The Death of My Childhood

Friends,
Bloggers ,
Countrymen ,
Countrywomen ,
in short , members of my blogging family

Of late , I have been busy working . No , I did not pick up my toilet and kitchen brush to clean the muck around us . That would require a lot more effort , and I will take a shot at it at a later stage in my life , God willing . To cut a long story , short , I was really working , and that is why , I have hardly replied to your comments . I have missed out on reading some of your posts . I have missed out on exchanging thoughts with you on some of your posts . The few that I have published , were written , long back , when I was not so busy . Thank God for that , at least my blog is not that stale . I almost didn't see the incredibly funny and imaginative posts Vimmu,OG , Solilo and the others came up with (Cross Border Terrorism and Sachai ka Saamna ) ! What I am trying to say is that , I get a little time to peek into the Blogosphere , but I will be back in full swing , soon . That is the hope . My apologies for not contributing to the blogging buzz . And this partial absence has taken a toll on me as well , for , All work and no blogging makes Kislay a dull jackass . I know I am a jackass , my friends and colleagues will surely agree with this one. :) But a tired and a dull one now , and my braying is minus the zest it usually has . I am learning to live life , and how to be an adult , who has to balance work , and life apart from work . And as a member of the IT Industry , I know it won't be easy . But I am trying .

A few weeks ago , I , Kislay Chandra , all of 25 years and a few months old , suddenly realized that my childhood is over . Yes . I know . It took me 25 , instead of your normal 15 to 20 . But then, that is how I am . For me , it was still going on , till I was struck by the thunderbolt of realization, that I cried a little bit , in private. Of course , the child in me is not dead yet. I still hog chocolates , fight for ice cream , jump and shout like a kid , hop around in my home in a vest and old shorts, air guitar like a loon when I listen to rock and try to sing as well, do bakar(a derogatory term for fooling around , doing nothing , but talking,laughing and pulling your friend's legs as hard as you can )as if my friends and I were still in College. Inside , I am still a kid . As they say , the difference between a boy and a man , is the price of his toy . The carefree child in me comes out , plays with his new toys, bikes, cell phones and videogames, the latest being a blender , which I use to make different kinds of shakes and stuff :) ,but not that often. I guess that is how it works . This is what growing up must be all about . Trying to make more money , and discovering new ways to save taxes , rather than coming up with new ways to spend it . I guess that is why childhood is such an innocent and pure stage, you get joy out of things so trivial, insignificant and ordinary, that it cannot but baffle most adults. For me, the death of a person is not the day when he or she breathes the last, it is the day when the child in you , the last bit of pristine is gone.

When I was a kid , my grandfather explained to me the concept of pooja or aradhana . There is the ritualistic version , the meditative way and the one where you try to connect with the Almighty by serving others selflessly. And then , there is your work . He said , and very explicitly , that "if you do your work , with the utmost sincerity and devotion, you need not visit a temple , or offer flowers and burn incense sticks in front of the many forms of God that we bow to" . I knew that all along, but never really did it . I am trying to do it now. And every prayer I offer , ends with a request for subuddhi and shakti to do my work as it should be done .

That was my short story , about me . I am a little down , cause I am still not used to a lot of work , but I will be up soon , as it becomes a habit . And I may be down, but I am never out. Mean while , you keep blogging .


“In every real man a child is hidden that wants to play” - Friedrich Nietzsche

“There are no seven wonders of the world in the eyes of a child. There are seven million.” - Walt Streightiff

“When you finally go back to your old hometown, you find it wasn't the old home you missed but your childhood” - Sam Ewing

“When childhood dies, its corpses are called adults and they enter society, one of the politer names of hell. That is why we dread children, even if we love them, they show us the state of our decay.” - Brian W. Aldiss

p.s. It was 2 AM . I had just come out of my office building . The cool breeze was reinvigorating . And that gave me an idea for - Elixir . :)