Known city's unknown hour

I had an early morning train to catch to a place I don’t like going back to.

This is pointless saying now that I got so tired of my own city that I ran away to this place in the first place.

But pangs have its own wicked way of creeping into us.

The moon was still up, and just a day post the much-talked-about super moon, it still had her large shell on, and was oozing out light like a big-damn nature-electrified streetlamp.

The sky was yawning its wake, and the sun needed more volume to kill the moonlight and fight its attention in.

As the car wheeled through my known city in its unknown hour, I saw it in attire I’ve never experienced.

And that was when I knew exactly why it is home, and why people keep returning back to.

It is the city of nostalgic returns, more than fancy goodbyes.

I, since childhood, more found more fascination in the rearview mirror more than the broad windshield; looking at things getting smaller with distance than gazing at things getting bigger and detailed with speed.

Through the known roads, often the known lanes the car went in its own mood and velocity. John Denver in my ears, visuals fed me with extremities of beauty; my time of leaving the city and it trying to seduce me back in.

One hour from the commence, I saw an entire city stretching its arms, throwing off its blanket and getting out of the bed. The sky had finally veiled the moon and applauded the entrance of the sun.  The skyline to my left was blood-red, and occasional trees in the vicinity with their silhouettes created a frame that you don’t just see, but you breathe in.

People, very finite in numbers, in their tracksuits and hyper-active limbs, started to be seen, trotting the lanes. The teashops saw shopkeepers lighting the stoves and sometimes, simply struggling to blow and light the chullah. The vintage almost-breaking-yet-standing-upright housings to my right looked down at me, drinking the city-wine, like a voyeur.

By then, I was on the Howrah Bridge, and just when I saw the Ganges and the Howrah station outline in that 5.30 in the morning, I knew why this city is not over-hyped, in fact with all its beauty, is indeed less talked about.

Birthday, away home.

I am going to sulk for the next few paragraphs.

First birthday away home and there are so many things I miss right now.

My grandmother would prepare the payesh for me every year only to have a hard time pushing a spoonful through my tight lips. Right now, I would catch any damn train to go back and have a bowl of that.

My mother would hug me on this day, bit tighter and longer than other days; maybe it was her way of saying that she is glad I messed up another year and grew older by one.

My dog cared no shit about the birthday. He would let me slip my cold feet under his belly and make them warm. And sometimes, when he would be bored, he would go from room to room, find me, encircle me, find him a good spot, place his paw on my thigh and sleep on it.

My siblings made me feel, it was more of their birthday and less of mine. My brother would take me in his arms horizontally and go round and round screaming birthday. He would also dance weirdly but let’s not get there.

I still remember my last birthday with my grandfather. There was no one home and I was as usual sulking. He called me to his room, and pushed money and a piece of paper in my palm. When I asked him about the paper, he told me to make a list of the favourite things I want him to bring home for me. I couldn’t write a thing. He died exactly a week after.

Four years later, there is nothing I would not do to go back in time, and write on that paper, his name.

My mother would come from office all sweaty and tired, and still would cook up something favourite for me.

My father would take us out to eat; I would order the same mainstream Chinese, and the day would end in happy burps.

Precisely, miles away from home, and the first time at that, wishes from people I don’t even care for the rest of the 364 days, choke me.

This place, I am at right now, there is not much wrong about the place, but probably the only right thing is, it made me write a blog after almost two years.

Pangs work in weird ways.