A Short Story

He woke up at 8:30 AM with a sudden bang of the shutting main door of his 2 room standalone house. Once again his mom had left for the office leaving him wondering alone. He remembered the faded sound of his mother screaming ... "Rahul get up.. you've to go to school, you've to show the assignments, Mr. Bhusan had called up this morning".

It was difficult for him now to give himself a push to get ready for school. He sat still on the edge of the bed looking at the cloudy sky. It was windy outside; the trees by the side of the road were making cracking sound with the blowing wind giving a feeling as if trees would fall any minute. From the window he could see the long array of coconut trees running parallel between the road and a wide sewerage. He wondered where does this sewerage start and where it goes. There was a rumor that government is taking initiative in changing the filthy, stinky sewerage to a clean water canal which should be used as one of the tourism attractions. But with the passing days, rumor what it stands for lost in air. Now they are constructing metro bridge, possibly a metro station on top of this sewerage. He's seen the sewerage and the coconut trees as long as he remembers. He felt very connected with the place, even with the sewerage, as he's grown up with them. There was a distant sound coming from the farther end of the road…the drilling sound from the metro construction site. These days, he was happy to see the construction happening, big drilling machines, so many people working wearing colorful helmets. In heart, he hated being alone, the crowd at the construction site made him happy and cheerful. Whenever he walked the road crossing the site, he always thought that he'll become an Architect some day. And that thought brought smile to his small round lips. Nights were no more dark, it was good to see the road flooded with the flashing big yellow halogen lights. The trees looked very beautiful when the lights fell on them, changing the hardly visible dark green color to radiating greenish yellow. It ran through his mind how he loves colors, how he wants to paint everything he imagines. He smiled as he moved his head a little to his right to see if the water bottle was still there. Last night his mom asked to get the bottle filled up while going to bed. He sipped some water gulped it down his throat. Wind was becoming stronger with every passing minute. He felt a little concerned, but shrugged the next moment. He thought of the last Sunday, the site was empty. He wondered why these guys didn’t work on Sunday, was it a holiday for them like his school was always off on Sundays. He pondered over this a while and then his thought drifted.

It was 15 minutes past 9 in the morning now. The wind was slowing down; a little sunshine could be seen behind the trees. A rickshaw passed by on the street. A bunch of hospitality services’ students dressed in white shirt and knee dip skirts rushed laughing and chattering loudly. Suddenly Mr. Bhusan ran through his mind… Ohh … I’ll have to go. He got up… snailed lazily towards the Bathroom Basin. He brushed his teeth hastily, took bath and went straight to the Dining Hall table where his mom had kept the food. It was baked bread and butter for breakfast. He wasn’t feeling hungry, somehow swallowed the bread down his throat. He was all alone in the house; there was a weird quietness as if the silence had the noise. He felt uneasy. He hurriedly finished his breakfast, took his school bag on his back and came out. He saw the neighbor girl looking at him. He snarled, doesn’t she have to go to school.
Sun was brighter now… he was feeling discomfort from the heat and humidity. He had just celebrated his 8th birthday last week. All his friends gathered for the party. He remembered how mom had arranged everything so good for the party. Everybody had loved the food and the decoration. But he didn’t like Shyam fighting with his own sister. He remembered how he had to call Uncle John to resolve the fight and how Shyam’s sister had thanked him for taking control of this. His thoughts again drifted as a Ford-Figo went by swiftly. He wondered if they have produced only one color car … Parrot Green… he remembered from the frequent advertisements on TV.
The sound of the drilling machine was getting louder as he walked close to the site. Very large yellow and black colored machines with tank wheels rolled nearby. It was very fascinating for his little imaginative mind. There were workers all around in yellow and red helmets. As he moved ahead along the road… many trees were fallen on the road. He felt sad. These trees had become part of his life. Every morning he took the shades to walk down the road, now they are being removed for the metro station construction. He felt tizzy for a moment. He kept looking at the fallen trees with his sad eyes as he walked along the road. Many lamp posts were also broken. It seemed it was a big storm last night, but he knew it’s the humans’ apathy and indifference that’s responsible for the destruction of nature and he also knew that a day will come when nature will destroy the whole species. He had seen many Hollywood movies on natural disaster and how humans lay helpless. Most part of the road was dug up and it was filled with dirt and sand. It was very tough even to walk by.
The traffic was smooth now after the construction of a flyover near Wipro. On the flyover Cars were speeding … screeching and halting sounds could be heard from farther corner. Big hordes were stretched across the turning… it read ‘Find solace in the divine relaxation… intoxicate yourself at Vedic Village’. He wondered how everything had become a money making business venture. In this fast paced life, overly populated metro place, providing a service to relax had to be a good business.

To be continued...

Beginning of a Promising Shining New Inning

Does it sound like too many adjectives... Promising, Shining.. all similar sounding homynyms? Believe me it feels like life is kick started again on the same road where i always wanted to run/float, but this time it's not a race, not the cut-throat fierce competition which got our lives burnt with the concentrated H2So4, got us choked like we were under the attack of a fully grown Gastro Esophaegal problem.
There is a certain relaxation in the confused burning desiring mind, i think it's all because i know inside there's somebody who'll be running parallelly, who will hold my hand whenever i fall, who will blow the needed breeze to the fire inside me. Now with all this, I've only one choice i'm left with.. that is to 'Excel' in what i always wished to do.

This weekend, we planned to go to the 'Painting Exhibition' by M. F. Hussain. This is organized by 'Gallery Rasa' at New Alipore, Kolkata. Beating the dirt storm from ongoing Metro construction and the 90% humid air, we took a white line Bus from Karunamoyee to Taratalla... romancing with the bouncing last row. The bus made rounds and rounds of streets in Salt Lake before it hit the Bypass. It's always cool to take a bus if it routes through Bypass, crossing Science City. After, the first 45 minutes in the Bus, we were impatient. But i've got this habit of relaxing myself in such times, saying loudly, just imagine that it's cold breeze outside and we are in heavy sweaters trying hard to save us from the freezing cold outside. This somehow, i believe, helps. I often use it on my wife as well and she thinks i'm crazy :). So after a very long 55 minutes, we got out of the Bus at Taratalla Petrol Pump. Just there we got an auto to take us to the Block-P, New Alipore. After getting down from Auto, we strolled past some tea stalls in those narrow roads. Saw some local people playing cards on the pavements sitting in circles half-clothed enjoying the game. We requested them to direct us to the address that i'd taken when starting from home. After 20 minutes of concerned stroll we got to the road to Rasa. I've a very bad sense of direction and on the contrary she's it very good. She pointed out the Gallery that was in the left side of the road, looked like a normal kolkata house. There was a beggar sitting in front wearing only dhoti. After a few seconds, we could locate the Gate, wooden. I tried to push open it, but could not. On the first thought, it came to us that Uff.. it's sunday closure, then we thought of calling the number that i had from the site i checked that morning before going there. I called up the number, lady on the other side was very humble speaking in pure UK accent english. I asked her if the gallery was open. And yes it was open, she sent somebody to open the door and we got in. It was a relief inside in the Air Conditioner, and good thing was the two hour of Bus traveling in the hot humid air was fulfilling. It was a good collection of Hussain's paintings. We two are not much of Art gallery visitors yet, but we were trying very hard to find some meaning in the paintings... but could hardly do. Earlier this month, Hussain Saahab visited the City and had a very good statement which came in the newspaper. “A silk screen print is like a silk route that satisfies people's need for works of art”. “They say a thing of beauty is a joy for ever. Here you change the word ‘ever’ to ‘every body’”. The place where everybody can enjoy art is a public museum. Da Vinci's Mona Lisa can't be kept at residences ~ she belongs to the world. We saw few but good collection of Art Books by Sculpting Artists, their works in different media, wood, terrocota, Bronze, Stones etc. After spending almost an hour there with those colorful and not so colorful artworks, we signed our remarks... 'Please Keep this good work up'.

We came out, it was 7:30 in the evening. We were feeling good as we passed one Hanuman Ji Mandir with loud but serene Aarti going on. I told her if we could find a 'Ladoo' shop to offer to Hanuman Ji, couldn't find one. We kept walking till we located a shop. We bought some laddoo, offered them to Hanuman Ji in our thought. We also enjoyed lassi and Gulaab Jamun. Finally we were on the Bus Stand. As we waited there for Bus No. S/4, saw many people busy fighting yet enjoying with the daily bread butter problems. 10 minutes, 15 minutes, 20 minutes.. no Bus, finally we decided to take the auto to the nearest Metro station - Rabindra Sarovar. In another, 10 minutes we were on our way back to Salt Lake. It was beautifu, satisfactory. I believe we should enjoy these smaller joylet packets instead of waiting for the Big Fat Happiness. And my wife.. my love.. seems to agree.

Passionate Desire

Passionate desire is disturbing and frustrating if not fulfilled. Desire shapes up every moment within you in different forms, it burns like fire. If kept unaddressed, it starts bugging your mind, heart and ultimately you as a whole.
If you desire to achieve big (big is something that's defined by you, it's sometimes the dream that you have for short time and sometimes big enough to chase for life) and if that goes unaddressed and unattended, this is sure to give you hard time.
Lately my sense of creativity is giving me burning in my head. I'm getting episodes of these passionate desires pushing and knocking hard to come out and surface my heart and mind. I wanna do this and that and this and that, a very confused state of mind. My heart is singing silently and loudly

'Saari umar hum marr marr ke jee liye

Ek pal to ab humein jeene do jeene do
Give me some sunshine
Give me some rain
Give me another chance i wanna grow up once again'

I know the sleeping creative baby is awake asking me to feed milk to her.

So this comes with the necessary thump in my head... go boy ... do something, you've slept long enough, it's time to wake up.
My life partner is so supportive, trying very hard to wake me up from my sleep, provoking my innate sense of love for all the things i desire to do. I got her a Guitar, a cut-away 6 string acoustic on her b'day this year. Trying to adjust my fingers to play A Major on 5th fret of this b'tiful Black piece.
It's a saying, 'there's always a woman behind a man's success', my mom did all the good she could, now my wife it here to take me to another level of fulfillment of my burning desiring dreams. I feel it, it has come, and I'm ready to sail this boat with her to the eternity of joy.