Goodbyes

(This is a pretty old composition of mine... Well, three months old... I was dealing with the double whammy of the departure of my boyfriend for his first sail- he's in the Merchant Navy, and a death of a grand uncle, just a coupla weeks prior to that. This granduncle of mine was from Kolkata. Hence the mention of the city)

There’s something about a goodbye.

It’s one of the most unwelcome things in one’s life. But a goodbye can sometimes be one of the best things of a person’s life too.

Sometimes, we get so immersed in our lives, that all it takes is a departure to bring the focus back to what is important. The departure of a near and dear one, makes us relive long forgotten memories, followed by the bittersweet feeling of guilt. Of thinking, “I really should have spent more time with him/ her while I still could”.

                Sometimes, that revelation or wakeup call need not be prompted by something far so severe as a death in the family. Mostly, it’s all the little things.

                The vanishing “pukurs” in the by lanes of Old Calcutta for example. Seeing fewer and fewer of these scum covered bodies of water every time I go there on holiday just makes the memories of early childhood more and more vivid. I understood that they needed to be filled in for they only served the purpose of being breeding grounds for mosquitoes and it was required for expansion of houses. Yet, the memories associated with these places protest outrageously at such change.

 I remember the folklore of snake sightings in the pukurs when women folk went to wash their clothes or the men went to bathe. We children would giggle at the uselessness of giving away soiled clothes to the washerman, who we knew, would simply wash them in the even more soiled water of the ponds and simply iron them and return them to us, probably dirtier and more germ infested than before.

                Another example. A few years back, our ancestral home in Kolkata was torn down to build three new four storeyed building in its place. Saying goodbye to the old place was nothing but inevitable. But there’s something about a high rise (well, alright, a four storey building) that just doesn’t match up to a rambling bungalow, overshadowed with all species of trees imaginable.

                Many a productive afternoon of my childhood  was spent whiling away in the shadows of aforementioned trees, rolling in the perpetually wet grass and swatting away irrepressible mosquitoes, that were as much a part of Kolkata as the Bengali language.

                When the source of such poignant memories is ripped away and when goodbye is the only way, is it no wonder that the memories get buried deep in our consciousness?

                These memories stay repressed, but then, something always happens that triggers them and brings back the smallest things that spelt comfort in a child’s mind; a grandmother’s gentle call, wild slobbery love from dogs, the sharp tang of bay leaves when my brother and I plucked them out and pretended to cook with them or make “shanti jal” and spatter the dogs with it.

                They say that growing old is mandatory while growing up is up to us. Whether we like it or not, we all need a dose of reality that forces us to abandon our make believe world of childhood where all dreams come true. 

                When time came to bid adieu to my beau as he set out on his first sail, it felt like the entire world around me was tinged in grey. Listlessly, I turned to my laptop for comfort and found it in digital photographs of times spent with friends in junior college.

                It was like seeing through a looking glass, into the past; a past where everyone was blissfully unaware that in less than two years, everybody would take on a different path. Paths, so varied, that everyone was hard pressed for time to exchange even simple greetings via messenger.

                Photographs are another way of making the past real. What is it about a ridiculous pictures of people frolicking during a picnic that can make you aware of the exact way you felt when the sun stung your eyes? Or the way you could always smell the chlorine from the three pools, no matter where you went on the venue? Or the lively games of Uno where all the other players were boys?

                Goodbyes. They’re just that way you know. They make everything come rushing back, and the memories wash over you like the powerful surf. Sometimes, they sadden you. But others make you feel hopeful. They remind you to move out of the express lane of life, pick up the phone and concentrate on making more memories with loved ones; memories, that will one day, pull us through another sad goodbye.

~ Inquisitive I