Time Travel

Like many writers, it happened to me that when today in the morning I wanted to write something, I couldn't. The paper was right under my arm, and I was fully prepared to fill it with feelings. The pen was set in rest, but the mind was all wrenched.

I went up the house terrace to get into the zone where I can chew upon a thought before it can be given to writing. Sitting alone in that morning, when skies were dripping wet droplets of dew from its greying bluish hue, I was scaling the whole of roof from left, right, and center. I drew a chair and sat with a notebook on my lap. I was looking to latch on something... like an idea. Like a thought worth paying attention to, an inspiration worth writing about. Something with which I can satisfy myself. But I found nothing.

I wanted to come out of this dilemma. The dilemma of this hazy dullness of displeasure, where I am constantly looking in the search for a subject.

So, I brought out my scooter and drove around to see something worth inspiring. I drove on roads I've never driven before. But none of it added to the cause. 

At last, I came down to a park; let out my slippers and walked barefoot on the wet untrimmed grass and then in the muddy unearthed soil, which perhaps was dug by dogs. I sat on a bench and saw the skyline, which was absolutely clear, shining. The clouds were grey from water they were carrying. The weather was such lazy and romantic that it reminded me of my childhood days, when I would go to visit my Nani and Mama-Maami in Chaubatia, Ranikhet, in summers for holidays with my mother and brother. In that moment, images came out running from a celluloid and awakened the wonder-child in me.

I was seeing my younger-self gaping from heights of the mountains to their very trench, while the bus is crisscrossing with other automobiles to get through the narrow cuts-and-passages of the highways. Standing there, one thing led to the other and a whole motion picture started running about things like how my brother and I would fight for the window seat to catch a glimpse of a crispy early morning in the roadside forest, or of the clouds hovering below us as the bus would go further upward. 

On these roads, sometimes the bus would stop before these temples to pay their respect and to seek blessings from the gods for a safe journey. During these stoppages, generally a pujari (priest) would embark the bus carrying vermilion and holy fire in a plate. This resembled a gesture of good fortune or blessings for the safe journey. In monsoon, a variety of drums and instruments were used in praying seasons to keep the gods happy.

All these memories brought me back in time and all of it happened just by going to a park. Wonderful, isn't it? And in the end, I had an excellent piece.