Whatever be your name

As a small child, have you watched a strong wind on a hot July afternoon? Feeling the heat wave, and seeing small pieces of papers and rags suddenly taking to the air, old people start rushing inside their home or shops where they are forced to go at such a time, and the small road side shop keepers and hawkers bring out large covers, usually blue thick polythene sheets to cover their items to avoid the blowing dust from settling on their vegetables, fruits, biscuits or other eatable. But, our would follow the small paper bit that has suddenly started flying from nearby. The newspaper piece first flies very down close to the road as if floating on water and goes up slowly but getting far away from us. So it becomes to difficult to keep track which is your paper as it joins a large number of such papers that have now taken the middle part of the road. And slowly these rags, papers in all colours, red, white, grey yellow and with them small polythene bag parts, twines, start revolving at a particular place away from you. Just like a cyclone. And we wonder whether this is cyclone.

The big colourful magic of small papers and wind.

And then suddenly within minutes, it is gone. The wind stops. And the colourful bits fall to the ground. Nowhere to be seen again.

All these while, when your eyes are following them with keen interest and longing for the wind to continue blowing, you would have failed to call your close friend who is sitting next to you in the classroom or your brother who is watching TV in the next room. Not because you didn't want to share the joy, fun, beauty, what do we call it then, because it was all of them, but none of them also and so we did not have a name for it then, but because you are so much absorbed in the excitement of watching it that for a moment, the whole world has to exist. Even your mom calling you for lunch or the teacher asking you to turn to the black board seem to be happening some where very far.

But later, you would not share it others, what if they call it very silly or fight with you for telling them then itself. Worse, even at that age, we knew one thing for sure, it will not happen everyday and so would not look forward to it. But even after several weeks and months, the lightest feel of a wind will bring back in you the image of the papers flying and arouse a small silly hope to see it again.

A predicament of the human life is this kind of feeling does not die down as we grow up, but only the objects that give us such a joy gets continuously replaced with age.

A teenager may get this excitement from suddenly seeing a big custom built bike zooming past him while a middle age person may lose himself at the smell of something very beautiful. Some others may get carried away on the sight of a garden in the early morning fog.

A person like me get can lose himself only at the sight of a beautiful girl. Except that for me it is the presence of a smart looking girl.

And the one I saw the metro station last night, she is still right in my eyes. All I need to do to see her, is just close my eyes.

It was not the first time that I ever saw her, because I get to see her several days a week. And on days when this does not happen, I know where to find her.

So, what is in her that makes me speechless at her sight, As if suddenly my whole body is frozen and I can't move my legs or hands.

In a tizzy due to the radiance from her, I even fail to look at her face properly. As a result, though I can see her now while writing this, am not sure whether she has a mole on her face or is it just my imagination.

In a worldly way, she might not be the most beautiful girl I see in a day. But the hair – did I say hair, she might find this funny – and her eyes. Yes, the powerful eyes that catch me unawares, meeting which I feel like being caught in a wrong act, but still am not sure whether they are looking at me or beyond me. And the occasional smile that I get a glimpse of when she is talking to others.

When she bends her head and smiles, I get carried to my young days when used to see a lot of cartoons and imagine the characters in human form. The one that comes to my mind now is the He-Man series, which had the most beautiful western characters.

But a detached analysis says she is not my kind. Also that I am not in love with her and have no yearning to talk with her or listen to her for hours. Or to hold her hand and walk on the beach. Worse, it is not even lechery.

Then?

It's magic. A magic that only a few have.

Like a sudden rain on a hot summer day or a thin ray from behind the clouds on a dark day, like a colourful butterfly that flutters near your nose, or a beautiful dream you know you are having – anything you do consciously will only kill it.

I don't want to break this magic by desiring to own her, or even get close to her. It's beautiful this way.