THE COLOURS OF MY LIFE

THE COLOURS OF MY LIFE
It was raining. None of us wanted to get off the car, none of us wanted to quit the automobile, not because of the rain, but each of us wanted to be in the car that was our last stop for excitement that day. There was a bitter fight among us on the issue of who would be dropped home first, and who would be the last. Each of us wanted to be in the car till the very end, each of us waned to preserve the excitement till the very end. The trip to Azdabia had brought about an element of change in our lives, for the world we were children; we had just entered our teenage, the world was fresh and new.

Novelty in all forms has been embraced by me at al different stages of life. Novelty has brought with itself excitement, Azdabia and Mickey always injected my life with a fresh dose of excitement. The excitement usually began at the gates of the school at 2 pm, it went a long way over the arid lads around Benghazi to the camp of the Indian Road Construction Company (IRCC) in Azdabia.

The IRCC camp in Azdabia did not hold much potential for excitement, but being together in the company of friends filled us with happiness. These days taught some important lessons to me. I now realise that it is being in the company of others that is called love. Whenever I see young boys and girls connodling in McDonald’s or Pizza Hut or in other public places, I’m reminded of this theorem of life.

Life was just beginning then, the vast span of life lay before me, there was a smile on my face as the car raced across the road towards Azdabia. The sun had just begun its descent from the zenith, but this could not wipe away the smile on my face. It only channelised my happiness. We enjoyed each other’s company, we played together, we went for treks over the desert, the desert had only rocks and sand, but walking together with a tape-recorder for company was like living our entire lives in just one day: it was our common passion for music that bound us together. There were several such days in the year, Azdabia hosted our group for the night on several occasions. These instances resonate with a unique frequency in my life. Compound utterances address themselves to my senses when I think of these moments. It is possible to view by the mind the features of the IRCC camp in Azdabia. Acoustic pictures are returned from the vivid scenery: I can hear the very notes of our happiness. The fleeting moments have left behind a lasting impression on my mind. Memories of these days are refreshed whenever I look at the photographs.

The photographs could capture only the physical aspect of the passing moments. The emotional aspect is safely preserved in my heart. They form some of the most beautiful memories of my life. Although a large part has been eaten away by time---20 years have gone by--- a few of the emotions yet remain undisturbed in my mind. They seem to have established themselves in a sort of timelessness.

Time shall eventually work on what remains of these memories. They would fall into the trap that life lays before us: these memories would eventually fade into eternity just as several others have. Memories of these days remind me how close-knit we were as friends. True friendship remains confined to that age, and that stage of life. We were together for no specific reason other than our age, all of us were on the thresholds of our teenage.

Teenage is the age when our personalities develop: the backward and forward play of our lives eventually saw all of us emerging as different and distinct individuals. Although I do respect the different personalities we developed into, we parted ways in several ways, things were never the same again, and life was never the same again. It was like the sun breaking up into the many stars in the sky.

The sky seems to be mourning the celestial event: it rained last night. The change was welcome after the hot and dry weather. The change suppressed the echoes of the past. The echoes of the past travel across the horizon faster in the hot weather. The voices of the present are not enough to suppress the echoes of the past: I find myself looking towards the heavens for a favourable constellation in the sky. At these times, I blame my stars for my fate, but I brighten up as I spot a favourable constellation in the sky.

The sky has stopped crying after all these years, there is a huge difference between then and now, there is neither thunder, lightning nor rain, the sky is not overcast with clouds anymore, there is no reason to mourn now. I see no point in retaining the reason why I fell prey to the lures of life’s tricks: life moulded each of us into entirely different individuals, the ruthless flow of time only adds to the realisation that things did not remain the same, all of us changed, all of us flowed with time. These tricks of my life have the potential to raise an orchestra of voices within me protesting against the antics of my fate and destiny. The notes of my life symbolizing my protest against fate occasionally o flare up like fire, but they also fade away with equal ferocity in a few moments. The beauty of life lies in the manner the dying embers are fanned into a dazzling bonfire after the flames have been doused, giving way to the varied colours of my life.