A Beautiful Memory: Learning, Belonging and Other Musings
High School Reminiscences, part 11 of 16
Back in the other life and somewhere far away in the past, my poor heart (if I must own it) had been aching with a feeling of loss.
I well remember the stir of a strange forlorn feeling somewhere inside me, overcome that I was by a feeling of something widening across my chest; maybe, a random hurt that never healed or maybe something else entirely – when I took my TC (transfer certificate) from my school’s admin office and found myself walking sombrely down the cool, shaded pathway canopied with the familiar lush green peepul, Ashoka and neem trees running along each side and heaven’s deep blue further above them, towards the outer boroughs of our charming school campus, to the bus stand to catch a bus home.
That day was the last I ever saw of my beautiful old school and the melancholy memory of painful parting is still so vividly etched in my mind as I write this from the standpoint of my adulthood.
Memories come in waves when I’m alone and soon I get nostalgic in an intimate haze of unexpected recollections. Memories often take me under like they used to and I embrace the intimate alliance of life’s well-earned compensation and respite from the impersonal, insensitive Present. Thinking of my old memories has always been a sort of great self-indulgence (guilty pleasure if you like) for me to not just connect to but relive the past. As I recollect them, I am offered to see familiar faces, handwritten notes, letters, book covers, snippets of games we used to play, and I even hear their voices distinctly, nothing seems to go amiss from the vaunted portals of my Hippocampus! I am unable to live without the kind of memories my heart can recollect and now and then it likes to take a solitary stroll down the melancholy memory lane looking for lost time and things past; I can say with great sureness my heart can even now remember everything from such a long time ago surprising little subtleties that bring back the soul of the good ol’ days.
I keep coming back to those old thoughts of my youth off and on, or whenever the opportunity arises I go seek my corner to evoke remembrances of every delicious bit of them that I have unfailingly retained over the years deep within myself, and honestly, I’ve never been at a remove from such a, I should say, touching effect of melancholic indulgence I have such an obvious fond feeling of. I’m especially grateful for the sweet ache of my charming secondary school years that I cherish today; I trust providence will keep it coming my way. Even after the long silence of three full decades the morning prayers which were conducted daily at the school assembly still ring in my ears loud and clear:
Leaving school
Leaving school meant a significant break in my boyhood experiences and that no longer will I be able to see my dear teachers and schoolmates again was nothing less than a puzzling reality to deal with. It also meant, however, that I’d be leaving the verdant school surroundings, losing touch with a lot of friends and leaving heart-throbbing memories of a special someone behind and heading off to join, almost unquestionably, the “real world” outside of the wholesome school experience that had up till then been my daily gospel of learning and belonging.
There’s a sort of ring to it that although I learned the meaning of friendship, I was not so much ready to acknowledge that the time has come for me to face the real world and, therefore, leaving school had likewise meant never returning or implying staying away forever.
Speaking for myself, I loved my school very much as did, I am certain, others of my class, and so leaving the familiar to go off into the unknown or take up, as is commonly said, the challenges of all the new possibilities out there were quite daunting to contend with from the outset. Despite the fact that my reasonably utilitarian marks and necessary certificates bore witness to my accreditations to anticipate a good college education, I still thought my life from now on and into the foreseeable future – will have to abide by the forced newness and novelty that a college essentially brings – will change, radically and fundamentally: The kind of change such as which one can never know beforehand during school life.
Yet, confusing as it sounds, I was rather feeling happy because knowing that the transition to a new life in college will be cool to welcome and rejoice. The fact that all the comforting familiarity I knew up till then will have taken a new turn as my cozy school life slowly transitions to the “real world” – for the better, I hope, as my mind apprised me so with bedrock conviction, somehow. I patted my back for maintaining an optimistic note on that count. As things progressed, the school had slowly receded into poignant memory; college showed up head-on straight after.
Loss of ‘friends’ from that old KV school was just one tiny ditty of my sense of melancholy and loss that came in tidal waves as it were which never ebbed – to this day, I might add for posterity’s sake here. I intuitively knew that when you are in the final stretch of senior secondary school, 12th grade that is, things will soon begin to take apace: Board exams will come, entrance exam forms need to be sourced, filled out and sent across for consideration, and above all, the need to buckle down and start preparing for the theory exams before the dates for science practicals are announced. Goodness gracious me!
Sooner we all retreated into our study cocoons to prepare for the exams: work on our lessons, burn the midnight oil, and cramp up as much as we can and regurgitate it out on the answer sheets the next day in the exam hall.
However, all this while, deep within my heart, I kept thinking about her and what will become of our relationship. It was a scary subject to raise. We knew the kind of hurt it could cause to both of us, particularly when we are amid theory and practical exams, not to speak of an entire world of expectations from everywhere that had already begun making its presence felt like a foreboding sense of loss that’ll perhaps never ease us from its clutches the slightest bit. At that point, I speared a hole through my heart to save us from brutal warnings and unpleasant circumstances that are doubtlessly going to come after us with a vengeance. I hated it, but the only way out was to smile at the thrill of what my heart desired, without being even the least bit bitter with anyone in the whole wide world. Surely I have loved enough to let her go: I repeated this in my mind numerous times for quite a while to reassure its true meaning, realizing that lifelong grief is the price we have to pay for love and she will go on living in my broken heart until the end of time. Love always wins, but sometimes happy endings are not always possible to achieve.
So now listen to this, World: We have not lost any relationship between us because real relationships once formed can never be lost nor easily forgotten. We may have gone our different ways in different directions, but were not lost to one another's enduring, eternal love binding us forever together.
Upon my person, I found an old love letter briefly stating thus: Come what may, my heart will never recover from the immortal affliction of your love. This has been my story all through and, dear love, let it be told now.
(To be continued…)
By Arindam Moulick
Back in the other life and somewhere far away in the past, my poor heart (if I must own it) had been aching with a feeling of loss.
I well remember the stir of a strange forlorn feeling somewhere inside me, overcome that I was by a feeling of something widening across my chest; maybe, a random hurt that never healed or maybe something else entirely – when I took my TC (transfer certificate) from my school’s admin office and found myself walking sombrely down the cool, shaded pathway canopied with the familiar lush green peepul, Ashoka and neem trees running along each side and heaven’s deep blue further above them, towards the outer boroughs of our charming school campus, to the bus stand to catch a bus home.
That day was the last I ever saw of my beautiful old school and the melancholy memory of painful parting is still so vividly etched in my mind as I write this from the standpoint of my adulthood.
Memories come in waves when I’m alone and soon I get nostalgic in an intimate haze of unexpected recollections. Memories often take me under like they used to and I embrace the intimate alliance of life’s well-earned compensation and respite from the impersonal, insensitive Present. Thinking of my old memories has always been a sort of great self-indulgence (guilty pleasure if you like) for me to not just connect to but relive the past. As I recollect them, I am offered to see familiar faces, handwritten notes, letters, book covers, snippets of games we used to play, and I even hear their voices distinctly, nothing seems to go amiss from the vaunted portals of my Hippocampus! I am unable to live without the kind of memories my heart can recollect and now and then it likes to take a solitary stroll down the melancholy memory lane looking for lost time and things past; I can say with great sureness my heart can even now remember everything from such a long time ago surprising little subtleties that bring back the soul of the good ol’ days.
I keep coming back to those old thoughts of my youth off and on, or whenever the opportunity arises I go seek my corner to evoke remembrances of every delicious bit of them that I have unfailingly retained over the years deep within myself, and honestly, I’ve never been at a remove from such a, I should say, touching effect of melancholic indulgence I have such an obvious fond feeling of. I’m especially grateful for the sweet ache of my charming secondary school years that I cherish today; I trust providence will keep it coming my way. Even after the long silence of three full decades the morning prayers which were conducted daily at the school assembly still ring in my ears loud and clear:
“asato mā sadgamayaTime has just flown! Old scenes come up so vividly in my mind; old sights and sounds still linger around, they echo even; old friendships have gone forever; fondest teachers and school mates withdrew into solitude, or domestic spaces, or into their ivory towers, or an inner exile perhaps vowing to lead an ignominious way of life no one would ever know. I still see their faces in my mind’s eye ad infinitum, how can I ever forget that fabled school of my childhood days? Those Plus 2 years were a true paradise of luxury, to say the least, and yet all get well and truly over when you’re into Class 12th and know that you’d soon step out of the portals you hold so dear into a new world with a new horizon – meaning the end of your school days. Those two years have passed like days in the school of heaven. As I jot this down in my journal, the vivid pictures of my school years are flashing through my mind. Memories of the past are so powerful that it’s nothing but being so fortunate to recall them.
tamasomā jyotir gamaya
mrityormāamritam gamaya”
Leaving school
Leaving school meant a significant break in my boyhood experiences and that no longer will I be able to see my dear teachers and schoolmates again was nothing less than a puzzling reality to deal with. It also meant, however, that I’d be leaving the verdant school surroundings, losing touch with a lot of friends and leaving heart-throbbing memories of a special someone behind and heading off to join, almost unquestionably, the “real world” outside of the wholesome school experience that had up till then been my daily gospel of learning and belonging.
There’s a sort of ring to it that although I learned the meaning of friendship, I was not so much ready to acknowledge that the time has come for me to face the real world and, therefore, leaving school had likewise meant never returning or implying staying away forever.
Speaking for myself, I loved my school very much as did, I am certain, others of my class, and so leaving the familiar to go off into the unknown or take up, as is commonly said, the challenges of all the new possibilities out there were quite daunting to contend with from the outset. Despite the fact that my reasonably utilitarian marks and necessary certificates bore witness to my accreditations to anticipate a good college education, I still thought my life from now on and into the foreseeable future – will have to abide by the forced newness and novelty that a college essentially brings – will change, radically and fundamentally: The kind of change such as which one can never know beforehand during school life.
Yet, confusing as it sounds, I was rather feeling happy because knowing that the transition to a new life in college will be cool to welcome and rejoice. The fact that all the comforting familiarity I knew up till then will have taken a new turn as my cozy school life slowly transitions to the “real world” – for the better, I hope, as my mind apprised me so with bedrock conviction, somehow. I patted my back for maintaining an optimistic note on that count. As things progressed, the school had slowly receded into poignant memory; college showed up head-on straight after.
Loss of ‘friends’ from that old KV school was just one tiny ditty of my sense of melancholy and loss that came in tidal waves as it were which never ebbed – to this day, I might add for posterity’s sake here. I intuitively knew that when you are in the final stretch of senior secondary school, 12th grade that is, things will soon begin to take apace: Board exams will come, entrance exam forms need to be sourced, filled out and sent across for consideration, and above all, the need to buckle down and start preparing for the theory exams before the dates for science practicals are announced. Goodness gracious me!
Sooner we all retreated into our study cocoons to prepare for the exams: work on our lessons, burn the midnight oil, and cramp up as much as we can and regurgitate it out on the answer sheets the next day in the exam hall.
However, all this while, deep within my heart, I kept thinking about her and what will become of our relationship. It was a scary subject to raise. We knew the kind of hurt it could cause to both of us, particularly when we are amid theory and practical exams, not to speak of an entire world of expectations from everywhere that had already begun making its presence felt like a foreboding sense of loss that’ll perhaps never ease us from its clutches the slightest bit. At that point, I speared a hole through my heart to save us from brutal warnings and unpleasant circumstances that are doubtlessly going to come after us with a vengeance. I hated it, but the only way out was to smile at the thrill of what my heart desired, without being even the least bit bitter with anyone in the whole wide world. Surely I have loved enough to let her go: I repeated this in my mind numerous times for quite a while to reassure its true meaning, realizing that lifelong grief is the price we have to pay for love and she will go on living in my broken heart until the end of time. Love always wins, but sometimes happy endings are not always possible to achieve.
“I don’t think of all the misery, but of all the beauty that remains.”Knowing that relationships progress at different speeds, our relationship had ended rather, unfortunately. Like Socrates, I concentrated my “mind upon a serene disillusionment”. In any case, we’d like to believe that it had matured up to a different level altogether that has to be beyond any reach of any detriment or any external stressors like people’s passing out wanton judgements needlessly or even forceful family obligations originating from one’s friends and family that we have to act upon and pay the ultimate price for having one’s existence in an atrocious world we know.
– Anne Frank
So now listen to this, World: We have not lost any relationship between us because real relationships once formed can never be lost nor easily forgotten. We may have gone our different ways in different directions, but were not lost to one another's enduring, eternal love binding us forever together.
Upon my person, I found an old love letter briefly stating thus: Come what may, my heart will never recover from the immortal affliction of your love. This has been my story all through and, dear love, let it be told now.
(To be continued…)
By Arindam Moulick