The Lost Child

I always feel I am doing nothing on this planet except growing old whenever my birthday is around the corner. Every birthday I promise myself that I shall find the reason to live or the reason to write a book. The former never gets formulated and the latter keeps on dealing with the subject matter.

Carefree Childhood days

So I decided to travel to places to remember what I was made of and visited the people who crafted a man out of a toddler. This led me to Udaipur, my birth place. The city of lakes that taught me change is inevitable and it kills if you don’t accept it in life. The second stop was my kindergarten that taught me the faller is destined to succeed. The third was my college which once taught me love and success can go in hand.  And out of everything I grounded one fact: Needless to say, the fact bearer told me all life what I have spent was in vain as I had been running after things that my parents, teachers and some of my friends asked me to chase for.

I still remember the days of my childhood when jalebi was sweeter and reminded me of the advertisement wherein a boy is convinced to return to his home when he was promised ‘jalebi’. I was so care free and ready to tell people what I knew forgetting the fact how much they know or what they wished to know.

My favorite color was the one that my English teacher wore and it changed around four times in a week.

There were no paychecks but the two rupee note and a ‘Poppins’ in my hand made me felt like a king.

The time when Batman and Spiderman looked great on paper rather than making me wait for the sequels that come every season to bore.

There were no mobile phones and my parents knew wherever I would be in this world I would return in a ‘single piece’ with my bicycle by 7 pm in the evening.

There was no Google still I knew what to search for and where the answers were hidden.

I had smiling faces around me not a book of faces saying where they are spending their honeymoons or which college they are studying in…!!!

I had a pencil and a rubber that lasted for a week and now I never see my pencil’s final notch sharpened up or changing my roller pen’s refill.

There were sparrows and squirrels I used to run after and spent my time watching clouds changing their shapes from elephants to horses.

The crayons that colored my life and made it look vibrant not the blunt bank’s SMS in my smart phone saying about my purchases and meager bank balance.

 I had love and the only thing that broke my heart was the moment when she said to me that her frock is brighter than my pants.

I never had the feeling of losing somebody or something except my new compass that I got free with ‘Bournvita’.

The months when I waited for the school to reopen and wished to see her with a new water bottle rather than the appraisals that I now carve and crib for.

Let me tell you a true story. When I was in 4^th grade we had a surprise drawing exam. And it really ‘surprised’ me. The teacher told us to draw a free hand sketch and the white sheets that looked like dinner table napkins came to my bench. I read the words ‘free’ and ‘hand’ and traced my hand on the sheet, colored it with the color of the skin and wrote in the centre ‘Free Hand’ and left the class room within 15 minutes. The teacher laughed and I got a ‘D’. But the lesson learnt was my shelling out what I knew.

I failed the Ph.D interview at some IIT last fortnight. After passing 3 rounds, I feared to express what I knew in the interview. And once again life placed me on the crossroads that say where to go with a lot of sign boards luring me to them.

Closing my eyes, remembering what ‘Into the Wild’ meant and now finding a reason to live because this life can’t be a reason to die.

Now Listening:

Wo Kagaaz Ki Kashti;  Wo Baarish Ka Paani…

The reason why my calendar days pass is a mystery and I am on the way to my answers…!!!

Amit Purohit

The Lone Soldier

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My Old School

MY OLD SCHOOL


                                    We all love our alma mater. Isn’t it? And even some one who is left and lost in our alma mater. It may/can be our first love/infatuation. This ode is all about those mesmerizing thoughts of my old school. The blurred memories of the first day of my school are still in this engineering mind. Every one of my porpoises wept, but it was I who confronted the school gate with a smile on my face. I was fervent to learn the ABCs. The origin of the arduous feeling was to read those fancy advertising boards all round. I still remember the hand that kindled me with the knowledge of English and Mathematics. I was weak in performing subtraction, but my Mathematics teacher was no naïveté. She tried hard to imbibe her knowledge in me. The steps of my old school were not leveled properly. We always slipped to one or two of them and ended with a bruise on our knees. Still our peon personified that the faller is the real winner as he/she learnt a lesson every time he/she falls. There was a boy in our class who once rang the school bell exactly 5 minutes before the lunch break. It was the time of our academic era when we were neophytes in looking at watches. Lastly, I only miss the angel seated on the second bench of the girls’ row. Whenever I roll the cavalcade of time I always end it with this rosy chapter of my verve. We were good friends and I used to guide her in Algebra and Geometry. However I was a novice in the calculative crusade still I managed to challenge the tide. I am still in juxtaposition rendering the fact that was it my love or infatuation…?!?

There lies my old school where
I learnt my ABCs
There lies my class where
I learnt those tongue tizzies
My teacher taught me
To subtract and to add
To read and to write
To face problems with glad
Those cozy class rooms
That became the place to gloom
When the exams surround
With the chilled supervision around
There lie my school steps
That taught me never to regret
Even when you fall in a bet
As the faller is destined to get
There lies the ringing bell
That we use to bell
Always a minute before the recess
To get that extra minute in excess
Finally we come across the row
Where I met my first lady love
We used to rhyme this bow:
To be together in any flaw...!
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