“Maktub…It’s written”
These words were engraved with chalk on to the back of the
door of my room 12 A at Pala house…
Along the years, even
as I lost my faith in god, even as I threw all the petty superstitions down the
drain, even as I cursed my life at some point for not going the way I dreamed
of, I used to wonder if the route life was taking me was just the route I should
be going.
I do not doubt it now. Because I wouldn’t have met the best
people in my life if I hadn’t drifted in the wind. You and them were the sign
posts that assures me life is going the right way…
The first in chronology was you, mr Theatrical Bodhavan…
Such fine is the balance that if I even studied a bit more
or studied a little less at school I wouldn’t have ended up at Pala. And it
would have been quite a thing to miss!!!
The one sentence I have told many a time in this blog is “this
is where I lived for the first time”, which is a sum total of many firsts…
In the “firsts” list of my life, there is one very special “first”
related with you. You are the first one I ever opened up my whole mind. I was
always the “chaluan” and the “talkative” they say I was. But this TVMite had to drag his ass all the
way to Kottayam, specifically, to Pala house, to have a really frank and open
conversation with a friend for the first time in his life.
People post in net that Librans are good listeners. I know
for sure that I was more of an interrupter. But you could take it. You still
do. Every single call,even now, I juz break your sentences up with some
unrelated thing. Well, you were the better listener of the both of us.
Be it in front of the brilliant’s fence-by-the-coffee-shop
throughout lunch break, or pala house terrace throughout nights, or even now, every
moment with you, the talks are incessant. It never ends!!!
My pranks too. I know they get annoyingly naughty at times.
Somehow, am very blessed to have friends like you, Bella, Venki, Kiran, Arjun, Sabari
etc etc who can bear with it , that too, happily and get along me in spite of
my little pranks. (Clint eastwoodnte kochumonum paatinte rajaavum prank for
instance).
I admit one thing frankly, I wouldn’t be able to bear a chaluan
like me, cracking silly jokes even at some pretty serious questions and
situations. Bearing with me is no easy task, I know. And in that matter, all my
friends amaze me. I have often heard many people scorn it in private and in
public, but I don’t mind them, because you and my closest friends have accepted
that part of me happily…
There is a world that looks at me and sees nothing but a
chaluan. There are people out there who are entirely wrong about me. There are
people who have judged me by the I don’t care attitude I have put up in some
hard parts and thought of me as exactly the “I don’t care” person… But I don’t feel
the need to explain it to them that I really do care and I put up that attitude
coz that’s the only way I can keep from getting hurt and carry on no matter
what… and here is a friend who watches me secretly when I watch something with
a secret wish and see how I ache for it in my eye…
Who needs the world. I’d rather have friends like you who don’t
need “paraphrases” “or “my guide to make you understand me” to understand me.
My little world. My close circle of friends… that’s enough.
And you were the first friend I “adopted”. Its with you that
I started making my close friends circle a very universal one i.e I shared my
friends with you. Venki or anil or many of my school friends for instance. Its awe
inspiring a thing that venki calls you up when he is here. The only root both
of you have in common is me. No alma
maters, no Nostalgias binding you two. Yet all this connection… aint that amazing?
I love having this connected web of friends… I love my close friends to be
close friends to each other too…and my friends have lived upto dat :D
Of coz, Maktub…it was written…it was not written on
vocations or path of destiny. It was written on people I shall meet in course
of life… and am happy it was written this way. You, a truckload of pala friends,
a couple of very loyal and true friends at college…
maybe 98 outta 100 couldn’t find a friend in me, but just a
chaluan. But the one or two who did find the friend in me, I am sure, wouldn’t trade
me for a 100 other friends…would you??? ;)
And let me conclude this one with a special note…
“one thing I like about ajith is that he is open to new
ideas, books, songs, films etc etc. vere aarum adhikam paranjitillatha, ennaal
oraalo matto soochipicha books aanu avan sadarana railwaystationil ninnu
vangaaru. He is a variety man with movies( and with paatu. He heard a lot from
my downloaded songs. Nalla patience undavum ennu thonnunille???”
This is from the only letter I wrote from pala to my
schoolfriends that I never let you read. The only one. And that too because it
mentioned this… I thought it very premature to let you read that… Now it feels
right that you see it…
:)
Love
Hari
PS- and you have one big achievement to your name… you
opened to me the universality of music and movies… had we not met, would there
have been even one album of “my movies”…ever??? I still wonder…I wouldn’t have
roamed this much into music without your suggestions. I don’t have a doubt in
that…
