Little joys of life…

Ever since I started working, life has, in a way, come to a standstill. Office, work, party and sleep. That seems to have become the routine. In between all this, sometimes there is a cup of tea at the neighbourhood tea stall where conversations segue from the most inspiring to completely banal. During one such discussion last week, an interesting topic came up. A topic that brought back the nostalgia of college, of the years we had spent growing up and of the dreams we had seen.

This tea stall is a place where tea costs Rupees 6 and the conversations are free but priceless. But the best part is that here we can exercise our credit limit endlessly. This is the reason why the conversation began. We realised we were Rupees 30 short and we told the owner we would pay him later. But just then, someone asked for another cup and as a chain reaction, so did everyone else. Somebody in the group just mentioned, “do you remember the way we used to run short of cash when we were students?”

Memories came flooding back. I remembered the time we used to sneak out of home to catch a late night show. The time when neighbourhood tea stalls used to be our stronghold. Someone dug up the memories of getting drenched in the rain and binging on any kind of edible, cooked substance that was classified food. The time when one cigarette was shared between 4 people and Old Monk was the warmest companion of winters. A lavish birthday party would only mean “you will be fully fed” and weddings at friends’ places were always welcome because it gave us limitless access to food. On the days of an absolute cash crunch, we would share one plate of idly or a dosa or a sandwich between three people, with everyone aiming for the lion’s share. We would borrow friends’ bikes to drop pretty girls home, in the hope that something constructive would materialise. With some people, it was always “pay for me now and I will pay you later” when we went to the movies. That “later” never came. The hassles of exams and attendance brought back incidents that we would have rather forgotten. But looking back, it seemed fun. There were deadlines and curfew timings at home, but post that was when the fun began. A mobile phone was a luxury with call rates that meant we could only give missed calls. For the ones with girlfriends, it meant huge (by student standards) bills. Which in turn meant that we would have to lie at home for extra cash, and innovative lies at that!
Playing pranks on teachers and creating a ruckus was commonplace and so was the resultant “get out of my class”.

If I start making a list, I will probably run into hundreds of pages. But the important part is that we all realised that somewhere, along the years, we have probably forgotten how much those little, insignificant moments meant and how much we have missed them in the work life. Those years seemed so long back in the past!

It rekindled a flame, the embers of which, were dying out and as I end this piece, I will just say that let’s not allow anything to interrupt the little joys of life because these are the moments one savours. Let us raise a toast to a promise that we will live and breathe such moments every day. What say?