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.
