Date with an old song and lost friends

With Hindi songs playing on the radio, I soaked myself in the gorgeous sunset in sub-zero weather. A few seconds later, RJ played the next song and brought back a sea of memories. Song was from a movie that released in 2001. I was in college, too worried for my House Exams that I skipped watching it with my friends. I irked with jealousy when they hummed this song. Apparently, the movie was spectacular, like its cast. I vividly remember thinking of being in a better place, with a new gang of girls, and without those eccentric friends. And, hoping that time would change for better!

15 years later, time has certainly changed. I am without those friends. They are with new ones. And, I am sipping tea with Bollywood music and sunset as my companions. Is it destiny? Am I lonely? No, it’s time. It’s wicked. It’s powerful. Above all, time is a trick master. It tricks you to dream about future and when you reach that ‘future,’ it makes your past unbelievably good. You feel like an idiot to let it go without enjoying it to the fullest. Your only wish remains - to time travel and re-live those moments you once cribbed about. You write memoirs, reminisce about it and share it with your new friends. Past somehow becomes an untapped opportunity. And, you were naive to think that things would change for better. No, they don’t! ‘Everything is in the present,’ your mature self rationalise. With guilt of letting the past go, you take a vow to collect every little bit of happiness in a little box and make a ‘time capsule’ for future. Ignoring the fact - you are still thinking about future, not enjoying the present. Sadly, you are lost in the labyrinth, which is too difficult to decipher, much like your own feelings.

The cycle continues... you work hard with only one thing in mind - a bright and happy future. This nonchalant attitude keeps you going, until one day when you listen to a song on a radio or stumble upon an old classmate on Facebook. Then, you take a break to take account of your life. You realise you’ve become a slave of time and its three dimensions -  past, present and future. You live either in your past or for your future, never in the present. Isn’t it funny that as I am writing and you are reading this - a part of us is lost in another world. Maybe, ‘what to cook for dinner tonight?’ We are tied at the strings and time controls over moves. But don’t think that time has only controlling powers. It heals too. It makes you a better person. It teaches to value love, family, friends and things you take for granted. Because, like time, even these things need to be respected.

I finished my tea and switched off the radio, the thought of enjoying ‘present’ took a backseat the moment I stepped into daily chores. I know, memories will knock to make me miserable. Future will keep me awake with worry. And present like always, will smile - too busy to say anything. As far as I am concerned, I will be struggling through all these, trying to make sense of my life. Will I learn from it? I think, only time will tell.