The older I get… the more I seem to want to go back to my childhood 🙂
It just seems to me, that the more complex, the world around me gets, I start to value the simplicity that life was. Thoughts and memories drift in and out of my mind and the line between them just blurs out.
Have you ever felt an ache when you are in the middle of a reverie about some thing long back, and you are so deeply engrossed, that you are practically living the moment again… and then at one, you “come back” into the present, into “Now” and have this dull sad feeling that, those moments are just gone forever? That you have grown up, grown out, grown apart, that situations have changed, and all that you are left with is such a feeling of loss… of not being able to have held those moments close to you for longer…
…the irony is that while you were living those times, you really had no idea of how precious those passing minutes were…
…any ways, so like I said, I am drifting around nowadays, between, the past, the present and the future. I have a lot of time on my hands and no distractions… and so cute, sweet memories creep in, and I am often amazed that its not the “big bang” events that I remember, but the seemingless, routine ones…
… like for example, I am aching to go back and celebrate the diwali of my childhood. I grew up in Delhi, and so we’d have the Autumn holidays around October. Exams just over, and the climate just perfect, I remember spending whole days loitering about the colony parks with my band of merry men 🙂
The place where we lived was surrounded by parks..and it was in one of these parks that we’d have the Dusshehra celebrations. There was a group of people who would create the Dusshehra effigies of Ravana, Kumbhkaran and Meghnath from scratch and we’d spent delightful days just tracking the development. We’d spent entire days in the park, interacting with this group, inspecting the hands, legs, the face of the effigies, tracking how many crackers were placed in them…. I can’t imagine a more carefree time. Our mom’s would actually pack us tiffins for lunch and bring them to the park, cause we’d just refuse to budge!
I remember, making lists for Diwali, of crackers, and diyas, and the Diwali cleaning, and then the D day itself. And more than any crackers or friends, I remember the simple pooja at home. Such peace, such contentment. The house set aglow with diya’s and candles, guests, sweets, and a lovely pooja which has stories within stories, and in papa’s voice. <sigh>
I really do want to go back home for Diwali this year… back to Delhi… back to the sudden nip in the air, and the bhutta, and the Diwali lights and sales. No matter how old I get, I feel like the time spent with my folks is the best time ever.
… I wish somethings never changed! that I was a kid, in the same place, similarly carefree and at peace, with lesser cares and more smiles…
<Sigh> <sigh> <sigh>
(Not the typical come back post you were expecting, right?, There is more to come!)
Sunshine Days 