Many Happy Returns!

For being one of the primary factors in my discovery, at age 5, of my biggest passion,

For teaching me to empathise, to exult, to imagine,

For introducing me to the company I love the most,

For being my first favourite author,

Thank you, Hans Christian Andersen.

Happy Birthday. I hope you are in a world as vibrant and beautiful as those you painted in your books, where wishes come true, nothing is impossible, and everything is right in the end.

Epiphany

It was like this: I went down to the chemist's for toothpaste. When I went to make my payment, I saw this big jar sitting on the counter. It was filled with candy bars of some sort - candy bars in bright, electric pink wrapping, and a trippy cartoon on the label. I squinted through the plastic - these were Jam Treat biscuits coated in chocolate.

Second to scurrying into my room to solve the daily crossword without so much as changing out of my uniform when I got back from school every afternoon, Jam Treat biscuits were the biggest bone of contention between my mother and me. "Why must you have half a pack at one go?", Ma would say, annoyed and incredulous at the same time. "It isn't exactly healthy. And all that jam and sugar and cream! You'll lose all your teeth by the time you're fifteen." Then, turning to my father, "What's wrong with crackers? Or even Bourbon? Why must you get these?". My father would placate my mother, or distract her with stories of how he had run into an old colleague, and my sister and I would solemnly promise to eat no more than two biscuits a day.

Ma had a point, though. In the fifteen years since, I have had two root canal treatments and three times as many cavities filled. I still think it couldn't have been the Jam Treat biscuits. Not those.

Jam Treat. I hadn't had one of those in years now - not since I came to College. It's one of the countless changes 'growing up' made to me, I suppose. (It happens to everyone at some stage or the other. Or does it?) Somewhere along the way, an old habit fell away, like a dried leaf off a branch on a warm March afternoon. There were so many alterations - some bewildering, some through concerted effort, some stemming from the need to protect myself emotionally, and the rest involuntary, as complete as they were quiet - that I never had the time, till that afternoon, to acknowledge a small, insignificant change like the complete absence of jam biscuits from my life. Change, alteration, metamorphosis...so that I don't quite know who I am anymore, on most days. I'm on a constant trip of discovery. There have been more discoveries than usual these past few months. I assume there is some growing up left. It isn't always pleasant, but it isn't bad enough for me to start complaining yet.

So I stuck my hand in and pulled out a bar, holding back the urge to buy the whole jar. Back in my room, I eagerly tore the wrapping open.

Two biscuits sandwiching strawberry jam looked up at me woefully. The chocolate was all over the inside of the wrapping. So much for 'delicious chocolate biscuits with a jam filling, enrobed in chocolate'. The Indian summer can deflate the fanciest product description.

I bit into the biscuit, anticipating the thrill that accompanies the first taste of jam from between crisp biscuits.

It didn't come.

Instead, my first thought was, "This jam is too sweet. Why is the biscuit so hard? This isn't really worth even ten bucks. Who put this thing together?"

It made me sad. Of course, people can outgrow things, especially something like food, especially jam and biscuits and sugar. But I still found myself wondering what the world was coming to if I didn't love even jam biscuits anymore. I worked my way through the biscuit pensively.

The last crumb gone, I began scrunching up the wrapper to throw it into the bin. Molten chocolate rubbed onto my finger. Reflexively, I licked it off. It tasted good.

It still tasted good.

Tentatively, I wiped some more chocolate off the wrapper and tasted it again. A little more...and then, with a chortle, I found myself licking the chocolate off the electric pink wrapping.

It tasted of cocoa, innocence, childhood, and an all-guards-down, uncomplicated happiness.

24

Hmm. Decisive, completely sorted out and raring to go.

One hundred per cent. Well, almost. Rounding-off is a scientific mathematical practice.
(But didn't Lorenz say it's responsible for the butterfly effect?)

Oh wait, this is my 125th post.

Now I'm happy. :)

Moving On

It was on a March morning similar to this one that a classmate said something that I have, since, given more than occasional thought to. We were both standing outside the cafe, where we had bumped into each other at a late breakfast. With the Univs less than three weeks away, we had ended up talking mostly about this chapter and that reading. But on our way out, I stopped under the Dhaba tree, mesmerised, for the millionth time, by the sight of the Cross against a clear, blue sky. So perfect, it seemed unreal.

"You're going to miss College, aren't you?" he asked.

"Yes. Yes, I will." I replied, still overwhelmed by the enormity of the simple fact that I was about to end three years in three weeks.

"I will, too. But I'm glad I'm leaving now", he said, and I turned to look at him.

"You know it's time to leave when people and things that you have always liked begin to annoy you just a wee bit, don't you think?" he said, frowning absent-mindedly as he leafed through his notes, checking for a CED tute. Then he looked up. "Even for College, which I love so much. Especially for College, which I love so much."

We were friends, but not exactly bosom buddies. It was more a cordial acquaintance, a natural result of studying in the same class, living on the same campus and running into each other in the Dining Hall every now and then. Inevitably, we fell out of touch as we moved on and got busy with our lives over the years that ensued. But the closer I get to each finish, and the more I think of his words, the truer they seem to echo.

I'm at the end of several phases at once. I may not have loved every bit of it as much as I loved College, but I'm glad all this happened, I'm glad I learnt so much. But I'm also glad I'm leaving now.

I've rattled my brain about, turned it inside-out, and scoured every inch. No inspiration. Absolutely none. If you're looking for some place to wander to, Muses, right here would be wonderful. Thanks.