Looking back..

As you make your way across the pebbles of a dry road that mounts and meanders like your lover’s mind, someone who you know comes and whispers---- you walk slowly nowadays. Is it the road; you wonder. Or the pebbles that break your pace? You walk fast. You always have. But what happened? somewhere down the line did the pebbles grow bigger? Or has the road become wider?

Suddenly you enter you room and start objectifying it. Instead of being a part of it, you start looking at it. You see it as your ‘young’ room. The room that witnessed a many of firsts. The first time you woke up embarrassed in the middle of the night, the first time you secretly hid the broken pieces of a vase and got away with it, the first time you put up a poster of Elvis and felt proud of it even if you didn't know who he was.The first time you watched pornography on the brand new computer which has now become faded, but proudly so.

This was the room that knew all your secrets. Like how you didn’t understand English songs, but felt intimidated when your school friends used to harp about them. This was the room that knew that the first thing you liked about your first crush was actually in your head, and you would never be sure if she was the same girl in real or not, and you didn’t want to. And now you see it as a room that saw all that. Now it has become the room you had when you were younger.

The leaves still fall from the bending trees in the dust stained roads of big cities the same way they had ten years ago. Cars honk, probably a bit more loudly, for they have gotten a little bigger. Children still run for their school buses and some parents still chase behind them.

School has changed too,certain teachers have retired though, some new teachers in the old schools walk around queerly in the same way as the old teachers did. Some old schools have a new coat of paint on them, but they would probably have the same scratches on the old desks. Streets tell the same stories and shops probably remain same, a thin line of silvery hair peeps out from the same shopkeepers but you don’t recognise.

The world often changes with a lot of pomp and show, but only when you change, do you realise, that the world that you think have been changing all along, must have changed a bit less than you have. And now you are old, but not that old. You just didn't realise it.

Suddenly elders don’t get surprised anymore to see you going to office in formals and how avoiding responsibilities isn't cute anymore. You didn’t realise that you probably tire out a bit too often, or your watchman is no more someone whom you can call “uncle” anymore. When while addressing you, a telemarketer uses Mr. (or miss) followed by your surname and your parents don’t tease you about it anymore.

Ahh,the parents..they don't change do they?The same mixture of childlike playfulness and ancient rigidity that both disgusted and enthralled you at different points of time. You remember the time when your mother became apprehensive about you spending nights out with friends, and the time when your father used to hold your hands to cross streets. In some years probably, you would do the same. On the same streets. Probably there will be a metro somewhere whizzing past above you. But I guess your father's hand would feel the same. 

I do know,that I miss my parents more than I let up.There has always been a barrier of sorts there. Maybe ,one of these days i'll call my dad up and tell him that I miss him and tell my mum how much i love her.

In the end,I realize that I am not so old,but the gravy train that's supposed to take me there is right on time.