As you grow older, the speed at which your thoughts are expressed in words diminishes. I have been writing a hundred-odd pages over the past few weeks. But I can blame my age and memory for it. It's been four odd decades since the time we shifted to Shantiniketan. Time seemed to be going faster as the children grew older. Lata loved her work as a teacher, and she was immensely respected by her students. Apart from our children, many of her students flocked regularly to our home. Lata was the headmaster of her school in the last twelve years of her service, and even when the children chose their own paths and shifted to bigger cities, our house would still welcome a lot of the children whom Lata treated as her own. She urged me often to sponsor the education of some of the underprivileged children from the nearby villages, and I would often be invited by the school for some cultural programme.
Often in the summer vacation, we would travel to wherever Narayan was posted for some change of air and during the Durga Puja vacations, Lata would often visit Punnya with the children. I avoided going there because it pained me even when I was informed that our property was razed to the ground and an administrative building of sorts, for the Government of Birbhum District, had replaced it. There was no trace of my childhood left behind for my children to see. Writers have no retirement age. The good thing about that is that you always find stories to tell and have the intention to finish one last draft. The bad thing about that is when your wife retires, at times, watches you stare at the wall, pen in hand, for hours and grumbles to herself that you had promised to take her somewhere or visit the grandchildren.
My pen has been interrupted by the knock on the door now. I must stop, for I am expecting my children back home today. They come every year on this day, without fail, with their partners and our grandchildren, no matter where they are in this world. They often flock around Ananta with their endless health issues. My eyes now travel to her as I smile and put the scattered papers of the draft aside neatly. I can hear the house help open the door as a flood of familiar voices rushes inside the otherwise peaceful place. I hear Ananta greeting my daughters and my eldest son, asking for me. I must go downstairs. But first, I must replace the dried flowers in the vase in front of her portrait. After all, Lata hated dried flowers. I can’t anger her on her birthday. And if someday these words make their way to you in print and paper, remember it was her "Protidaan" in my life.
