time stands still

I find myself looking back more often now….at phases of my life which were defining even though I didn’t know it then. The best part of them seem to be in school which is to be expected I guess since we spend the first fifteen years or so of our lives there. As I walk the corridors in my school the smells and the sounds enmesh me in a time warp.

Nothing has changed. The cool marble benches, the dark corridors with the flagstones, arched ceilings, the wooden chairs and the desks smoothened…worn out by generations of school children…..time stands still. The smell of a forty odd ‘tiffins’ mingles in the break...jam, bread, butter, mango pickle inexplicably rolled into one amazing smell that pulls me into a tunnel…almost like Alice….and evokes memories of me sitting in my first ever class…..crying my heart out!! I could not believe that my mother had actually left me there!! Come to think of it from a child’s perspective... its first the feeling of being abandoned and then having to deal with a roomful of strangers….cant be a nice feeling for sure. I mean do that to me even today and I’d hate you for it!

As I walk up the graveled incline leading to the principals office block I remember the innumerable times I fell while running down the slope…..all those scraped knees…..running to the matron at the dispensary and getting the customary ‘laal dawai’ swab along with a dose of her acerbic comments!! It didn’t help that I was allergic to that medicine and instead of healing it just used to aggravate the sore. Happened every darned time and yet I would still limp to the dispensary like a lamb to slaughter!!

The principal’s office was only talked of and never seen. God forbid if anyone was summoned inside….it had to be bad news. So we walked on tip toe, talked in hushed tones and scrammed if we were discovered walking in the precincts. The boarders were looked up to because they actually lived there….they talked of places we hadn’t even seen…..they were on better terms with the staff and yes they were a team like us day scholars never were!! The boarder-day scholar cold vibes continued all through our junior years until we all finally realized that hey we were all on the same page….blimey!!! Made some of my best friends there…

Today  I watch my girls dress up in the same uniforms we used to wear and it fills me with a sense of pride. I love it when I see them get affronted if anyone dare say a word against their school……the love they feel ….the loyalty….the feeling of oneness is the greatest gift of all. Proud to be a Martinian!