“You stupid,
where have you been all these years?” my best friend at school, Kadambari,
confronts me.
It felt nice
to be called ‘stupid’ with so much affection after so many years.
That
morning, at the St. Anthony’s school gate, I saw a group of parents.
It seemed
like there was a Parent’s Meeting. We were also having a reunion of our batch
mates on the same day.
As I
approach the group, I realise that the people I thought were parents were
actually my batch mates. Everybody tried to recognise each other. There were five boys called ‘Rajesh’ so it was
a bit confusing – then and now. The faint lines on our faces showed that we had
all laughed and loved and lived.
We caught up
with each other about what we had been doing with our lives. There were several doctors, engineers, and teachers among us. There was also a diamond merchant. However, there was no showing-off or bragging. Every body was modest and had a deep respect for each other. The nuns and teachers at St. Anthony's Convent High School seemed to have done a great job. We belonged to the 'charmed generation' as we had limited access to television and phones and no internet while growing up.
We visited
our classrooms and took the seats we used to occupy once upon a time. The
scribbled names were still there on the wooden desks. Nothing much had changed.
The only difference was that with our extended waistlines, it was difficult to
sit on the narrow benches for a long time.
Memories
were revived. Solemnly, we grieved for the teachers who had passed away.
There were also
a few surprises.
The little
bright boy in glasses, Ajit, who sat in front of me, had become an Inspector of Central Excise.
Another boy,
James, who occupied the last benches, had become a Catholic priest.
Many of our
batch mates had migrated to other countries or were working elsewhere and had
promised to be with us on that day in spirit if not in person.
It was decided that we should start a charity fund in memory of our years at this school. Meena, one of the members of the organising committee of this reunion, printed a picture calendar as a souvenir and
arranged to send it to all.
My calendar
is in our kitchen and takes me every morning to those innocent days that we
spent at St. Anthony’s.
