These 60 Years! - Foretale of the Tongue-Tied Raconteur

 

Not a typical writer's block. That would be assuming more than I am entitled to. The blank page syndrome had come much earlier. It is something else. Some fear of another state of fright. A tale told too vividly could invoke a recall of things probably better left in the recesses of memory. But then there are stories in need of vehicles and hears. Tales that if untold would keep nipping at the innards.

The tales will be told in their own time and of their own merit. Now, we will just indulge in carthasis. That ritual of emotional cleansing. It is that non-apologetic, non-aggressive letting out of the unseen self that we put out today. Not all of the innards, but that which tells who cares to know, who needs to know. These 60 years have been my walk, my way, my options, my choices, my preferred route. Way I will walk again. There are the Ifs. Everyone has that If. Some have Ifs. My Ifs have no burden of regrets. They gave options. Options I took, knowing what intervening factors exist, and those too are options in themselves. Every pick of the available choices that dogged the feet of the Ifs was a conscious pick. 60 years! I love this man and his picks of the options of the Ifs.

I recall now vividly the choice of correcting a teacher in YOR 101 and the price paid. It was perhaps one enormous for an 18-year-old. A tale to be told properly soon. The loss of faith in a dream space looked fervently forward to that in one semester became an anathema. But if that heartbreak, the loss of faith, the “death” had not occurred, there would not have been a “resurrection”. No regrets, I have only gratitude for those who woke me up. Some, unfortunately, are not here anymore to get the thanks for the more confident, unconventional one who evolved. There are those who are still here, and I owe much to who I am.

The Ifs turn up at many turns. They come in ambushes, in mocking garbs at times. What still comes knocking hard at them is the me I see. The me I prefer. The knowledge I have that these 60 years have been defined by me, in spite of all interventions, some uncomely, some exhilarating.

The tales will be told soon. These 60 years!