Recently I watched this song on YouTube, again and again. I felt very happy and satisfied. Maybe I enjoyed it more at this age rather than when I was a child. Maybe it is not meant for children at all. Maybe the message it conveys, which is still very relevant, is for the elders. I never thought that this old song could be so new to me. I played it again and again and since I had learnt the lesson, all I wanted was to be a child again.
But after some time I was in pain. Although for no apparent reason, I felt terrible. I wondered how can that same child who knew nothing about anything become so mean, selfish, cynical, self-centered, and at the same time such a fuck-up. How can society even allow this type of processing and packaging? I felt as if those Moral Education lessons which were dined into me until class 8th were in tatters and I flushed them time and again without even realizing it. What about those stories In English and Hindi subjects which always had some meanings and lessons to take home? I now realize they only floated in my mind but never settled in my heart. I could score good marks in those subjects but what about those marks now! I am failing miserably and I want to redo my entire course. And there are ‘practical’ people out there who would tell you “Don’t worry about such petty things; this is your life, live it as you want”. I call those people double standards people. They know what is wrong and what is not, but they don’t want to accept it.
Sometimes you find people who can see through you, even if you inadvertently want to blind them with your fake appearance and mundane demeanors. They give you subtle but sufficient hints to do some introspection and by introspection I don’t mean filling a questionnaire when you have nothing to do, I mean doing it all the time, every time, each single breath. I felt the same watching this video, as if this song knew me completely.
So when I was done watching this video, I was silent for the longest period of time and I was busy reminiscing about good old days. I tried to recall everything I could. For three hours I was lost in reveries alone, I chuckled alone, I cried alone, I thought alone, and then I slept (alone?). What came to me as a cool breeze in a cold, dark and dry night, left with sunshine and dew in my eyes.
