Realities...

A thought has been nibbling quietly, in a secluded corner of my mind over the past few days, nay weeks, and I haven't given it as much thought as I should have, though it has steadfastly been calling out to me for a moment or two of reflection. It is to do with the changing nature of our "realities," at different points in our lives...for example, what might seem to be an indispensable part of our immediate lives at one moment, might be relinquished to the realm of that which "will never more be seen," at some point in the distant, or indeed near future... One can start at the level of the most minutely micro-cosmic...if I dwell upon the bone shaped pillow I sleep on at night, the grating phone alarm which tears me away from my tryst with Morpheus's land of sleep every early morning, the wooden floor which I drag my feet across in the early morning hours, the blue walls which blankly greet me everytime I look around at the walls, the sliding windows opening on to the Buddhist temple adjacent to our block, the old age home which my window looks upon...these are the immediate realitites, the absolute truths I open and close my eyes to every morning...these are the few things I can count on to remain the same, the realities which I can depend upon...for now... There might be days when I cannot predict the nature of my own moods, the content of the days events, whether I will receive a much awaited phone call, or have time to longingly meet some much awaited people...but this expectation which builds up is also a building block of the temporal reality of my present situation... When I am out with, for instance, a particular person, and we go out for a meal...his/her, (okay using one's is easier), one's side profile, the slant of one's face, the size of one's shirt, the scents of the day, the way in which one eats, indeed what one eats, the look in the person's eyes on seeing you, the hour at which one has to to part from the other and say goodbye, where one parts, (train stations, bus stops, below housing estates),all become part of our unquestionable though temporary realities...and I can't help but think that a day will come when these situations might change...for instance, if a point is reached, rather, when a point is reached when we decide to have meals in our homes, which was the case with my friends and loved ones in Kolkata, back home, we might sit together very differently...not in a semi-formal setting of a restaurant...we might sit across one another, on sofas, on mats on the floor, on the terrace...and the steady reality of having to eat out at restaurants in a foreign land will yield to another kind...when deadlines and time restrictions will slowly give way to new ones, before they too, change... The reality of my present moment constitues meeting the myriad job deadlines, making sure I make time for my loved ones, getting sufficient rest, negotiating fatigue, managing my time, coaxing myself into pursuing a few of the hobbies I held very dear...but these are so different from the everyday realities of my past...as a Uni student, my life was inundated with a deluge of rehearsal schedules for theatre, socialising with friends by watching intense films, studying for our ubiquitous tests and exams, attending lectures and seminars with unwavering enthusiasm (honest!) waking up later than I do now, diligently (umm, mostly...LOL) attending yoga sessions till the face of my instructor became excessively familiar, till our patterns of breathing matched, till our bodies resonated with the same rhythm... My reality then was just waking up and seeing my mother smile into my eyes every morning, kissing her blessed face, my father tuning us all into Rabindrashangeet, driving me to some very early French classes, waiting for my grandmother's early morning call, conjugating French verbs in my head while singing along to our car radio, and getting very confused in the process...of talking to certain friends daily, of the realitites of their rooms, of them in my room, of our endless threads of continued conversation, our sustained interests... Which again, was so different from the reality of my school days, when routine dictated me to board our school bus, bearing the number of 6162, of me watching out anxiously, hoping I didn't miss it...that number was uber important then , but 6162 just reposes, sleeps silently in my mind's corner, rendered useless unless in the realm of memory, until I stir it for a bit, before letting it rest again...of those assemblies at the Calcutta International School's 18 Lee Road porch, (which in its present day reality has been converted to a monstrous parking lot for a hideous shopping mall), Back in those days, 9 y-10 years ago, the reality of our school's court case with the owner of the shopping mall who wished to take over our space loomed big and large...of me of worrying about performing well on tests and exams, but mostly enjoying the process of learning, of exploring education to its extreme extent...my realities then were my HUGE, red coloured Biological Science text book, my yellow, (put me to sleep) Physics text book, a thumbed copy of Tennessee Williams's A Streetcar Named Desire, Mrs. Chatterjee's unique handwriting flooding my essays with comments, my electronic calculator which I needed for integration and trigonometry, the apple green colour of Barium's flame test, the swivelling motion of my hand as I performed titration experiments, the readings on the meniscus, the horror of handling a vernier calliper?(is that how you even spell it?)...I couldn't do without these...without these contents, my life would be rendered impossible to live...but now, I don't even possess a calculator, which was stowed away once the desired grades were received... But the realities of my mind, my priorities have also changed...from being the kind of person who moaned in despair if I got even a mark less than I had expected to, of always wishing to perform and excel, yes, indeed I believe that spirit of competition which used to rage (haha, well, maybe flicker) within me, has changed to one which is far less so...of one which is happy to just contribute to the trying to help others, to measure success in terms of touching lives is the aim I'm trying hard to work towards, and I have a long way to go ...a long marathon looms... I have touched upon, perhaps, just a tip of the tip of the ice-berg...but perhaps one could note that each indispensable reality, will in time, be replaced by a slew of others...it is all very dependent on one's sitaution...temporal and spatial...one reality will soon become a memory...near or distant...and the more one remembers, the more real the things which are out of our reach now, perhaps forvermore, will seem...if only for a brief moment or two...fleeting...fleeting...so I wished to photograph some of my remembrances in words...and I am taking in my present surroundings, my cubicle, with its sheets of marking, with my name etched over it for now, (which too will change once I leave, being replaced with the name of an unknown other, who I might never meet, though we will have occupied the same seat),the faces of my colleagues, the green cup of green tea by my side...