Saturday, June 10, 2006

growing up


Growing up meant outgrowing polka dotted fancy 'durga puja' shirts for less gaudier, plain, ones... it meant wondering how actors changed costumes in the blink of an eye during song sequences.

growing up meant learning about the worlds of Right and Wrong, Dos and Donts, and then witnessing their boundaries dissolve.. it meant watching the black and white blend into solemn grays... it meant learning that the 'ever after' in the 'lived happily ever after' ending stories was actually a Short, Finite period of Time

growing up meant asking questions to which there were no answers: in a fight between a hippo and a shark who will win? do you love daddy more or me?

growing up meant watching adults make funny faces and laughing at their foolishness.. or breathing life into battery powered toys, favourite pencilboxes, and fragrant erasers such that losing them sapped you of reasons to be happy

growing up meant letting school teachers build edifices in your memory that lasted more than a lifetime... it meant piling up birthday candles until there were too many

growing up meant not letting a drop of pee out until mother said 'ssssssss'... it meant learning to tie shoelaces by yourself... or lisping 'baba black sheep' before proud, indulgent mama and papa

growing up meant saying 'god promise' to be privy to deep, dark and mysterious littlechildren secrets... it meant swearing to be 'best friends for ever'

growing up meant dreading when you had to look mother in her eyes and lie and realising that it was futile... it meant listening to grandma's fantastical stories with rapt attention and then believing in them... it meant being petrified by the palpable dread in ghost tales


growing up meant having an idea of 'adult' questons and wondering who to get their answers from... it meant watching a world of infinite possibilties shrink when you fathomed those answers

growing up means biting nostalgic pies from memory and almost smiling out loud at the lucidity of bygone years... it also means losing an artlessness and not mourning the Loss

6 comments:

Anonymous said...

do u really think that people lose their artlessness as they grow up?
i know of some people who are the same inside out.

Anonymous said...

do u really think that people lose their artlessness as they grow up?
i know of some people who are the same inside out.

yashovardhan gupta said...

hmmm, interesting article!!!

didnt know you were so deep :)

Y? said...

it also means losing an artlessness and not mourning the Loss

so true. you get so used to the world you fail to look at it in new ways , you are less open and more complacent. ANd then you accept yourself that way!
I like your post.

Anonymous said...

one rockin article man..
greattttt stuff..
keep it up!! :)

satyajit said...

@ anonymous: ya there must be.. i'm not denying that but they're lost in the crowd

@y?: thx a lot..
somehow once you grow out of your childhood skin you can't go back into it and walk around..u can only look at it wistfully

@paka: thx paka