December is a special month, allowing me to keep my longish tryst with my home. I often ponder what components make up and define 'home.' What is it about growing up in a place that makes it special?
I went to the Club we have been members of, for ages, yesterday, with my parents. And all of a sudden, I was sucked back, through a whirling vortex of a timeless illusion...suddenly, I was 6, staring into the pool in which I had swum my first lap, where I had participated in that very long ago first swim meet...where I had struggled to negotiate with the raw energy and power of water, grappled against its strength, and completed my first 'length,' without stopping. It was by the side of this pool, that my parents, my grandparents would so patiently wait, while my coach trained me...to whom I would run to for food and warmth, shivering, cramped, when I had my breaks. It was the same Moon, which I would look at, while floating on my back, and counting the stars...something I still do...and it was so overwhelming to meet both my swimming coaches yesterday...and how they still treated me like a little child. Then I ran across the club lawn...where the fountain of Yore still stands in a quiet corner...and I took in the changes with slow breaths...change and sameness...all around...decay in some corners...compensated by renovation...and that is when I suddenly realised that I will keep coming back to this city of mine, each time older, hopefully, (in some ways) wiser...but all that my eyes will seek in this City are those signs of my childhood, which I want to cling to forever...and the older I get, the more sharply will I hunt out everything which made me who I am...those lower rungs of the ladder of life, which we climb with shaky, tentative but unforgettable steps...treasured, treasured...the tension between the tug of childhood and the future of all that lies in front...for I won't call this a contradiction, for growing up is but a Logical culmination of those ever-etched formative years. Everytime I try to re-live old episodes, which never die...living through memories constantly making new ones.
And then I went to the street which used to house my old school...which has now been reduced to a wel,, one knows what...and I had to furiously activate my imagination, to replace the, well, structure, with dear delightful CIS...its green windows, regal (I insist on calling it that) staircase, its cosy little lawn, its glass room( class 7) its people, the atmosphere, the values, the culture, the cosmopolitan ambience...
And then there were phone calls...for thought most of my friends are world-scattered, there are some who have thankfully stayed on in Kolkata...and I realised how blessed I am to have met such a Host of Kindred Spirits as I have...my four best friends from College, and all those wonderful school, building, club friends, all so different, all so excellent...I should catch up with my Bangalore friends...another eternal episode...
And the fact that when I am in Kolkata, I am inundated with familiar old loves, Feluda.........on sign boards, Tagore everywhere...sighs...more later
I went to the Club we have been members of, for ages, yesterday, with my parents. And all of a sudden, I was sucked back, through a whirling vortex of a timeless illusion...suddenly, I was 6, staring into the pool in which I had swum my first lap, where I had participated in that very long ago first swim meet...where I had struggled to negotiate with the raw energy and power of water, grappled against its strength, and completed my first 'length,' without stopping. It was by the side of this pool, that my parents, my grandparents would so patiently wait, while my coach trained me...to whom I would run to for food and warmth, shivering, cramped, when I had my breaks. It was the same Moon, which I would look at, while floating on my back, and counting the stars...something I still do...and it was so overwhelming to meet both my swimming coaches yesterday...and how they still treated me like a little child. Then I ran across the club lawn...where the fountain of Yore still stands in a quiet corner...and I took in the changes with slow breaths...change and sameness...all around...decay in some corners...compensated by renovation...and that is when I suddenly realised that I will keep coming back to this city of mine, each time older, hopefully, (in some ways) wiser...but all that my eyes will seek in this City are those signs of my childhood, which I want to cling to forever...and the older I get, the more sharply will I hunt out everything which made me who I am...those lower rungs of the ladder of life, which we climb with shaky, tentative but unforgettable steps...treasured, treasured...the tension between the tug of childhood and the future of all that lies in front...for I won't call this a contradiction, for growing up is but a Logical culmination of those ever-etched formative years. Everytime I try to re-live old episodes, which never die...living through memories constantly making new ones.
And then I went to the street which used to house my old school...which has now been reduced to a wel,, one knows what...and I had to furiously activate my imagination, to replace the, well, structure, with dear delightful CIS...its green windows, regal (I insist on calling it that) staircase, its cosy little lawn, its glass room( class 7) its people, the atmosphere, the values, the culture, the cosmopolitan ambience...
And then there were phone calls...for thought most of my friends are world-scattered, there are some who have thankfully stayed on in Kolkata...and I realised how blessed I am to have met such a Host of Kindred Spirits as I have...my four best friends from College, and all those wonderful school, building, club friends, all so different, all so excellent...I should catch up with my Bangalore friends...another eternal episode...
And the fact that when I am in Kolkata, I am inundated with familiar old loves, Feluda.........on sign boards, Tagore everywhere...sighs...more later
