Hey You !

I was listening to this youngster and his tale of heartbreak and moving to another city and of loneliness and feeling sad. He talked of music and musings and of memories. Suddenly he stopped and stared at me. - "Ma'm I must be boring you. But tell me did you ever have a heartache? Did you ever love and lost?" - I must have,  I mused. " Of course , dear! But it is so long back in time. And after 40 decades I guess it was easy to cope with heartache than have a body where each part aches!!" How flippant ! He stared as if he will reprimand with " How would you know? " But he smiled and asked, "Will I ever find my rainbow?" -" Rainbow? But then , you create your own, just like the sun rays. You take out  the happy pics from your memory, put them together and color them VIBGYOR!!" He wasn't convinced , but he looked better , less woebegone and looked out into the sky. The summer sky has it's own beauty, and after the ent...

Darjeeling happened for me in 1984. Baba took us there after I had casually remarked I have never been to the hills. And he wanted it to be  a family holiday before I get married in 2 months time. The Darjeeling of 84 was very different when I went back there in '99. Crowded, dingy, demolished and de-glamorized I promised I shall never be back again. Recently while browsing my old diary and my bucket lists, I found Toy train to be one of them. The romance of Aradhana.... And Air Force Officers who rode a bike and played mouth organ (sigh!!!!). I had to tick that one off even if I was in my mid 50s and the Air Force Officer had long retired from the forces and the harmonica rusted. So our tryst with Darjeeling began .... anew, dusted and de-biased! However, the Toy train experience was worth a tale !! 5 hours wait to ride a train that was on my bucket list ever since I saw Aradhana in the 70s , was quite an experience. No announcement, no message and the enquiry had no clue....