Thursday, October 2, 2008

A Day, Still to Remember

A Day, Still to Remember … …

Then I was a lad of fifteen years old. My eyes were filled with dreams, thoughts and imaginations; my body was filled with energy and my mind was filled with diverse aspirations.

Basically I am a person who was groomed and nurtured in a village. Before reaching the age of twelve, I spent my babyhood and youthful years at my village. In that way my live style was quite a bit different from a life of a child of metropolis or a city. I fancied to take chances on the fields; I spent time with neighbouring persons at our village and always resided in a uniform and integrated manner. We never felt that we would part ourselves in future. But “man proposes God disposes”.

I had to take myself off from our village thinking about my future career. As usual there was no career prospects as such. High schools could hardly be figured out and in every step there were problems after problems. Eventually I had to migrate in Kolkata for pursuing higher education. After spending a year or so I again thought of paying a visit at our village. And finally I got my chances. There was a long alcove at our school during the months of summer.

The day finally arrived and I was already ready to start my dreaming venture. More the train started to gain its momentum; more beleaguered I began to feel. The only picture that repeatedly arrived before my eyes that when I would see my parents, when I would perceive my kins, my errant little sister so on and so forth. Long hours passed by. Eventually I reached my destiny. But at that point of eon dark clouds filled the sky and there was not a ray of light that penetrated through it. As if everything was pitch dark.

To shield myself from heavy shower I took shelter under a tree. I had no other alternative and not a single house or soothing shelter came to my eyes. No sooner had I placed myself under the leaves of the tree than a girl of my age also came to protect herself. But the most surprising feature about this was that none of us either talked or communicated with each other. Both of us were absolutely flabbergasted and dumb founded. Probably both of us wanted to say something but could not. After the weather appeared to be settled both of us started moving on either direction of the alike road. The girl moved in the direction opposite to mine.

After the above incident took place in my life thirty long years have passed. Now I am a father of two sons, a husband of a wife and hold a respectable and dignified position in the society. Yet I have not disclosed the matter to anyone; be it to my parents or my sons, or my wife o friends. More so, I also came across the tree three or four times after the above incident have occurred in my life. Every time I pass across the tree I feel that I would notice the girl that I saw thirty years before. Even I pause for a minute or two anticipating that I would spot the girl.

But till now my anticipations, dreams have not really converted into reality.

Now when I take time to ponder about the nostalgic incident, I feel that she also wanted to say something like me but failed. Perhaps a day will come when we would meet each other. After all the language of true love must be identical… …

Composed By: -
Saptarshi Dutt.

VARIATION OF LOVE

Variation of Love

The etymology of love is hard to trace. Likewise, the definition of love is hard to locate. Basically, the concept of love varies from person to person, from age to age. Literally speaking, the notion of love may appear to be very simple prima facie. But an in-depth study; would reveal that ‘love’, if understood in true sense is as hard as anything else.

‘Love’ --- to a philosopher may mean to be eternal. While to a business man / to a business community, it may mean to be ‘a way of exchange, more precisely give and take policy’, which floats from both sides. Likewise, to a baby; it may mean to be shouting aloud and pleading for help on the lap of his mother. While to the parent or guardian, it may mean to be something more. Also, the sense of love may still go on carrying different sense of obligation or meaning to the sagas of seers or saints.

‘Love’ itself cannot be generalized. Mostly because, it does not have any specific code or norms, by which one can understand its characteristics. Unlike various scientific inventions or discoveries, (where most of the things have their common tenets or features); ‘love’ does not have any universal characteristics by which one can draw an inference of love. Hence, it varies from person to person, from mentality to mentality, from attitudes to attitudes, from maturity to maturity.

All these adjectives or phrases that are high lightened in the captioned paragraph, (viz, mentality, attitudes, maturity etc.) plays a decisive role under the umbrella of love. To elaborate, let us see the love, which parents usually imposes upon their children. Generally, parents (taking the matter from Indian society) show-case wide amount of tender ness upon their children. They are not even hesitant to give away all their property and materialistic possessions for the sake of their child. Parents’ sacrifice sometimes escalates to their own life-sacrifice (life of the parents’). They do all these, not for themselves, but for upliftment and betterment of their kids. But these very attitudes may not be prevalent by the wife, peers, neighbors or well-wishers (apart from rarest of the rare cases).

What you would call it as love (during your baby-hood years) may turn out to be a funny stalk when you would grow up to be a lad of 12 years. Also, the kind of love, which a boy / girl possesses during his late school years or early college years towards his girl-friend / her boy-friend, may soon turn out to be an unpragmatic or irrational when those persons, joins his / her office or any corporate sector. Likewise, the stint of love also undergoes sea-change when a nuptial bond matures into an experienced couple. The essence of love lies not during the bliss ness of the romantic moments of life, but during the gloomy moments of life. The real test of love lies in the fact, how to tackle the painful hurdles of life’s sagas. The perseverance, pain-sticking attitudes, honesty, belief, adjustment, selflessness etc. are the morals of love. It can be said that the true stint of love is best experienced during the years of despondency and deject ness. For if one gets support from his / her partner during ‘those very stages’; one can be well ensured that there is very little chances of being bluffed by the same partner. Thus, in a nutshell, the meaning or experience of ‘love’ is never static. It changes with time, it changes with situations, and it alters with experiences. And to mould one self in accordance with all such stuffs, reveals the true spirit of mellowness.