Tuesday, February 1, 2011

From the Backyards of the Memory




Years of dreams kept these greens fresh in me. An unhinging end of the world, among the deep dark forests, with an ancient temple in the middle, whose walls I can’t say were like chiseled stone. Rather the walls were the mud, baked by the time. A pure dream, that often woke me amidst the night, with a soft, breezy cool face, lost in the mesmerizing moment. It clouded my brain against anything that would pass me through the day. Casting a reverie. The boundaries of reality somewhere melted away, left to live with the flakes of this life on the edge of the world, without any physical presence.

It was morning when we had reached this unknown corner of the Himalayas, lost among the steeps of the hills. We had to park the car above the hill, and sway down on a narrow pathway. With a several foot deep trench on one side, and an overwhelming hill on the other, nature was more silent than I had ever experienced. We reached the high hills, walking among the trees. The powerful silence, the intensity of purity, was it only me experiencing it?

I held my mamma’s hand, pressing gently, and said “ I know this place mamma. I have been visiting it… I have been coming here since.. I don’t know when. … You remember, I have been telling you of the temple I have been dreaming of?”
Mummy was dumbstruck as she saw me, and it would not be till we came back to Delhi, that she would tell me, that there was something in me, through all the three days we were there. I was beautiful. More beautiful than she could ever express. With glassy, watery eyes seeing something too subtle. And my dad & sister would repeat that every time we would talk about the place. Stealing frequent glances at me.
And it was then, that I started reminiscing, of what I knew of the place. And the newness it had adopted, as the world turn outside, from the inner, comfortable world. A new world, that included a new me….

Sun dawned at 4. And soon it was a full moon night, with rising din of the forest filling the atmosphere. AT 7:30, it was a deep awake night, so intense that it could have been past midnight. Bathed in the sliver light, I was standing in the middle of the forest; in the premises of that old temple… a sense of endless wait engulfed me. The surmounting pine trees brought an uncanny feel of being related to them since what seemed an eternity. And the clouds of my dreams condensed to materialize tangibly. Mixing with the melted reality. Was I living a dream? Or dreaming a reality? Was I reliving the past life? A life that my flesh could never relate to…

There was me, full of aspirations and sprite for life.. and there was my silent ‘self’ of a past life, with a soul more vocal than my words in this life can ever be… I existed in the calmness of a life, balanced, and stuck between the love for the din of DJ parties and silence of my ‘self’. The pushes of my contemporary life, and the pulls of my past life met where I existed completing me…pulling me apart...which road should I take? The one bustling with humanity, or the quiet, lonely lane that will lead me to my cradle? Or am I destined to live a double life, to somehow find a balance between my twin selves?

This story is a part of Fire Freeze contest. You can post your story too, if you can see and give expression to what you feel and see as the chemical opposites existing in you. This competition is sparked off by Close Up.

If you really like my story, then please comment on it, and vote for me here.

31 comments:

  1. that was a very thrilling story,brilliantly scripted.......

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  2. wow aswum story... very tru.. gud work avantika!!!

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  3. Something I can relate to...Even I experience these pangs of confusion living my life in fast paced noisy cities after all those years of my serene and quintessentially quiet slow paced teenage years in a small town Assam...well written...

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  4. Truly engaging post...first time I'm reading your blog..We are constantly battling to balance or choose between two contrasting sides of life - past and present, public and private, rural and urban, office and home...and the list is endless

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  5. The eternal debate rages on; whether to listen to one's heart or to follow the path charted out by one's logic. The path you choose defines you as a person.
    Brilliant piece of writing..brings out the sharp contrast between what we want superficially and what we really crave for deep inside the recesses of our many-layered minds.

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  6. The heart vs the head, very well captured. All the best :)

    Here's my story:
    http://fu-ck-lo-ve.blogspot.com/2011/02/fire-freeze-moment-of-my-life.html#comments

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  7. Chanpreet said....
    Marvelous story, every word, every lines were amazingly well organised. It was so beautifully writen that I find myself related to what you experienced ,while I was reading it.
    Honsestly saying by reading all this I can imgaine how beautiful your experienced was.....
    keep it up Avantika

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  8. This is super like... absolutely, the way you described the forest and the nature's lazy sleepy side, it felt so visual! had to promote your post, no other way ...lol!
    blog on

    sauvik
    Read me@ http://dreampeddler.in/

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  9. Beautifully expressed. A spot on explanation of a "freeze" moment. I think we have all had moments like these. Moments where our subconscious completely overwhelms our "logical" sensory impulses. Weather we call it deja vu or flashes of past lives, these moments always intrigue me. The mind is stuck in a limbo - weather to question this "intuition" or give in to its overpowering power and follow it with our innate childlike innocence. It is in moments like these that we begin to get a glimpse of our hidden natures. To somehow grasp the permanence of our selves amidst the trivial ephemera of material reality. To truly decipher the many mysteries of our being.

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  11. The powerful silence, the intensity of purity, was it only me experiencing it?

    I like this line.

    Brilliantly written story. :)

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  12. thank u all! ur comments are very precious for me... :)

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  13. Very well written Avantika. I am sure u must have written this blog with heavy fingers and may be a tad bit of that fear. great job again !

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  14. Very well written.....keep it up...Booker prize is waiting for you. :)

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  15. Very amazing piece of writing.. just loved what i just read thrice.. u dazzle with your writing, ideas, thought combined with feelings. Very perspective and very well delivered !

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  16. Hey!! This an awesome delineation of almost all the swings of mind. Awesome work Avantika.....Keep up the good work.

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  17. good job avantika..... its really took mah breath away for a minute while i was reading dis... very nice brilliant work done... keep it up...

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  18. Cool script and nicely executed...keep on the good work:)

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  19. wow baby... ofcouse it hs to b nice if u r scriptin it... i super likkeeeee!!!

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  20. Awesome story. Had me gripped till the very end. I like the ease with which you play with language and words. And how you seamlessly oscillate between ideas. Inspiring!

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  21. ahan... that's a good entry...and welcome to indiblogger too...

    my story is here...

    http://www.indiblogger.in/indipost.php?post=46830

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  22. Really an interesting story. I must say you can write really well. There was a smooth flow in the writing. Enjoyed my stay here :)

    Hope you enjoy reading my post too -
    To hold you in my arms, to promise you my love!

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  23. Thanx Daydreamer and Romeo.. i am glad u liked it.. :)

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  24. well, avantika....this is something i can relate to ...the ambivalence in our lives..great job...plz tell me where can i find more of your writings

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  25. thanx Aditya..:) u will find more of my writings in this blog itself..hope u like them too..

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  26. Ah! Great stuff again !
    I'll 'vote' - if that helps :P

    Good Luck to you.. :)

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  27. Yes and do visit my blog too ! It's new and it requires some sensible readers..I've already had a couple of them and I need a few more.

    If you think it's Crap - write CRAP in bold all over my blog posts. That's how I define sensible readers. :P

    Keep blogging :)

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  28. I like ur spirit! :) you will soon spot me on your blog.... iam intrigued

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