To kill a mockingbird...

Nothing else tastes good for a while after I finish a particularly good book. I can't pick up anything to read for some time. When I finally finished 'To Kill A Mocking Bird' by Harper Lee and closed the book last night, it was almost 1 am and my eyes hurt. But I just could not go to sleep for a very long time.

A week back, I plunged into the book and was lost and transported to another world that was vaguely familiar. A world that comprised innocence and insecurities of childhood, fun of school days, father-the role model... A feeling of something like sadness, but not entirely so, lingered long after I finished the book. An inexplicable sense of loss engulfed me.

I always prefer reading books to watching movies. According to me, when you read something, you have the exclusive privilege to imagine everything explained in the book. You can imagine the places and details how you want them to be. Characters in the book come out alive in your mind. It becomes much more real and much more personal.

'To Kill A Mocking Bird' is one such book which takes you through the journey of childhood of a brother and sister in a small town in Alabama. Having grown up in one such small town myself, I could relate to every word of it. My imagination took wings, I became the little girl in the book that transported me back to my childhood. The experience was so real!

I mused for a while on the title of the book, how true! mockingbirds don't harm you in any way. They sing and fill your ears with the melody of their music, make you happy, lift your spirit and it's indeed sin to kill these songbirds...

It rains memories...

It's pouring. Again. Rains always stir powerful emotions in me. Rains always bring back memories from my childhood, my school, my mother and father, old granny, a pair of damp socks, those carefree days...

Mom wanted me to study in a good, English medium school. So I and a small group of other kids with like-minded parents were enrolled into this school which was about 25 kms from my home. We had to travel up and down by bus that used to be so packed that we kids became invisible after boarding. We had yearly passes and hence even if we managed to 'catch' a seat, we had to get up and let the elders sit. So we stood with our huge school bags that weighed no less than a kilo.

Schools always start on June 1 after the 2-month-long summer vacations - a time when rains lash mercilessly. When it rains it pours in the sleepy little town amid Western Ghats where I come from.

Till class 5, I wore raincoat to the school. I would climb the bus hitching up my raincoat in one hand and carrying my lunch pack in the other, trying to balance. Other passengers would sulk at the very sight of us kids. We were oblivious to the water we sprinkled on people as we passed by them and to the fact that our bags got inevitably stuck when we tried to move, we just wriggled our way through the overcrowded bus pulling our bags along, attracting 'ooooohhhs' and 'awwwwwws' and 'ooooouchs' from people who then cursed us loudly.

As a kid I always craved for one of those stylish umbrellas. Every year I pestered mom to buy me one. She just wouldn't listen. She thought I wasn't old enough to handle umbrellas, beat it! And all I got was lousy raincoats year after year which mom would button up and warn me not to remove till I was safely inside the school.

My bus always reached just 4-5 minutes prior to my school time. I never wanted to cross our PT miss, a rather stern woman, by reaching late for the prayers. So I would start running the moment I got down. The geometry box inside my school bag made a rhythmic jingling sound as I ran.

Panting and puffing I would reach school just in time for prayers and struggle to remove my multi-buttoned raincoat. Phew! those rainy days...! Occasionally it rained so much that the school authorities anticipated danger and declared holiday! We celebrated then. Any excuse to skip school was welcome.

Walking in rain was fun (with our raincoats on of course!) water clogged everywhere filling up the pot holes and we would deliberately step on them as hard as possible splashing water on each other. We ran and chased each other to the discomfort of the vehicles on road who honked in panic as we ran haphazardly.

Mom would give me hot milk and biscuits as soon as I reached home. I always begged her to add a few drops of coffee from her own steaming coffee mug which she refused most of the time. ''I will drink coffee regularly when I'm as old as mom,'' I would think. It wasn't that I was fond of coffee, I just wanted to imitate the elders.

We had to be satisfied playing indoor games like carom board and chess (So boring!) as elders never let us go out during rainy season to play meaningful(!) games like 'coco' or 'kabaddi' which involved a lot of running and chasing around.

How I wish I could rewind my life and re-visit those days...

As I grew up I left for Mysore for studies and then to Bangalore for work. But when first showers of rains starts appearing, wherever I am, I always make excuses to go home for that is the only place which can quench my thirst for rains!

There is something about Su

Su called some days back to tell me that it was raining! ''Ok. Ok. Got to go!'' she said and hung up after whispering that precious piece of information. Su is my cousin. With just about one year age difference, we grew up like friends. We are both this typical dreamers and connect very well. I, for one, believe that I have no existence outside my imagination. I literally live in my own world of fantasy. Su is crazier.

Su lived in this very beautiful fairy tale-like house full of people. My aunt and uncle welcomed anyone who they knew, who wanted to study, into their home. So about 8-9 of our cousins of different age group lived there. I would visit them regularly during vacations.

The house had bamboo furniture and a showcase that held so many little things from an amazing miniature model of Great Wall Of China made of bronze that my aunt had got from China to huge, shapeless, unrecognisable things made of plaster of Paris by Su. It also had a terracotta Ganesha, a note that Su wrote to her mother when she first discovered pen in some yet-to-be-recognised language, a picture of Su as a kid (not that she was any better looking then!).

The house had spiral staircase that led to the charming library with a lot of old-looking books stacked neatly on the shelves. Su had a little room for herself which she had covered with Shah-Rukh Khan's posters and I think there was Su's study timetable written on a lousy paper that had somehow managed to worm it's way in to the room. (I have a strong suspicion that my aunt had something to do with it)

But our favourite place was the terrace. We literally lived there. Even during mid-nights we would sneak to the terrace and lie down looking at the stars. Mild fragrance of jasmine wafting from the garden below, a small battery operated Walkman, and two mindless teenagers with our impossible dreams... We would spend hours on end up there. I think my love for open terrace began from there. Whenever I had to choose hostels I always went for the ones with terrace.

Su has a whole chapter dedicated to her in my memory book from teenage. She no longer lives in that house now. My aunt and uncle sold it and moved to a rented house closer to their workplace. But whenever we happen to pass that street we look at the house, "our house'' longingly.

Su completed M.Sc in Bio chem with flying colours and now works for Bio Con. She hates her monotonous job and dreams about travelling around the world. Su did not attend my wedding. She had no offs. I reminded her over and over again about her promise to put 'mehendi' for my wedding so long ago and tried to make her feel guilty (It had very little effect on her though. She is immune to such things.) ''OK. Here's an idea!'' she said, after I nagged her for the umpteenth time, ''You don't attend my wedding either!'' ''Forget it. You are hoping for too much,'' I replied.

We got so busy with our lives that we have very little time for each other now. But I love her for she has enough craziness left in her to call up to say it's raining!