Lost Love

My first brush with him was when I was twelve. Way too young to even understand with intensity any of the emotions he could invoke. Yet Abhas Kumar Ganguly or known to most as Kishore Kumar has had a profound impact on my early years.

I was besotted by the haunting aspect of his voice and was completely taken in by his ability to transform the mood I was in just by listening to him.

Koi Hota Jisko Apna...
Aye Tum Yaad Mujhe...
Kiska Rasta Dekhe...
Yeh Laal Rang...

These were my favourites. In the next 3-4 years, not an evening would be spent without my Philips two-in-one blaring his songs. Mother would just not figure out why I would listen to such tragic and fatalistic songs ! Of course, in that there was a reason. And as in most cases, the reason was a woman. That is however, another story for another day.

Today, I cannot quite fathom why I loved those songs. The only word that comes to my mind is 'inexplicable'. I do still remember the context but what I find absolutely deplorable or incomprehensible is what is it that appealed to me so much about them then and what is it about them that I am indifferent to them today ?

The answer is not in the songs. Maybe the answer is me. An unfortunate and sad fact of life is that I have grown up. And though I am still every bit the hopeless romantic at heart, I cannot by any stretch of imagination feel anything when I hear these songs.

It is a love story gone sour. We are still friends and we will always be, yet somewhere we have lost a chord. While there are still many such nuggets which tug at my heart, but that is nothing compared to the passion we shared. Maybe, this is how it was meant to end. That I be replaced as the most obsessive follower by some other 15 year old of the day and me looking back and wondering how I could have loved so much.

15 years - that is what it took for me to lose one of the most endearing part of my childhood.

Give and Take

Whenever I wonder about the balance of life, I am quite simply nonplussed. If the basic assumption is you reap what you sow, then what or how much you give finally should equate out to what you get. Yet, that hardly seems to happen. You look around and see that absolute nitwits for whom the word 'bastard' was possibly designed get away by being lousy S-O-Bs while the inherently good and decent ones get the stick.

But this is not about them. It is about the countless times when you have given everything you had to people who have hardly ever stopped to glance at you and thank you for what you have done, and appreciating how much they mean to you and got nothing in return. So much so, that at one point you wonder where do you go from here. What else do you need to make them appreciate you and then you realize that whatever you do, it will not happen. For they are too oblivious of you, too consumed with their own considerations.

It hurts. And you are filled with a sense of wastage.

The other side of the coin is more interesting and more poignant. Many a time, while we are pursuing our set of interests, we commit the same error - an error of utter neglect towards the ones who have given us their love and undying attention. For those, your smile might be the most important thing they look forward to. Maybe, you do smile but not with them, but at them, at their all too apparent folly at the things they do to be with you. In short, you trivialize and insult their emotions. Yet, looking at it purely objectively, they are the ones who deserve you the most. And they are the ones who have been left high and dry.

So, how does this equate out ? Does this ever stop us from making the same mistakes again ? Does this make us more sensitive and teach us to appreciate love as and when we see and feel it ? The feeling of deja-vu is not one which is gratifying irrespective of which end of the spectrum you are at and in both cases, you should be more careful of losing out on the wonderful touch of love because of your inability to appreciate it.