Back to school……….
Back to school……….
The summers are getting hotter with every passing year…more than my body; my heart was getting scorched by the spirited little morons, playing in the society compound all day and night. No schools to attend, no office to go to, no boss to report to, no inevitably horrible canteen food…and a smirk that always wished me a good day sarcastically...
…and then there was a wind of change…quite literally…the
seemingly ever glaring sun got over shadowed …the high flying hot air was
pinned down by a chilly, damp breeze…the pretentiously dead trees gained and
passed on the momentum to each other…it was a warm up time for the car
wipers…it was the time for the hibernating raincoats and umbrellas to come
out…it was the time for the sky to cry…it was my time for redemption…it was the
time for the kids to return to the school…it was Monsoon…
Suddenly all the roads and all possible modes of transports diverted
towards schools. The usually bright looking children (dressed and otherwise) of
summer were now sized up in glum and definitely not colourful school uniforms…
Mothers had a sympathetic looks on their faces as if they
were seeing their children off for a 5 hour battle…but as soon as the kids
turned their backs the ‘sympathy’ fell off like a bad makeup...expressions were
similar to a slave set free after two months of tough summer.
Fathers were as usual irritated, because the only things
that would have reined their wives were now reining themselves for good 10
months.
Amidst the yanking, cranking, howling, sobbing I found
myself with a ceaseless grin…the expression of irritability was directly
proportional to my width of smile…
Getting into the office bus was less painful. After all I
wasn’t the only one climbing the bus. The bus moved ahead and a nice cool
breeze glided me back in past….
I hated going to school. During the nearing days of doom
(that will be school days) my father used to wonder that what got me interested
in news, especially weather reports. My only ray of hope was the monsoon (nothing
more ironical than finding a ray of hope in monsoon). I prayed like I never did
in rest of the 11 months and 29 days…I wished for a rain that would drown my
school, wash off my teachers, drain down my classmates and do all things
necessary for a school to not function…
My classroom turn into a muddy puddle…hopping big
frogs…making my teachers leap to safe heights where frogs won’t reach…wearing
raincoats in the class...eating tiffin within the raincoats…A persistent shower
washing away each and every word my teacher wrote on the blackboard…the melted
chalks that would never bind together to form a writing...permission to use
blackboard as a raft for going to toilets…Finally the teachers relenting and
declaring the closing of school …and as soon as they do that the school
crumbles down completely…assuring another 6-12 months post monsoon to get
renovated and opened…wow!!! No school for one year!!!
Raindrop never seemed so pleasant...the vicious circle of
the school was being taken care of…the breed of schools was laid with the
dinosaurs....muhuhuhahahahaha
….and a little tap on shoulder brought things back in
perspective…the leaping sheep were made to take a break and the window was shut
on my face…a shut window with the possibility of dead schools…none of it ever
happened…the school prevailed…again…
I closed my eyes for a moment and got the glimpse of my grinning
teachers…even worse bosses; things changed for bad, from hot pan to fire…even
worse… from school to office…I looked at my watch…it was 15 minutes before I
reached my office…I closed my eyes hurriedly ideating, hoping and praying for a
disaster that will destroy my office in next 15 minutes…the resting sheep got
back to leaping….
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