51 times around the sun

#170

No bookie would have given me higher odds than 1 is to 1000 on “Sathya reaching 50+” even a decade back. But then I live to survive and stack up the years. In nature’s scheme of things some people should never grow old – I would hate to see an old Jonty Rhodes, we remember his athleticism and “dash to the wicket and flying in the air to hit the stumps”.

            The last four days were glorious days where I mined through over 800 comments and made 8 blog posts of them. It felt like cleaning the cupboard in a decade, you come across antiques – like your 8^th standard report card, or a love letter you got from a classmate or the now tattered novel gifted by your first sweetheart in school. I have nearly a 1000 blog posts and these reflect my times under the sun, this week I realized that the “comments” were the world’s validation of me. “Comments” come with this extra feature that one’s own writing doesn’t; when I read my blog post of 2007 I almost know the next sentence. It’s my genetic wire hidden barely under the skin. But each time I read someone’s comments, there’s a novelty and freshness. One thought stuck in my head after the exercise: I have lived long, I have lived deep and I have been strong. I felt like Alexander reflecting on his achievements in his dead-bed as soldiers gathered around him one last time for a head shake recognition or a hand shake.

            Yesterday was just another day except I had a bath at 7:00 am (instead of the usual 8:30 am) and chanted “Dakshinamurthy slokam” and I also managed 20 minutes of SPARRC exercises – a birthday motivation for I am lazy here. TH Iyer mama was the first caller and he sang “Happy Birthday to you.” He is a very accomplished person and this was a grand gesture. He is 88 years old, with a razor sharp mind, and he has grown affectionate over the years. Ganesh Shenoy called for a quick “Happy Birthday Machan.” With him, I slip into “mama” and “machan” as fillers in a conversation. Sandeep Lakhina called in the afternoon and I said, “I don’t have 21 friends. Not all of you are as capable as you (in Hindi).” He laughed as he did a Facebook post thanking each friend for each day of the lockdown 1.0, “Any celebrations today?” I said, “Not by a mile, I don’t remember even cutting the cake and blowing candles for more than 5 or 6 times in my 51 years.” I am recluse alright and it sits well with me.

            The best part was the surprise call of Deepak Mehra from Dubai and it made my day. He said, “I can see your growth being a regular reader of your blogs, “which sounded the best sentiment by far. I said, “I envy the Punjabis for their bonding, family and friends stick to one another in a crisis.” Deepak said, “It’s your romantized view, maybe it stems out from your siblings’ indifference. In normal families, people do stick with one another.” There were half a dozen greetings on Facebook, another half a dozen on Messenger and some more on SMS and Whatsapp. As I hit the bed, my mind reminisced with gratitude the four callers of the day. It was also time for thanksgiving – doing the “Comments” collation my mind went back to the heady days of pUsHpA. It was a relation that had no rhyme, the pairing was like a “bird falling in love with a fish” and my heart blessed her a million times (remember I am lying on the bed) on her decision – the surgery was heartlessly cruel but the deed was wholesome. It saved my life and probably hers got better. I also prayed: God, I felt a million times alive during those times. God, just give me one more chance. Give a woman for whom my mind flips, my heart pounds, my hands to caress and lips to lick on the skin real estate. That’s the prayer and thought I left myself with as night stole over and sleep took over.

            51 years is 18,628 days (612 months and 2661 weeks). The best part is it’s 1,609,459,200 seconds. So I am a little more than 1.60 billion seconds and life is as many moments of living. God gives us painfully long lives, I was happy to live to write this tale. I am a genius in self-praise and self-congratulations and I told myself: Courage in adversity has never gotten so far. Sathya be praised and the Lords be praised for creating this wonder!!!!