Changing Seasons..!!

Green hard seat and a rusted bar to hold…pressed to the corner by the two fat men and sticking onto the mud stuck window ..luckily half opened and blowing enough wind to keep you wide awake..endless coffee estates running behind your sight..in between some villages..some open paddy fields..occasional group of villagers…all of them ignorant that the red bus is zipping past them and taking me to my Coorg....the more the distance covered by the bus…I was feeling more away from the school…more away from the routine…and gradually into a space which I would have been waiting..for months now..

All my school days..I would wait for the sultry and sweaty summer…for a carefree two months of discover-your-life-times…feel highly energetic…eat amazingly fast and full..play almost all day and night..and only worry about which game to play next at the end of one..

I believe that your parents also love you more these days…it seems strange but true… there would be no yelling from the kitchen early morning to get your butt off from the bed… It was shocking to hear mom say to dad..” let the kids sleep..don't wake them up…:) no rush to eat breakfast…actually..they didn’t even know if you have eaten or not… nobody made sure you have to brush your teeth before the first glass of coffee..may be milk in some of your cases..not mine…)…nobody bothered if you didn’t change your clothes…no bath in the morning…and how I loved those mornings which started after 10 …!!! These were the days where there would be no home work…no assignments…If at all there was any reading from a printed material…then it had to be the adult magazine sourced by the eldest cousin in secrecy..the learning would be a different kind…!!

If you were like me…then I bet the first thing that has come to your mind now is your close cousin brothers and sisters..and their homes…in a different town than the one you lived..…Always!!! How I loved to travel in those jam packed buses..with absolutely no place to keep your second leg…forget about a seat!! With a bag in one hand…one eye on mom who is far away in the front with sister..and one eye on backward moving fields and cattle and villages…mind would jump like a monkey..unable to control the fun you are going to have this season..and by the time you would reach coorg and walk past a couple of miles in the estates and paddy fields..the only thing you would do is sleep like grandma’s cat in front of the cozy dark kitchen’s warm fire…

Come sunshine and the tail would start wagging..Lesson One of the nature would begin and by lunchtime.. you will be grinning from one side of the ear to the other with either a scratched and bleeding knee or a twisted ankle or a torn chaddi…yeah yeah..obvious reasons..blame the tree branch! Would have played in the small lake till the sun went down and come back home to a hot shower and then family prayers which seemed like an eternity…Devil would stand next to you with sleeping pills and I hardly resisted..ever…! Dinner would be spicy chicken..enough to kill the devil’s pills and make sure you giggled till midnight with half a dozen cousins sleeping in one room..and yes…every time an irritated adult shouted from the next room ..you would giggle more!!!

Going back to School post this season was never bad… you would get a new pair of clothes and shoes..which you knew have to be kept good till march next year..and of course..the early excitement of checking who has made it to the next class..checking which bench to sit…feeling sad when in the first period of day one, the class teacher would ensure you and your best friend sit separately. Uh..how I hated them when they made me sit next to boys always…! Then the smell of the new books…some wrapped in brown sheets and a label on it with your name written on it ..boldly shouting that it has to be studied by you…the Master! By the time all novelty wears off..you are in the rainy season and if you have seen rains in coorg, I don’t have to stress more on how much you hate this season. No playing in the ground…your uniform is wet and dirty everyday..bags get wet and don’t dry even next day..and the frogs and insects seem to shout more at night than Anil sir in Math class !

You pray for these tough times to end and by the time the craving winter sets in..( ok..guys in US can stop laughing now..Indian winters are bad enough :) It does brings in much joy because atleast you can run around during the day. You love mummy’s hot chicken and egg curry in the night and it’s never bad to sleep warm in those thick woolen rugs. Mornings are bad.. for all you want is that extra 5 minute of sleep and somehow feel that the entire family is hell bent on not giving you that…the festivals in India seemed to have been planned around this time..while the Ganesha habba ensures that you are playing the new movie music as loud on your street as much as you wanted in your room…  Deepavali gives you a chance to test your courage levels holding and blasting green colour hydrogen stuff.. Dasara time ensures that you get to eat amazing food…and pass the November…enters Christmas and year end, it seems like a long party time..with a few monthly tests and revision exams thrown in..a school day and a sports day  in between to ensure you miss classes officially…!

When the toughest season starts in January, you are suddenly serious in life. Every book gets your dirty handprints once a day..pages are made thicker with small notes clipped in the sides…real friends are those who study together..parents sit through with some of the gods lesser children like me..but the theme of the season is to ensure whatever you carried on your back to school all through the year inside the bag is mixed in the grinder and fed inside your mind and expected to come out in neat handwriting during the course of a 10 days of final exams. But then once a subject is done..then the brain washes of that extra redundant memory space and focus is on tomorrow’s subject. You better not have your birthday during this season..and better not have any subject with incomplete notes…these are forbidden sins of the season. And suddenly..like magic…on the final day of the so called final exams…life begins to blossom again. You will start seeing the colors of life..the empty grounds calling you and your friends to brings stumps and bats.... and of course ..the faithfully following Ice-cream gaadiwala and that uncle who always sold cucumbers and green mango with salt and red chilli powder..!!…Mind slowly wakes up to the other senses in this world…. the shops on the street ..the whistles from friends to get out of home..the mango trees…and the fun is stealing them under the nose of the guard..the swim in the well with tyre tube around your waist…the cycle ride to neighbors’ area for a betting match…and oops..April 10^th…the only dreaded results day…but guess what…its summer time again!!!

It’s been almost 20 years now that I stepped out of the school gate from the Joseph’s in Mysore and I remember that day..I felt lost..felt lonely..felt like going back again one last time..but didn’t..and I have seen this cycle of seasons changing relentlessly then onwards..and very unfortunately……I have actually felt that the seasons changed without affecting me.

As soon as you enter the next phase of college, you will notice that you actually are changing your preferences. Summer time is uncomfortable and hot and not fun…while you longer hated monsoons and actually started loving rains.. Bikes replaced the hero ranger cycle…branded shoes replaced the black Bata shoes…metal cross over a rusty chain replaced the red uniform tie…cigarette replaced pen in the fingers..and the ever so romantic heart replaced the perfectly working brains!!  Falling in & out of love with girls who liked you and with girls who didn’t know you exist …..taking extra time to get ready in the morning…not to climb the bus unless you can hang with one hand over the door…never to run for cover when it rains but actually get drenched with a smile.. Teenage is so lovely isn’t it……you feel that the younger ones are not upto you and elders have no life.. The girls in the Kinetic Honda would fly their long hair..wearing tight top and jeans which I am sure took an eternity to get inside and zipped up :-) The boys had a different walking style....Boys with girl friends were class apart…Boys who were trying for girl friends were encouraged…Boys who believed in their mom and waited for love after marriage were avoided.

Most daring would be the ones who drive their bikes during heavy rains…with the girl behind to hug you tightly enough so that your back never gets wet :-)  Girls loved those boys who had the shirt button opened and generously wrapped their girl with the leather jackets to beat the chill..you tried all mannerisms of the guys on screen..and would always feel jealous of the fact that best looking girls in your class had boyfriends from the senior batches :(

As that season passed…and life started to stare at you in your eyes…job hunt replaced all other forms of hunting :)  blessed were those who were guided by parents or well wishers..but blissful were those who did everything on their own..before you realized…you were spending your days and most part of the night inside the most cleanest walls you have ever seen… sealed glass windows and temperature controlled machines.. Both friends and nature gradually disappeared…. Seasons went by without any hints…They didn't care for me and moved on ..then I stopped missing them.. slowly, we broke up like 2 distant lovers.

I get reminded that it’s summer time when kids are at home….when they join these programmed coaching classes with rules and timings!! …I get reminded of the rainy days when I get stuck endlessly due to the over flooding on airport road and end up late for my meetings.. Winter seemed to have come now..because I don’t need to use the AC in the bedroom... I don’t know how the last dozen of years have zoomed past in my life…But I am slowy becoming aware...all over again!!…and I don’t want to see another dozen of years go by without the seasons changing for me !!!