End of a Holiday

I’m not fond of long vacations.  Work keeps me engaged and happy.  This is the first time I took a long holiday (one full month) in Kerala.  I needed it.

One of the first persons I met after returning to Delhi (whose afternoon sun reeked of malice and vengeance in stark contrast with the monsoon that drummed a relentless yet enchanting rhythm on the roof of my brother’s car as he drove us to the Cochin airport) was the boss of a commercial conglomerate in the national capital. 

I met him this morning, two days after I reached Delhi.  Why didn’t I meet anyone in these two days?  People seem to be hiding themselves somewhere on the campus.  Did I smell fear on the campus?  Not even the children played in the courtyard of the staff quarters as they used to do till late into the night in summer.  Why weren’t my colleagues coming out of their homes on their usual evening walks, I wondered. Even those who dared to come out did not seem to dare to start any communication with anyone!

“Your school is becoming famous,” said the person whom I had to meet for a personal reason. “It got some place in a national newspaper recently.”

“I know,” I said.  [I had mentioned this report in an earlier blog.]

He was very much aware of what was going on.  “The new management is dismissing or suspending the staff like children throwing pebbles into the river,” he said.

I smiled at the simile.  Is life a silly game like those played by children, I wondered.  Or is it a nefarious game manipulated by people with protracted childhood?  People who failed to live their childhood as it should have been are some of the most dangerous creatures on earth.

“It’s an unfair game,” said the person as if he had read my thoughts.  “But where on earth do you get fairness?  Has anyone succeeded fighting the system?”

Just a memory of a bygone holiday

Money and political clout rule the world, he suggested.  “If you want to save yourself you can.”

I knew what he meant.  Never don the garb of a messiah.  Every messiah was martyred by the same people whom he tried to save.

Though I was aware of the futility of trying to save anyone except oneself, what he said disturbed me.  He had managed to throw a pebble into the tranquil pool of my consciousness.  The ripples reminded me that my holiday was over.