When you wish upon a star
February 24, 2006
Not paragliding per-se, but another type of high...
"You’ve seen your birth your life and death
asked Jim Morrison in The Movie, and while I am not sure if my life would amount to even a short music video, there are certain moments that stick on in my memory, perhaps in the vain hope that even a pointless life that runs its course has certain turning points that are important from its own local point of view.
It was quite an ordinary sunny day, and I was perhaps no more than six. My eyes widened with wonder as usual as we sped past the giant two story cricket bat on the return trip from school every day. This was the best part of the day: to board Khajroo's bright red auto rickshaw with the nine other kids and head home in the afternoon. The trip would get better and better as we dropped off more and more kids, till I, the last to be dropped, could move to the "back" seat that was the domain of the senior kids, from the wooden plank we juniors were otherwise relegated to. These were idyllic days in Indore, with balmy evenings spent in the park, and slurping shrikhand late into the night as the cacophony of yet another gujju wedding filtered through the skies over Vallabhnagar.
With its weight unloaded, Khajroo and his rickshaw felt the immortal lightness of being as we rounded the corner going full blast to enter the street where home was. I giddily bounced around on the back seat, gleefully enjoying being thrown up and down, when suddenly, in a flash, tragedy. The next moments are hazy at best: an anguished howl, pain, moments later the panicked look of horror on my mothers face, my sister crying because of the disturbance, Khajroo's grave expression, his apologies.
I couldn't bear to look at it; there it was, my beloved basta (a briefcase carried by kids to school in India), completely bashed up. It never stood a chance against the weight of the rickshaw on the rear wheel. Khajroo looked at me and grinned, trying to assure me that it would be as good as new after Chotu, the cobbler from down the street, was done with it. I didn't believe him. Chotu had started pummeling it with a large rock to bring it back to shape, but the matte smooth aluminum finish would soon have more pockmarks than Om Puri's face. But the real horror was when the tattered remains of two of my books were pulled out from the compressed innards. As I tearfully gazed at the shredded brown cover, that brown paper cover that my mother would lovingly drape each book with, in that fateful moment, I made a solemn vow: by the age of 37, I declared, I would write two books of my own to avenge this dishonor that had befallen these cherished storehouses of imagination under my watch.
And next month, this dream will finally come true as
Not paragliding per-se, but another type of high...
"You’ve seen your birth your life and death
You might recall all of the rest
Did you have a good world when you died?
Enough to base a movie on?"
asked Jim Morrison in The Movie, and while I am not sure if my life would amount to even a short music video, there are certain moments that stick on in my memory, perhaps in the vain hope that even a pointless life that runs its course has certain turning points that are important from its own local point of view.
It was quite an ordinary sunny day, and I was perhaps no more than six. My eyes widened with wonder as usual as we sped past the giant two story cricket bat on the return trip from school every day. This was the best part of the day: to board Khajroo's bright red auto rickshaw with the nine other kids and head home in the afternoon. The trip would get better and better as we dropped off more and more kids, till I, the last to be dropped, could move to the "back" seat that was the domain of the senior kids, from the wooden plank we juniors were otherwise relegated to. These were idyllic days in Indore, with balmy evenings spent in the park, and slurping shrikhand late into the night as the cacophony of yet another gujju wedding filtered through the skies over Vallabhnagar.
With its weight unloaded, Khajroo and his rickshaw felt the immortal lightness of being as we rounded the corner going full blast to enter the street where home was. I giddily bounced around on the back seat, gleefully enjoying being thrown up and down, when suddenly, in a flash, tragedy. The next moments are hazy at best: an anguished howl, pain, moments later the panicked look of horror on my mothers face, my sister crying because of the disturbance, Khajroo's grave expression, his apologies.
I couldn't bear to look at it; there it was, my beloved basta (a briefcase carried by kids to school in India), completely bashed up. It never stood a chance against the weight of the rickshaw on the rear wheel. Khajroo looked at me and grinned, trying to assure me that it would be as good as new after Chotu, the cobbler from down the street, was done with it. I didn't believe him. Chotu had started pummeling it with a large rock to bring it back to shape, but the matte smooth aluminum finish would soon have more pockmarks than Om Puri's face. But the real horror was when the tattered remains of two of my books were pulled out from the compressed innards. As I tearfully gazed at the shredded brown cover, that brown paper cover that my mother would lovingly drape each book with, in that fateful moment, I made a solemn vow: by the age of 37, I declared, I would write two books of my own to avenge this dishonor that had befallen these cherished storehouses of imagination under my watch.
And next month, this dream will finally come true as
finally comes out. I will not be present when this momentous occasion happens on March 24 or so, as I will be in exile in the backwaters of Kerala, braving the heat and humidity as some strange woman pummels my own tired body to shape between bouts of strange cuisine made up of peculiar ingredients like five stars (what does this mean? oh the uncertainty.) However, I trust that you will celebrate, and buy lots of copies from crcpress.com, because not only is it this little boys' dream come true, but it's the dream of the
littleboywhosebastaflewoutofhishandin-
anautorickshawcausinggreatpainandanguish
in all of us.
posted by PM at 12:54 PM
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