Memory lane

Nostalgia! A supremely abused concept in my opinion! We have movies, songs, poems, stories and what not revolving around this topic. Why, even Ol man Yanni has a song that goes by that name. It is an awesome song, no doubt, but the concept? Quite suspect indeed!

Now, I am not writing this piece just to prove how 'against the flow' I can be. Most people love dwelling in the past. Why, even I loved my photowalk in the random gullies of Mumbai, when I knew a separation was imminent! (spoils of the photowalk still scream out to be shared and they shall meet their due soon). But through the photowalk, I began to wonder why exactly I was getting a thrill out of that walk. Why was I feeling cosy while being engulfed in memories? Why did I see a younger me in some shop, at the ticket window of a theater, on the katta alongside the sea, at an ice cream place, and why did I feel all warm fuzzy happy?

Luckily for me, I got into a bus that took a circuitous route around town to get back and I got myself some time to think. And think I did! Only to realize that maybe I was scared and a tad apprehensive! And nostalgia was my way out of the pressures of the present and the future! This might sound bizarre but I felt it made sense! Too afraid of the imminent uncertainties that the future held, I tried my level best to hold on to the pleasures of the past! We all write in B school essays that we love and relish change and challenges. I think somewhere, we all lie! The very fact that we smile each time we walk down memory lane, perhaps shows how change-averse we are, that we prefer holding tightly to the certainties of the past!

I know I loved the clothes I bought at that shop or the movie I saw that day or the conversation I had with a friend on that katta and how I loved the fact that on that very brick wall, we had buried our differences and fortified our friendship! Those moments were truly pleasurable! I wondered whether the future would bring even a handful of such events!

But then again I thought back about the moments that preceded the memorable ones. I know I was apprehensive about going to a shop I'd never tried and I was worried about wasting toooooooo much of my time. I did not want to see 'Dhamaal'. I was too worried about hurting my own self prestige and ego to want to go and mend fences with my friend by the seaside. In short, in the moments preceding the ones that now line my memory lane, I was worried about the future.

And by the time I reached my bus stop, I decided that it was time I limited my dwelling on the comforts of the past to just a bunch of pictures and focused more on the challenges and excitements of the future!