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Sweet Heart Stories

I would have loved to start this piece with the well-known disclaimer "All characters here are fictional and any resemblence to any person living is merely coincidental". But nothing is farther from the truth, since this is a piece of my emotional life; a few words about my attractions to a bunch from the fairer sex I had come across. I dare not make a story out of it! But believe me, I'm not stone-faced or gloomy right now. Instead I'm looking back at selected episodes from the last twenty seven odd years with a smile, a little bit of regret and the contentment from the wisdom that came with them. The names are irrelevant as these beautiful minds themselves are larger than what I could perceive of them, still commanding reverence.

What reminds me of these adventures is an occational chat with one of them! After my heart recovers from the ensuing sunken feeling, everytime, I count the pieces left on the board - the black lessons I learnt and my white take-homes.

At school it was a crush, a little good feeling that I kept inside all through the last two years at school. What attracted me was her liveliness on stage and her command over English, be it the competative speeches or compering the school events. She was one of the inspirations for me to gather nerves to stand on stage and talk - put simply, I wanted to imitate her. She looked good as well, though she wasn't the best-looking lass around.

By the time I could tell myself that I really liked her, I was made the school prefect - that meant a bigger ego and an image to protect. Moreover, ours was a pretty conservative school and boys rarely met girls, except ofcourse in classes, and talking to them was considered a sin. Only a couple of my most trustworthy (hah!) friends knew about this tingling feeling of mine. Very soon the wind blew over the walls of the boys dormitory (you know that's easy!!), and when it blew back I heard she said "she didn't expect this from me!". In a desparate attempt to rebuild my image, I orchestrated an accidental(ho! ho!) confrontation before a study hour and lied to her "You see, it's all rumours. Don't bother". A girl with half her brain would have taken that as a confirmation of what she heard, yet I didn't get this view of my "show" until the wind came back and told me "that she was very upset and back at the hostel had cried bitterly". I never got the nerves to follow that up, instead chose to dig into my books to prepare for the final exams.

After I left the school she was always there in my mind, and I wanted to talk to her. But this time all I wanted to do was to apologise for being rude, if I had been, and start a friendship if possible. Although I knew her address by heart, my first letter to her was written during the Christmas of 1998, a little over a year and a half later. I wrote a lot of drafts, just to sound perfect and I still have a funny copy with me. I did not write my name on the envelope and I had written so much all over the outer page, mostly apologies, just to ensure that she wouldn't tear it away. My new year surprise was a letter from her, a very friendly one at that, and that started a good friendship.

We talked in general and wrote freely about things that happened around, right after we sorted out the ambiguities of intentions. I met her family at her place and it was a great easy feeling. And this went on till she got married. I was the only 'senior' to have been present at her wedding and I am still not sure who were the most embarrassed of the lot then- her classmates who came for the wedding or myself. A big deal later she wrote to me about Aditya, her son, and that's where the line dropped.

To this day I don't know how much of what the "winds" told me at the hostel, is true. I never bothered, especially after we became friends. That probably is the lesson I learnt - to be skeptic about what the winds would tell you or, better still, avoid a wind when you are talking to a close soul. Kind of talking through the vaccuum!

posted by ദീപക് -:-Deepak @ 12:04 AM