At home - Getting Carried Away

This ones wat I wud put in a dairy rather than a blog. But since i dont maintain a dairy i ll put it here.
I have been at home for an extraordinarily long time this time around. Five full days. What did i do? - Orkutting, Gtalking and catching up with old friends, while at the the bug count(work) has kept increasing...a four-week high i guess... arun if u read this u can correct me. Though I vowed never to check office mails, I couldnt resisit looking at the bug count.

So back home , I have been uncharacteristically social, met friends, went to college, TALKED to teachers. These friends are ones who live in the same city as I, somehow it never struck me( or them) that we shud have met there. However, we got to meet now.I have promised myself I will never do the mistake of losing touch with friends. But sometimes you feel like you are not wanted ........digressing, I ll stop.

I was wanting to visit college for a long time, but going alone wud have been a waste of time, I wasnt exactly what you call "popular". Infact , the only reason I am remembered at all is because of a skirmish with my HOD in the last semester. And when i did meet him, he left me in no doubt , he remembered, too vividly for my liking. But the emotion was different, I could see pride on his face, proud of my retaliation, happy that i had stood up to him when my integrity was being questioned. We were lucky to have found 5 of our teachers in one room, they were asking bout a lot of ppl- dead, alive,happily married, broken-hearted,everyone. An emotional conversation which I cant put into words, even if I were beeter with words.

I never thought these things would happen one day- you know what, we had tea together, and I (we) was stupid enough not to carry any money,(I had 20 rupees and my debit card) they bought us tea and coffee and bajji. One lesson I learnt, have some clothes back home too. I usually come home, spend the weekend in banian and pyjama and go back in the same costume (u know which one) . This time I had to make do with a red shirt and almost grey pant to go with my brother's old over-sized shoes, it was not a pretty sight I assure you. we had decided to meet near the XEROX shop.....tats how we call it. I was already uncomfortable in my dress, and my friends' reactions on seeing me only worsened my state. At no stage in my life was I a good dresser, but this was over the top. With determination, we proceeded into the E-block (EE,EC,CSE,IT depts are housed here).
The college itself has changed or rather is being changed a lot. The bridge across the avinashi road has been built at last. Not yet operational though. The A-Hall/cafetaria building is being redesigned. Ours was never a big campus, and now tat the population has grown , I see that all structures are going UP. A lot of things have changed but even more things are the same. The capsule lift , the voice in the lift, the computer centre, our classroom near the lawn (A-block).
With the classroom comes other memories,which I have fought hard to forget, relationships and their complexities, what it feels like to be ditched, moments wen u feel inferior,the great times and the sad times...favouritism, intelligence.... lectures...the place where she used to sit........those secret LOOKS during lectures....simply overwhelming!!!
If this is how it is after one year, I think I will have a major emotional problem IF I come back later in life. Some things I have resolved to do after this trip: re-establish those connections which have rusted over time, give ego a back seat and be the first one to say hi., give something back to the institution which gave me my life...... Lets see wat can be done.

Those days....SIGH.....

Like most children of my generation, I simpy lived cricket, and believed I would one day bring the world cup to India with a last-ball six of Allan Donald. Then the harsher realities of life caught up with me, I had to do what I had to do, sit down and study. MAY be i shud have pursued my dream, but like Sidhu says "MAY BE was never a good honey BEE".

But thankfully, I could postpone serious cramming/learning till my higher secondary exams. I was average by all means, but remained at the top of my class, because ......well, no one was particularly interested in studying. The headmaster dint help either, his ultimate goal was a cent per cent(all -pass) result, whatever marks you got over 35 was a bonus. All this left ample time for cricket. WE followed and played cricket like there was no tomorrow. Life was split in two, school and cricket.Life was simple - it was about hitting sixes. Dint matter if you got out, won or lost.

Those days are long gone now(actually it is just a little over half a decade) . Life is complicated, I already feel wise ;) ,old and slow.Life is more about staying at the crease and keeping the score ticking(How boring). Technique is valued more than raw talent, I see that on screen too, Lord Sachin is no longer the master blaster I used to love, people have forgotten afridi, even dhoni has mellowed down, even my code has gotten complex and structured ;).

Everything has become so complex that I am not able to think straight, or write what I think.
I started out to write a blog on Kumble's century , a great gentleman and an epitome of commitment. And naturally thought I shud set the background - how I grew up with cricket, and got just a little carried away ;). For great blogs on kumble's century, please ask me or just google.