Gone are the days when the school reopened in June and we settled in our new desks and benches. We queued up at the book depot and got our new books and notes with the school emblem on them.
We wanted two Sundays and no Mondays and yet managed to line up ourselves for the daily morning prayers.
We learnt writing with slates and pencils, and progressed to fountain pens and ball pens and then micro tips. We began drawing with crayons we evolved to colour pencils and finally to sketch pens. We started calculating with tables and then with Clarke’s tables and later with computers. Days gone by are not going to return again.
We chased one another in the corridors in intervals and returned to the classrooms drenched in sweat. We had lunch in classrooms, corridors, playgrounds, under the trees and in cycle sheds.
Gone are the days when a single P. T. period in a week’s timetable was more eagerly awaited than the monsoon.
Gone are the days when cricket was played with writing pads as bats and socks rolled into balls.
Gone are the days when few played “Kabadi” and “Kho-Kho” in the scorching sun while others simply played “book cricket” in the confines of a classroom.
I remember flashes of fights but no conspiracies, of competitions but seldom jealousy.
Gone are the days when we used to watch live Cricket telecast in the TV’s in the shop windows during the interval and lunch breaks. Few rushed at 3:50 to conquer window seats in school bus while few others had “Big Fun” – “peppermint”, “kulfi” and “road side pani puri” at 4:00
Gone are the days of Sports day and the school Annual day and the one-month long preparations before them.
Gone are the days of the stressful Quarterly, Half early and Annual Exams and the most enjoyed holidays after them.
Gone are the days of tenth and twelfth standards, when we spent almost the whole year writing revision tests.
We learnt, we passed, we failed, we played, we won, we lost, we enjoyed, we laughed, we cried, we fought, we thought. So much experience, all this and more.
Gone are the days when we used to talk for hours with our friends.
Gone are the days when we played games on the road.
Gone are the days when we used to chat with friends on grounds.
Gone are the days when we studied just to pass.
Gone are the days when we shouted on the road. Now we don’t even shout at home.
Gone are the days when we had no money in our pockets and yet the world and out hearts were full of happiness.
Gone are the days but not the memories which will linger in hearts for ever and ever….
This self made genius has been my greatest inspiration of late. Before him the honour went to Homer Hickam. During various points in my life, it was shared by great minds like Shakuntala Devi, Albert Einstein, Thomas Alwa Edison, Micheal Vasanth, Linus Trovalds, Subramaniam(DMACS), Bill Landreth... Names from the contemporary and other wise. But unlike these names Nash has somehow inspired me not just in reading about his personal life and being awestruck but then also got me to sit at his research work. It was through an unconcious motion of fate that I happened to stumble on him. "A Beautiful Mind" was inspiring and absorbing but minmax was what got me into him. He had nothing to do with it, but the creative brain he showed in taking it to further exalted heights... Unlike many others(which includes John Von Neumann) he has never had a great mind. What he had been bestowed upon with was the creativity. To look at problems from a wholly different angle. One from which the whole world had never imagined possible. New dimensions seemed to exist to known problems when he was at work.Fighting the world is one thing. But what poor thing it is if you have to fight your own self. He did that and did that successfully. To know that and to realise that you are abnormal and to defy science and to cure oneself from what he suffered from(schizophrenia) is considered to be something phenomenal. Things like these have got me deeply engrossed into game theory of late. Am I just getting interested to it or is it really pushing me onward for something deeper? Only time will tell.
The first step is always the most difficult for anyone. Ask a child what is more difficult? Its first tottering step or the sprint it later got acclimatised to. I have for long been contemplating on this idea of having my own blog. But procrastination has always been one of my strong points. The point of action must come at some point of time. The sooner the better. My best friend gave me one of the best lines i keep musing over in the recent past. "Dirty your hands if you want to learn something".
Went to Besant Nagar beach last night at 12. This was the first time for me being in the beach at that late hours. Add to it my own driving all the way to the beach and back. Makes it all the more interesting. May be crazy if you know the way I drive. But then there are times for celebration. I wont call this exhilaration but a celebration all the same. Had been waiting for a long time for this monumental moment to fall on me. Now all those friends who have lent me some very nice moments to enjoy in the past couple of years are now placed. An year from now, we are all assured of a future for ourselves.
Pedestrial as it may seem, it is the dawning of a new era in the life of so many guys. Guys who always thought their future was bleak now have their own space to breath. This feeling comes to everyone at some point of their life time or the other. The feeling that you are not a no-good. you too got something in you. For me personally it dawned some five years ago. There sure would have been some who would have enjoyed that moment today or atleast within the past month.
Always there is the beginner's eagerness to anything that is new. The first blog generally tends to be the longest. Hopefully this is not my latest fad. Hoping to continue soon.
