On The Way

 Recently, I went to Murshidabad with a few relatives, for a short trip. Relatives, as is in my case, would be the last people on earth whom I would like to accompany in a trip but then, sometimes, you have no other option than to compromise.

Maybe one day isn’t enough to pass a judgment. Yet, I failed to find anything worthy of my wasted time and spree, over there. Historical places have never interested me and Murshidabad too had no reason to like me at all. So, I returned, broken, disgusted and enervated by the hardship of the journey. 

On my way back, our bus halted near a petrol pump. I got down.

It was a beautiful night. One of those nights that stun you. One of those nights that make you stop and listen to the sounds of silence.

I wandered alone till I reached a small shop of chocolates, biscuits, spices, and other trivia. There were a couple of benches in front of the shop. About three to four people were sitting and lazing there. One of them grabbed a packet of nuts and began to eat. “Hey, take one” he said to his mate.

“No, I won’t.”

“Arre I know you like nuts. Why are you being shy like a bride?” And they laughed.

On the other bench too, there sat two others, relaxing and chatting away the time.

As I sat at one corner and looked on, tears welled in my eyes. A strange sadness overcame me – a sadness I could not explain, nor could I understand. It was as if after eons, I felt an acute sense of belonging. A sense of rootlessness and belonging, all at the same time.

Melancholy and ecstasy mingled as one and flowed through me, with such zest, that I could not help weeping.

All our lives, we lie in wait. We trust in goodwill, in hope, in humanity and see the trust broken time and again. And you know what makes life all the more pathetic? That we keep on trusting and hoping. Even when everything falls apart, we keep on dreaming and hoping in our castle of ruins.

 

Then there comes moments like these that redeem our consciousness and make us feel that we belong. That we too exist. These moments are all that life is worth living for.

The baul dancing in the Sonarpur-local at 9.50 in the morning, the blind hawker who sells chocolates, the old man reading newspaper at the platform or the madman singing at the dead of the night – they all remind us that we too belong. We don’t realize. We don’t notice but moments like these come and go like fleeting ships and wayward dreams.

We look beyond the horizon and see the crew bound to lands anew.

We wave our hands and sometimes, they wave back.

One life smiles at another and a new era begins.