It’s afternoon. Lunch is over. I think it’s in the middle of our winter break. I am in my grandparent’s room.
For a schoolboy like me, growing up with grandparents and uncles and aunts was awesome. The old house had a tin roof and it was painted red. My grandpa had surrounded the entire property with flower beds, and my grandma taught me beautiful colourful words like petunia, begonia, pansy, marigold and much later I found out “godavari” was chrysanthemums.
11th Mile, Kalimpong, early eighties and the rural landscape was drowsy in the sleepy afternoons. I don’t recall anyone else being in the room. The windows had white lace curtains and it was fluttering in the soft breeze. I am lying in bed, probably trying to read a Louis L’ Amour paperback. The sparrows had made their homes under the rafters. I could hear them twittering away in the eaves in the quiet afternoon.
As much as I try, my mind drifts to the sparrows, they keep twittering, busy collecting small twigs, blades of dried grass and building away their cosy nests. Their conversation distracts me. I look outside the window, the corn fields are empty. The harvest over, the land will lie dormant till the next monsoon. It’s our playing field for the winter.
Somehow today all my friends have gone elsewhere. We aren’t gathering wild raspberries, catching dragonflies, playing cricket with balls made from bamboo roots. It’s not one of those days.
The dogs lie still in the afternoon sun. Winter days in Kalimpong are mellow and the afternoon sun is a welcome warmth. My grandma is somewhere around, maybe in the kitchen garden, pottering after her vegetables – jumbo garlics, lettuce, chilli, cucumbers, guavas. I am thinking no homework, schools out.
This day is etched in my mind like a high definition video and it’s a very comforting reflection. The safest place to be - my grandparent’s room, the sparrows as my companions.
The year's at the spring And day's at the morn; Morning's at seven; The hill-side's dew-pearled; The lark's on the wing; The snail's on the thorn: God's in his heaven— All's right with the world!
- Robert Browning
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