The First Light of The Rising Sun....
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The feel of the wind in my face and the rain drops hitting the face hard from the drizzle, while riding the Hayabusa powered by the 1300 cc Suzuki engine, never ceased to evoke the thrill of being god on wheels.Well almost, I was no god. He was up there looking at me probably enjoying the aerial view. As I shifted my 'Busa into the top gear, the devil of an engine thrusting us into the 140 kmph slot, I felt HER hands engulf me from behind and clasp my shoulders. I could sense my now not so young body spring up the well toned muscles which lay under all that extra flab. Our bodies wet from the drizzle had been flung together with the 'Busas' flight into top gear. As she clung on to me,the wet clothes separating us, neither of us uttered a word. We were both enjoying the peace and tranquility at high speed. The road seemed to never end, stretching straight for miles together as far as the eye could see.
Suddenly someone called out to me and the never ending road seemed to vanish right from in front of me, as I heard my Pa's voice calling out to me. I was suddenly wide awake. Nothing till date can wake me up as instantly as his deep husky voice does , which incidently I have inherited, calling out to me with my nick name which he always refers me with, in first person. As far as my memory serves me he has never called me by my real name. But I never complain about that. It is that nick name that strangely bonds me with my father. I acknowledged his call the second time. But he did not seem to have heard me. I knew he would call again not realizing I was awake. I grabbed a T-shirt from the wardrobe and walked down the steps lazily. Pa wanted me to drive him over to an uncle's place. He had been the happiest person on my return home for good. He had missed me terribly in all my years away from home. And it showed. Now he made it a point to have me around as much as possible. Even if it meant having me drive him around though he had still been driving around all this while. I didn't have any plans of my own so I agreed. We got into his old car, which he seemed to still drive around. Even the proposition of buying him a new car as a birthday gift had been rejected him. He was happy with his own car.
As we reached uncle's place, I dropped in to say a quick hello and decided to drive back home since Pa was gonna spend the evening. He told me he'd get a drop back home later with my cousin. As I drove back home, I took a different route - one that took me from near HER place. I was pleasantly surprised to see the lights on in the house as the sun had set and the house showed some presence.I could never figure out what it is with me and the numbers but I could remember numbers like anything. License plate numbers, birthdays, phone numbers they would just pop out of nowhere.Deciding to test my luck and memory, I pulled out my Nokia and dialled HER residence number from my memory.Bang on target. It was the right number. I could hear the phone ringing in the house. I waited with bated breath as the phone rang. It had rung long enough for someone to answer it, if there was such a kind soul inside who had bothered to light up the house for the evening as well as my hopes. The thought had barely passed my mind, a 'Hello' from the other end startled me and I dropped my phone into my lap. S**t. As I fumbled to grab the phone from my lap and put it to my ear, I pressed the horn.Double S**t. The sound of the horn cut through the stillness of the evening that had descended on the neighborhood. I was bang outside HER house. I froze in the seat. I stared straight at the french windows as light seeped out of it. Someone had just pulled the curtain back and peeped through. As fast as the curtains were pulled back, they were drawn again. The sudden hello resounded on the cell phone. I could barely utter a word. I heard the click after a couple more hellos.
The porch lights came on. I could hear the footsteps loud and clear on the floor. Someone was coming out to check up. Any sensible person in that situation would have started the car and got the hell out of there. But it was probably my anxiety to take a chance hoping it would be HER coming out of the door. Just then the large teak wood door opened and a man in shorts and vest walked out. It was obviously not her. I was not sure whether that meant trouble. I turned the key in the ignition and was ready to roll, but the damn car wouldnt start. I tried again, no luck. Damn it! How could Pa drive around with this piece of scrap?! I could only wonder. Before I could curse the car any further, the man who seemed to be in his late 40s looked down questioningly at me through my car window. I could not think of anything so I gave him a smile. He smiled back ands asked if I was looking for someone. I smiled again, it gave me time to think. Even all those hours in the classroom of the B-school wouldn't help me think of a gullible excuse. I blurted out HER surname and inquired whether they were at home. I was not sure whether he was even remotely related to HER but his whole get up looked more of a helper or the sort. He asked me who I was with raised eye brows. By now I had somewhat recovered from the initial shock. Taking a chance at that I cooly replied that I was a cousin and had returned to India after a long span of time. Proabably my new found confidence did the trick, he relaxed and the raised eyebrow look soon converted into a broad smile. He invited me to come inside. I fooled him into believing that I wanted to give HER a surprise. The old man turned out to be a housekeeper and who was staying the night to guard the house. That eased me. I talked him into telling me where they were vacationing. To my surprise they were at a hill station which was less than 250 km away from there and I had been there once. I could drive through the night and I would be there well before dawn. I thanked him and got into the car. He was left with a bewildered look on his face. And I drove home blessing the car for not starting the first time.
With all my excitement I entered the house. It was lil too early for dinner and a lil too late for evening snack. I decided to settle for coffee. All the years away had habituated me into making my own coffee, even though mom offered to make it for me now. I thanked her and quickly made my coffee. I planned to slip out of the house around 11 pm. The extended afternoon seista would not let me doze off and neither the excitement of going after HER. I chatted up with ma at the dining table as she was busy making some sweets for her grandkids, who would return in a couple of days from their paternal grandparents house. I had finished my coffee and cleaned up the mug. I still had more than a couple of hours to kill. The pallu of mom's saree was still a very entertaining piece of cloth. I could still pull and play with it once in a while and trouble mom. She would shout at me for being old enough to have my own kids and still play with her pallu. But nevertheless she still was happy to have me around. And she started with the -" there is this nice girl, whom I met at some wedding....." . I made my quick exit from the scene, climbing 2 steps at a time and into my room.
I had my backpack ready and loaded in my Honda CRV. This was its 2nd long distance trip since coming out of the showroom. After assuring my parents that I was going for a trek and would get back in a couple of days, I set out for my 250 km of sheer driving pleasure trip. This was something I had always wished for. Long night ahead, highway driving, music for company and no worries. As I reached the highway, I sped up. There was no fun driving a SUV slow. I eased into the 80 to 100 kmph slot. I always enjoyed driving at this speed. I was happy driving like this like never before. It was pretty late for the local traffic and the only traffic I encountered was that of the lorries and trucks which did the National route to transport goods. My window glass was lowered and the breeze was pretty relaxing especially since the summer was not yet out. The rains had been late by more than a week. The thought of rain and breeze reminded me of the dream that I had that evening. It was pretty similar. Except that I was alone and in the car instead of the bike. Well god alone knew what was coming up. I decide to concentrate on my driving.
It took me close to 5 hours to complete the drive to the hill station despite the high speed driving at the beginning. The breaks for stretching and coffee in between had taken up quite some time, so had the serpentine road of the ghat. It did not help that there was almost no traffic, the very nature of the curvaceous road made it too risky to avoid caution. Plus I was in no hurry to get there, since nothing would open until maybe sometime around dawn. Finally I reached the top at 3.30 am. I could see the couple of motels and the lone resort that thrived on the tourist business and had actually come up since my last trip here. The place seemed to be a developed but somehow the natural beauty was unfazed. With no hopes of getting even a cup of coffee at this time, I parked the car. It was highly likely that if at all she would be staying at the only resort in this hilly town and it would be hard to get a room so early before dawn. With nothing more to do, I straightened out the back rest of the behind seat and lay there with the sun roof open. Trying to grab some sleep with the stars shining down.
The excitement of the day to come was barely allowing sleep to even wander close to me. The long straight road, the drops of rain hitting the face and her hands clasping my shoulder, as she hugged me was the only thing that came to my mind. It is said that usually you dream about what you think all day long, however my case seemed to suggest otherwise.My intuition said I would meet HER today. I lay down there until the earliest of the sun rays escaped through the far away hills across the horizon to reflect the arrival of the sun. I got out of the car and stretched my body. I checked my watch. It was 5.20 . The watch had been a gift from my best buddy for my 25th Bday. It was a digital one with an in built GPS too, besides the many other regular features. Many new ones had come in the market but somehow my watch had kept me in good stead and I din't feel the need to update. It had been along just as my buddy had. As I stepped out of the car,I could feel the sky open up to a light drizzle. Not that I was worried about getting wet. I walked a short distance to the point where one could catch a glimpse of the rising sun. There was no one in sight. I climbed a stray rock that pushed out of the hill and perched myself on top. Looked like I would be the only one to welcome the sun that day and the first shower of the season.
I fixed my gaze at the point between 2 far away hills. The sun was starting to come up. Any director would have gladly given one hand and an eye to get this kind of background.The rising sun, a slight drizzle and the sunrise point.Awesome. FullStop. Without any further thought in mind I just continued to stare at the sky, as the sun rays continued to spray its orange color across it and set it alight. I remembered the first time I had seen the rising sun. It was sometime when I was probably 3 or 4 years old. And I just could not come to terms that the sun would disappear and leave us with darkness everyday only to re-surface the next day. My grandfather had been patient enough to carry me to the top of the small hillock behind his house, before dawn, just in time to catch the sun peep out from beyond the hills somewhere and solve the mystery of the disappearing sun. I would always wonder what the Sun would reveal with its first light. I had seen many sunrises and missed too many more, but the rising sun would continue to charm me with first light. I realized how happy I felt inside to witness this event that happened every single day of our life but we were lucky enough to be awake only a few times to see it.
It had surely given me hope and I was filled with energy. I turned my gaze from the early spray of light across the sky, and it took me a couple of moments to adjust to the still low light around. But when I did see clearly, Standing right across from me with folded hands and facing in the direction of the sun was a woman intently soaking herself with the early morning light.The light reflected the profile of her hair tied high up in a pony tail and the straight nose. The slight dimple on the chin was proof enough. I did not have to wait until she opened her eyes to stare in awe at what the First Light had revealed today. It was HER!
The feel of the wind in my face and the rain drops hitting the face hard from the drizzle, while riding the Hayabusa powered by the 1300 cc Suzuki engine, never ceased to evoke the thrill of being god on wheels.Well almost, I was no god. He was up there looking at me probably enjoying the aerial view. As I shifted my 'Busa into the top gear, the devil of an engine thrusting us into the 140 kmph slot, I felt HER hands engulf me from behind and clasp my shoulders. I could sense my now not so young body spring up the well toned muscles which lay under all that extra flab. Our bodies wet from the drizzle had been flung together with the 'Busas' flight into top gear. As she clung on to me,the wet clothes separating us, neither of us uttered a word. We were both enjoying the peace and tranquility at high speed. The road seemed to never end, stretching straight for miles together as far as the eye could see.
Suddenly someone called out to me and the never ending road seemed to vanish right from in front of me, as I heard my Pa's voice calling out to me. I was suddenly wide awake. Nothing till date can wake me up as instantly as his deep husky voice does , which incidently I have inherited, calling out to me with my nick name which he always refers me with, in first person. As far as my memory serves me he has never called me by my real name. But I never complain about that. It is that nick name that strangely bonds me with my father. I acknowledged his call the second time. But he did not seem to have heard me. I knew he would call again not realizing I was awake. I grabbed a T-shirt from the wardrobe and walked down the steps lazily. Pa wanted me to drive him over to an uncle's place. He had been the happiest person on my return home for good. He had missed me terribly in all my years away from home. And it showed. Now he made it a point to have me around as much as possible. Even if it meant having me drive him around though he had still been driving around all this while. I didn't have any plans of my own so I agreed. We got into his old car, which he seemed to still drive around. Even the proposition of buying him a new car as a birthday gift had been rejected him. He was happy with his own car.
As we reached uncle's place, I dropped in to say a quick hello and decided to drive back home since Pa was gonna spend the evening. He told me he'd get a drop back home later with my cousin. As I drove back home, I took a different route - one that took me from near HER place. I was pleasantly surprised to see the lights on in the house as the sun had set and the house showed some presence.I could never figure out what it is with me and the numbers but I could remember numbers like anything. License plate numbers, birthdays, phone numbers they would just pop out of nowhere.Deciding to test my luck and memory, I pulled out my Nokia and dialled HER residence number from my memory.Bang on target. It was the right number. I could hear the phone ringing in the house. I waited with bated breath as the phone rang. It had rung long enough for someone to answer it, if there was such a kind soul inside who had bothered to light up the house for the evening as well as my hopes. The thought had barely passed my mind, a 'Hello' from the other end startled me and I dropped my phone into my lap. S**t. As I fumbled to grab the phone from my lap and put it to my ear, I pressed the horn.Double S**t. The sound of the horn cut through the stillness of the evening that had descended on the neighborhood. I was bang outside HER house. I froze in the seat. I stared straight at the french windows as light seeped out of it. Someone had just pulled the curtain back and peeped through. As fast as the curtains were pulled back, they were drawn again. The sudden hello resounded on the cell phone. I could barely utter a word. I heard the click after a couple more hellos.
The porch lights came on. I could hear the footsteps loud and clear on the floor. Someone was coming out to check up. Any sensible person in that situation would have started the car and got the hell out of there. But it was probably my anxiety to take a chance hoping it would be HER coming out of the door. Just then the large teak wood door opened and a man in shorts and vest walked out. It was obviously not her. I was not sure whether that meant trouble. I turned the key in the ignition and was ready to roll, but the damn car wouldnt start. I tried again, no luck. Damn it! How could Pa drive around with this piece of scrap?! I could only wonder. Before I could curse the car any further, the man who seemed to be in his late 40s looked down questioningly at me through my car window. I could not think of anything so I gave him a smile. He smiled back ands asked if I was looking for someone. I smiled again, it gave me time to think. Even all those hours in the classroom of the B-school wouldn't help me think of a gullible excuse. I blurted out HER surname and inquired whether they were at home. I was not sure whether he was even remotely related to HER but his whole get up looked more of a helper or the sort. He asked me who I was with raised eye brows. By now I had somewhat recovered from the initial shock. Taking a chance at that I cooly replied that I was a cousin and had returned to India after a long span of time. Proabably my new found confidence did the trick, he relaxed and the raised eyebrow look soon converted into a broad smile. He invited me to come inside. I fooled him into believing that I wanted to give HER a surprise. The old man turned out to be a housekeeper and who was staying the night to guard the house. That eased me. I talked him into telling me where they were vacationing. To my surprise they were at a hill station which was less than 250 km away from there and I had been there once. I could drive through the night and I would be there well before dawn. I thanked him and got into the car. He was left with a bewildered look on his face. And I drove home blessing the car for not starting the first time.
With all my excitement I entered the house. It was lil too early for dinner and a lil too late for evening snack. I decided to settle for coffee. All the years away had habituated me into making my own coffee, even though mom offered to make it for me now. I thanked her and quickly made my coffee. I planned to slip out of the house around 11 pm. The extended afternoon seista would not let me doze off and neither the excitement of going after HER. I chatted up with ma at the dining table as she was busy making some sweets for her grandkids, who would return in a couple of days from their paternal grandparents house. I had finished my coffee and cleaned up the mug. I still had more than a couple of hours to kill. The pallu of mom's saree was still a very entertaining piece of cloth. I could still pull and play with it once in a while and trouble mom. She would shout at me for being old enough to have my own kids and still play with her pallu. But nevertheless she still was happy to have me around. And she started with the -" there is this nice girl, whom I met at some wedding....." . I made my quick exit from the scene, climbing 2 steps at a time and into my room.
I had my backpack ready and loaded in my Honda CRV. This was its 2nd long distance trip since coming out of the showroom. After assuring my parents that I was going for a trek and would get back in a couple of days, I set out for my 250 km of sheer driving pleasure trip. This was something I had always wished for. Long night ahead, highway driving, music for company and no worries. As I reached the highway, I sped up. There was no fun driving a SUV slow. I eased into the 80 to 100 kmph slot. I always enjoyed driving at this speed. I was happy driving like this like never before. It was pretty late for the local traffic and the only traffic I encountered was that of the lorries and trucks which did the National route to transport goods. My window glass was lowered and the breeze was pretty relaxing especially since the summer was not yet out. The rains had been late by more than a week. The thought of rain and breeze reminded me of the dream that I had that evening. It was pretty similar. Except that I was alone and in the car instead of the bike. Well god alone knew what was coming up. I decide to concentrate on my driving.
It took me close to 5 hours to complete the drive to the hill station despite the high speed driving at the beginning. The breaks for stretching and coffee in between had taken up quite some time, so had the serpentine road of the ghat. It did not help that there was almost no traffic, the very nature of the curvaceous road made it too risky to avoid caution. Plus I was in no hurry to get there, since nothing would open until maybe sometime around dawn. Finally I reached the top at 3.30 am. I could see the couple of motels and the lone resort that thrived on the tourist business and had actually come up since my last trip here. The place seemed to be a developed but somehow the natural beauty was unfazed. With no hopes of getting even a cup of coffee at this time, I parked the car. It was highly likely that if at all she would be staying at the only resort in this hilly town and it would be hard to get a room so early before dawn. With nothing more to do, I straightened out the back rest of the behind seat and lay there with the sun roof open. Trying to grab some sleep with the stars shining down.
The excitement of the day to come was barely allowing sleep to even wander close to me. The long straight road, the drops of rain hitting the face and her hands clasping my shoulder, as she hugged me was the only thing that came to my mind. It is said that usually you dream about what you think all day long, however my case seemed to suggest otherwise.My intuition said I would meet HER today. I lay down there until the earliest of the sun rays escaped through the far away hills across the horizon to reflect the arrival of the sun. I got out of the car and stretched my body. I checked my watch. It was 5.20 . The watch had been a gift from my best buddy for my 25th Bday. It was a digital one with an in built GPS too, besides the many other regular features. Many new ones had come in the market but somehow my watch had kept me in good stead and I din't feel the need to update. It had been along just as my buddy had. As I stepped out of the car,I could feel the sky open up to a light drizzle. Not that I was worried about getting wet. I walked a short distance to the point where one could catch a glimpse of the rising sun. There was no one in sight. I climbed a stray rock that pushed out of the hill and perched myself on top. Looked like I would be the only one to welcome the sun that day and the first shower of the season.
I fixed my gaze at the point between 2 far away hills. The sun was starting to come up. Any director would have gladly given one hand and an eye to get this kind of background.The rising sun, a slight drizzle and the sunrise point.Awesome. FullStop. Without any further thought in mind I just continued to stare at the sky, as the sun rays continued to spray its orange color across it and set it alight. I remembered the first time I had seen the rising sun. It was sometime when I was probably 3 or 4 years old. And I just could not come to terms that the sun would disappear and leave us with darkness everyday only to re-surface the next day. My grandfather had been patient enough to carry me to the top of the small hillock behind his house, before dawn, just in time to catch the sun peep out from beyond the hills somewhere and solve the mystery of the disappearing sun. I would always wonder what the Sun would reveal with its first light. I had seen many sunrises and missed too many more, but the rising sun would continue to charm me with first light. I realized how happy I felt inside to witness this event that happened every single day of our life but we were lucky enough to be awake only a few times to see it.
It had surely given me hope and I was filled with energy. I turned my gaze from the early spray of light across the sky, and it took me a couple of moments to adjust to the still low light around. But when I did see clearly, Standing right across from me with folded hands and facing in the direction of the sun was a woman intently soaking herself with the early morning light.The light reflected the profile of her hair tied high up in a pony tail and the straight nose. The slight dimple on the chin was proof enough. I did not have to wait until she opened her eyes to stare in awe at what the First Light had revealed today. It was HER!
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