Childhood

I finished watching the movie wonder...and thoughts of it made me drift to the movie Paa, then Gifted and then to my own childhood..

I have kind of always felt that I was the happiest there. Innocence, trust and infinite hope without a shred of negativity. I grew up with a group of boys, with my hair similar to them, jumping off walls, acting like a gang. There are mixed memories of growing up.. of being a child. . and yet, my friends were amazing. 

Sometimes, I feel I never really had that one "best friend" you grow old with. . I was good in studies, which simply means more marks, and I used to think that's something I am good at. But as I grow up, I tend to ponder whether I was actually good at it or I had nothing else working for me so I just studied? I don't know. 

I remember in nursery to kindergarten exam, I had come 7th in my class. I actually told myself someday either in that class itself or as a thing when I was still a teenager..that I didn't like being 7th in class. Even after one of students before me left school, so my name in the roll call will be 6th place, I wanted that limelight of 1st. Of that topper. That special treatment.

And I had it next year. From kindergarten to class 1, I stood first. You know, being the first person whose name would be called for attendance is a pressure in itself...coz how can u already be there mentally when you name is called. This continued till I landed in college for graduation. And bam! That place was full of toppers like me, better than me..for they were good at so many things that being good in studies was a part of it, not their entire identify like mine. It was bitter realisation and crawling back into skin. The fact that we were young women, didn't help much either. Insecurities you name it pal!

But, I don't know.. I have always been blessed with many supportive people as friends. And my college was the first place where I had people who shared my life, and left deep imprints in my heart. Each of them had their life stories, and for the first time I understood it was not actually easy for anyone. Something which wonder also shows and Something which I have always wanted in all the novels I have read. Why do you give me only one narrative? What about the protagonist's wife's friend who is reduced to just a small character..she will have her story right? A lot of times I have not imagined myself as the protagonist, but as those people. As that old neighbour or as that tea boy in Sherlock's Hounds of Baskerville..I deserve that story, I would think. Then, it shifted to probably I will write one like that.. but the ink just won't spill good, coz that's not the talent I posses, keeps holding me back. I see million ships and boats sailing merrily in the vast unknown ocean, and my feet just stay frozen at the shores knowing not which way to take and how..

Coming back, I would say that I had a lot of friends, at different stages of time.. I have fought with them, I have liked them, and even wrote love letters of sorts. . Or just kept things deep in me. If any of those friends, ever read this, please know I have never forgotten you. I have remembered you, in flashes with different words and emotions... anywhere and everywhere. I might not have said thank you there maybe, but take this as my acknowledgement that each of you were valuable for what you have taught me. In the little ways you unfolded life's lessons, I have been humbled by the knowledge and experience as I go on understanding their impact in my life's journey. Though I would deeply want us to meet all over again, I still am not sure whether it will be full of so much emotions as I am now.

I have instances pop in my head of a school fight where my white shirt got torn and was sewn later with a black thread by my mother. That stitch mark I carried like a proud scar. I also remember how once I did something during lunch..maybe made someone's lunch fall by mistake or it probably didn't fall, but she got very angry. And I had moved with my Tiffin to a primary class, just to avoid crying near them all. And this guy, my friend, had joined me and said he understands and it's all right. Or I remember my literally silver jacket, that I thought was cool, and years later a friend told me they used to call it the 'alien jacket'.

 I also remember hearing the letters of my name spoken by my 'friends' in answer to their question as who was the darkest in the group. At that time, it hurt me more, not sure if it was my insecurities or the truth coming from my friends or the fact that it mattered to both them and me.. I also remember how I once by mistake squeezed an orange with my feet on the bedsheet at a friend's place, and her parents were so nice that they didn't even yell at me.. instead they offered another one. Or a friend visiting me after going to another place and later I visited her again, in college. 

Most of all, I remember myself as a smiling face and imaginative to the tips. Wearing round hats at an evening-night party with friends- getting hit from a truck's open door- as I could not see anything but the legs of my friend and his brother..or getting dripped in a bucket full of water at Holi, or eating sewaiyan and all sorts of pakoras while getting tutored in the holy month of Ramadan..to those moonlit nights of bengoli lakshmi Puja going from house to house fulling our tummies...and swinging in the wind when tutor asked us to call one of the kids to tution.. even the curfew, ftv, games, everything, is a memory that I cherish and hope that someday I will pen them to remember when I could no longer remember them..

To happiness, to childhood, to people!

Stay warm and sunny, let the storm teach you something, and mostly thank you!

-Love, R

02-10-2020