Growing up!

(# 119 - my oldest friend .Written for the Sunday scribbles)

Date:20th April

Somewhere over Indore.

Altitude:11500 metres.

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This time around when i was leaving home for Pune, my parents came to the airport to see me off.The flight was for 2:30 pm and we reached there by like 1. We caught up for a last round of coffee at the terminal CCD. Such occasions are always a little uncomfortable. You know all us are sad, yet Dad checks out for another time if i am carrying the tickets or Maa is pleading me hard to carry the ghar ka paani in a wrethched two litre Fanta bottle! The rush of emotions in the hush of pretence! The clock strikes 1:45 and i think its appropriate now to say how wonderful it was for the last ten days being with them ( a little regretful for the petty fights i had with them on one occasion and hadnt quite talked to them for three full days! ). We all get up , pay the bill ,pick my handluggage and move towards the security checks.

Before the final glass door that separates the ticketers from the ticketless, i drop my luggage on the ground and look at them.Maa, moist eyed, Dad, looking somewhere else, Me , smiling ear to ear in concealment.I hug Maa, and say, she looks beautiful still. And suddenly dad pretends to understand, Oh boy, u moving? I say, take care dad.He places his hand on my shoulder and wishes happy journey.

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I cross the glass barrier. Separated.

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I walked a few confdent steps to the Kingfisher counter to get my boarding pass. As it was being processed, i looked back. I saw Maa and dad waving their hands in huge sailor arcs from behind the glass panes, probably saying Come Again.Maa smiling or crying i couldnt figure out; Dad, bored to show whatever it was,as usual.

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I thought. This...was the couple. Who weathered each other for 27 long years, day and night, and then nights and days again,who never exchanged I-love-you s between them but still loved as much, who fought,fought themselves, fought for themselves, and fought for everything their children wanted these many years. They grow old now i see. My mother a little tinier, a little less beautiful, a few lesser teeth, a new bunch of grey on her head each time, and my dad, a little less robust, a few unmistakable wrinkles,and a little more worse with emotions!

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Fifteen minutes to spare , i sit in the departure lounge surrounded by a sea of people waiting to get into their flights.

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When i was growing up,one of my hugest fancies was to live an independant life, away from home, earn on my own and be the messiah son to my ageing parents.That day was here, but was nothing near or like the way i imagined it. It was a certain Ishaan Awaasthi kind of hollow thing, hardly explainable!

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Soon my flight was announced and i realised i had only my handbaggage wit me and forgotten my laptop in the security check As i went back to collect it, through the corridors of the hallway, i saw Mom and Dad still there . Maa, her nose still stuck on to the glass panel, for a glimpse of probably nothing.Teary. Tired. Dad standing besides, and carrying her bag of tiffins and boiled water bottles around his shoulder, looking earnestly at the Kingfisher boards to read Departed. I clicked them in my mind.The moment that was, priceless!

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I suddenly felt like rushing back in time, be dependant on them again, ask for pocket money ,have flanneled night suits, live by their rules, fight with them,and never grow up!A certain feeling of unreachableness crept in, a place few inches beyond my grasp. A squarefoot of vacuum. The price of growing up.

I rushed ahead for my flight and wrote this piece in mid air.Like my feelings, hung!

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