“Lackadaisical” surely is the word. Even a Nepalese counterpart or a translation of the word would have been as accurate as it could be to describe the effort I put into riding my bike. My mom would never comment on my biking, especially when I was carrying her at the backseat. You are always bound do get cautious whenever there’s people sitting behind, on your bike (cautious for everyone but friends, though). So I wouldn’t ride the way I normally do. But whatever be the situation, it was pretty much the first time I heard my mom commenting on how I was riding like an aged man; lazy and slow( albeit safe), dull posture, et cetera, et cetera. I chuckled at first, but realized instantly that her comments actually made sense. I had been riding quite sluggishly. Maybe it was in my late teens that I practically had a bike for myself (though I never owned one). I had a knack for this acceleration thing and instantly fell in love with bikes built with excellent pick-up. So basically, my obsession for that “Pulsar clutch” made sense. I was never really into reckless driving though. I’d hit the road occasionally to get that top speed thrill (mostly deep in the highway woods), try some wheelies every now and then, and things like those, but I never rode recklessly, off the limits, on the city streets. Never!! And to the irony of things, things have changed quite drastically in the past few years and biking is no more fun to me. Maybe too many factors came into play; age, lack of interest and preference, etc., but biking happens to be just one of the numerous interests of mine which have faded quite remarkably in the past decade or so( which I honestly thought would never fade a tad bit). Not surprisingly though!
Times have certainly changed now. More than half a decade back, when I left this place (to pursue my studies, of course), it was still a small city (or a town). It was talked about a business hub and one of the most important cities of the country, in the west. It certainly was. But I could hardly fully understand the business value of the city. Yes, it was a happening place back then, yes it was a planned municipality not particularly lacking infrastructure and other facilities (and luxuries), but it wasn’t that big so that calling it a “City” would sound okay (or at least I thought so). And suddenly today, it is a Sub-Metropolitan city (which, in a country like ours is just a tag, more than anything. Some barely significant criteria fulfilled and there you have it. It is hardly a matter of taking pride anyway). The infrastructural changes that have occurred are quite apparent (wide, really wide roads, a host of huge buildings, Kathmandu-esque business centres, etc.), big things happening, peripheral progress and so on. While the progress and development stories keep on coming, it is something else that envelopes my mind whenever I am back to my place.
Back in the days, I hovered around the city with some real purpose. Not purpose as in a sense of having a task completed, finishing a business or something, but at least those promenades and the satisfying sensation that followed whenever I roamed around felt like an achievement. Tiny and short-lived, but an achievement nevertheless. There were people around I could expect to get bumped into, maybe there were some I loved to sneak up on, some who I wanted to discover anywhere around their place only because their whereabouts were unknown to me, you know, just out of curiosity. There were some sweet coincidences and some deliberately sweetened coincidences. The roads and piece of lands, tress and landmarks connected me to some wonderful memories from the past. Wandering around sometimes also meant strolling through the roads I’d never been before, reaching places I had only heard of, having a glass of tea at a totally unfamiliar place (TBT Load shedding helped a lot. I wandered around with a friend because basically there was nothing we could do staying home in the darkness (study under candle lights? Are you kidding me??). In fact, we didn’t even spare foggy winter nights, we just wandered around, almost every other day, as the electricity was cut off in the late evenings). And at this day, when I return home for a short period and whenever I move around, I only see an almost grayscale portrait of the place. No resemblance to what it were, whatsoever. The colors have simply, faded away, it feels. Most of the time there’s no real purpose behind my walks, my strolls, or bike rides.
Demographically, the place might have grown bigger, but it feels there are so fewer people now. I mean, in those days, being around here at any time felt like being amidst a crowd of kins, friends, acquaintances, or less unknown strangers (you know, there were lots of those whom you’d see frequently and recognize anywhere despite having no communication, or any connections with them at all) even without having simplest of interactions with them most of the time. Today, most of them have gone away. Some have migrated elsewhere, the kids I saw around have grown into adults that I no longer identify, there are new faces in the streets I grew up playing (faces that barely recognize me), and since almost every single friend of mine has left for abroad (or is in the process of doing so), practically there’s only one or two of them I can actually call for when I’m here. I don’t even know the whereabouts of many others whom I thought were there for the long run (to be honest, any place isn’t the same anymore without some specific people, to have them temporarily away is a different story, but to have them leave the place altogether is something really distressing, it just doesn’t feel contenting).
There are changes in the domain, the environment as well. The football grounds are now occupied by the owners’ residences, or banquets. My school bus has changed its route and it no longer runs past my gate. The old shops have either shut or moved away. These are only a few of umpteen evidences. Everything has paced up, everything seems to be walking forward in a frantic pace, and that beautiful steadiness simply isn’t here. The place is slowly losing its tint. There were specific memories related to every season, the winter fogs, the autumn downpours, those fierce terrifying storms, the spring skies. That smell of Dashain’s arrival, of those ever thickening fogs, of that winter exit theme, all of them were simply sensational and indelible. Now there is hardly time to ponder upon all those, anyone hardly cares. Even if they would, it would be too faint a feeling they could rejoice in.
I quite clearly understand that there are a lot of factors which have a role to play in the surge of feelings that have been making their way in my brain lately. It may just be my idiosyncrasy or my attachment towards simple things in life that I valued a lot. It might be my age that has made me reflect on past events and possibly everyone else shares the same feeling at this point of time. My lamentation might just as be an over the top remorse about the most banal things, in the most prosaic way possible. It might just be my inability to concur with the most obvious strings of changes in the nature or simply, an oblivion. But whatever it is, there is certainly a decay in the vigor and glimmer of the good old days. Enjoying every moment and regretting every past second for it shall never return again. Or at least there isn’t enough time to sit and relish those feelings. Well memories are memories, reminiscence is reminiscence, and moaning about the lost times is a complete waste. But my dismay is only about how those memories can now never be recreated, because the nature and the time never remain the same. It is a lamentation not towards the inevitability of things, not a criticism towards change, but a simple look back towards the past and a tribute to how marvelous those olden times were. It is a wishful lamentation!!
P.S.
Sorry for accidental Muphry's Law encounters (if any)!
Beautifully portrayed.
ReplyDelete