, to watch the change which the place underwent and yet how beautifully it held the warmth I went looking for. I don't love the city because it is Kanpur, I love it because my younger self still breathes the air of those narrow streets and whimsical junctures which hold so many stories. I love it because it holds close to the bosom the unadulterated innocence, the incongruous dreams which once blustered through my little head and those nascent aspirations which I had forgotten about.

It was lovely to relive the happy times with my friends there. They are beautiful people and it did not feel like we were meeting after ages. It felt like yesterday. My visit was short.. just two days. But it was enough to rebuilt the lost love.

But before Kanpur, I went on a week long trip to Barot with my college friends. Barot is a beautiful valley in Himachal Pradesh which gave me nth number of bitter sweet memories. It would be unfair to not write a detailed travel post on how amazingly well my trip went in the streets of this less known valley. But that will happen in a few days.

Right now, I'm preparing myself for the next journey. Yes, there is one more place left. But it is not for a vacation. It is for an internship. I will be moving to a new city for the next whole month. Myriad apprehensions are making me go crazy!!! But one thing which I'm really happy about is that I will finally step out of my cocoon and live alone in a new city. It's scary but it's equally exciting too. Wish me luck, my friend.

That's it for now. I missed so many posts of my favorites. Hopefully, if the new city treats me well, I will be regular here again.

Much love.
_______

Picture Source: That's me, somewhere in Barot.

When my fears help me grow.

I don't remember how this fear entered my mind but I've always been scared of cockroaches. I know it is one of the most girly thing in the entire world but even if I hate to be a part of this category, I cannot help it. They are big disgusting insects and sometimes come with wings too. Why God why?!?? When I was in second grade, we shifted to a new city. My mom like always pestered me to meet new people of my size and be friends with them. They came to my place to play in the evening and I tried my best to make a good first impression by flaunting my big kitchen set and feeling proud with every 'ooh' and 'wow' reaction. But all my pride was washed away when a big cockroach entered my t shirt and I screamed in the highest pitch and jumped like a ninja making a complete fool of myself while the little people laughed incessantly. Though that broke the ice and gave me a wonderful childhood, my hatred and fear towards these freaky insects grew to a mountainous extent.

I fear deep dark waters too. I am a swimmer and I learned swimming when I was 6 or 7. Those were the days when I, a four ft. girl could play around with friends in a nine ft. deep pool, all day long and all night too. But as I grew up, this fear of deep dark waters started building up in my head and wrecked my swimming sessions. Now when I step into a pool, nobody in the world has the power to drag me to the deepest portion. I fear that someone might pull my legs from inside the pool and I would eventually drown. And that is perhaps, too much of Aahat (a horror series) etched in my mind.

Then there is fear of elevators. It is attributed to a heart-failing experience where I was with my parents in some old wobbly lift and after going up and down non stop for a couple of minutes, it got stuck somewhere in the middle. It was only when I bawled out and screamed, some people of that apartment came to our rescue. Yes, I was one hell of a screamer! Though I have recovered from the near death experience, I still sometimes fear stepping into an elevator when I am all alone.

Change. This is the most inevitable thing and yet I fear it the most. I fear change! It could be of any form. A change in my regular menu when I visit a restaurant, a change of place where I stay, a change of music that I listen to, a change of people that I like to be with, a change of dreams and aspirations and so on. My friends mock me because I fear to try new things in life. I try it when someone pesters me to but never on my own. And then I'm the one who wishes to travel the world and experience new things. How ironical! May be because somewhere in my mind I have this urge to conquer this fear. Yes, may be this is the reason.

When I am stuck in those days where I have nothing to work on, when I have no aim, no task to do, no movie to watch and no novel to read.. I use these fears and turn them into a purpose. Like stepping out of my comfort zone and be unprepared. A couple of weeks back, I went street shopping alone. I have never done that before and it was a big deal for me because I constantly need someone to fall back on. But that experience, oh it was different. I don't know good different or bad different, but it was something which I have never felt before. Standing alone in the middle of thousands of people and still not feeling depressed. Yes, it was different.

There are many more things that I fear and that scare the hell out of me but I think they are there just to give me a purpose when I lose one. So that makes them good, right! Except of course, cockroaches.

Anyway, you tell me. What are your fears?
_______

A September Evening

A gorgeous feeling of happiness is racing up the veins as I flip through some old pictures. Looking at my small, geeky face, hair tied back at the nape of the neck, a few strands falling casually on the temple, toothy smile, flashing broken front teeth and striking a random pose. How innocently pretty I look even though I am in a pair of blue bell bottom jeans buttoned up at high waist.

The weather outside makes the moment even more beckoning. Streets are sublimely soaked up in the last rain this monsoon. Black clouds growling as they float past those huge trees across the road, which are smoothly performing a not so coordinated waltz. I see darkness crawling up stealthily in my room as I sit with a bunch of photo albums on my lap and flip through them, caressing a subtle, faint smile. My mind is laden with a bundle of anecdotes and incidents...moments of pristine joy, flashing every second. They oscillate rhythmically creating a fine rhapsody which I could play on forever and never get tired of.

And then, the faint curve turns into a wide smile as this photograph comes up, reveling a fragment of me which had vanished eons ago.

It is a picture of my old, grey colored study table on which I had beautifully doodled so many things.

:)

Losing some shreds
On the graveled path
Of being a woman, a lady
I hear her whisper,
lingering loosely
along the lines of faded yesterday.

I watch her impression..
Her fragmented laughter
grow deep in my skin,
Gradually rebuilding
cryptic patterns
of abandoned love,
slyly calling out my name
in a familiar voice..
Of the novice little girl
I once was.
And then effortlessly
bridging the gap
between two tangents,
my past..
and her present.

______

Yellowed Chapters and That Withered Flower.

For one more time, I saw myself standing there. It was quiet, still and I was alone. The place was familiar, a lot familiar. I have grown up here and I knew this area by heart. But I couldn't comprehend the mystery why I failed every time. It was supposed to be there, I thought. I walked closer. It clouded more. I couldn't see clearly but I was sure it was there. And with the last step, it vanished completely. I ran again, not losing the verve. But I couldn't find the bridge, that small open bridge, which I never knew would be so important to me that I would crave to walk through it once again.

There is this tiny, little, petite part of me which yearns to go back, particularly to the years that I have spent in Kanpur. To my old junior school, to those grey colored pavements, to those big corridors and narrow aisles where we raced in the afternoon with a heavy bag on shoulders to reach first to the swings' section, to the place where that mysterious foot print on the cemented floor was, that place where one of my classmates had thrown sand in my hair. Uh! how much I hated that boy. And then there was this graveyard beside my school, and how we cooked up stories about the dead, and the small botanical garden with just one special attraction: touch-me-not plants.

Then maybe, after a while, I would visit my old home too. That calm old street, Ektapath, that's what it is called. My home, it would be where I had left it but not how I had left it. It might have shrunken by now. But the younger me, would still be embalmed cozily. And I would long to be that girl again. At one moment, she would walk past me with a piece of cloth around her big eyes and hands stretched in search for her friends and then the next moment, I would watch her trying to get to the secret room without any help. My room had a smaller room which ran up the wall adjacent to my bed. Ma used it for storing random stuff. I was short so I had to put up a chair and a stool and a shorter stool to get to that room. And yes, at times I had spunk to do it all by myself. I liked those pink walls. They were mine. Only mine.

Then a noise of laughter would snap me out of the moment. I would rush out and watch the girl playing golf with a random stick and her older brother standing nearby waiting for his turn, probably. The lemon tree would still be there, on that corner. But it might not recognize me. It might not remember how I rejoiced at the sight of so many bright, big lemons falling on wet grass whenever it rained. Neighbors dropping by our place, having an extended chat with ma (she was the charm of Ektapath) and grabbing some lemons from the garden: this had become a routine back then. We had this long stick with a hook on one of its ends. My father had designed it to reach the higher branches of the tree and get lemons by pulling them down. But Bhaiya and I cleverly utilized it as a golf stick. Thus, the game.

After quenching my thirst by replaying such beautiful episodes, I would step out and take a stroll on the old street or I would just sit on that unkempt grass of my garden. I think that would make me feel sanguinely good. That feeling of being finally back home! But what if I would just want to turn around and leave the episodes untouched, unadulterated and pure...like an abysmal part of the lost pages...like snippets of memories hanging loosely, somewhere in my mind. Just like they have always been.

I am not sure whether I'm ready for an answer yet. But I would like to know the answer, sometime. And when the time comes, I would walk through those grey pavements once again, through those narrow aisles of childhood! I would reach the fogged bridge and cross it without losing it into nothingness. I know the little girl with that piece of cloth around her eyes, may not see me but I think she would be happy to know that I am her older self. And maybe a little proud too.
:)

Even if the chapters have turned yellow, the story residing in them shall always be vivid. And that story belongs to me. Only me.
________

Picture Source 1
Picture Source 2

Yabbaa Dabbaa Doo!!!

Dear Flintstones


Where did you guys go? I miss you and your 'Yabbaa Dabbaa Doo' sooooo much. And your other friends Dexter, Road Runner and Scooby Dooby Doo too.


I hope my internet speed remains good and stable. And I'll download you all as soon as my exams get over.
Watch out!


From
A girl who was born in the 90's.