November 10th 2010
Koi atka hua hai pal shayad
Waqt mein pad gaya hai bal shayad
Dil hai toh dard bhi hoga
Iska koi nahin hai hal shayad
My favourite poet, Gulzar Sahab reminds me of this. (I hesitate to translate this as I do not think I can do justice to his thoughts and words)
Last week, Wednesday was a beautiful crisp almost winter day. We were to go to the high school with our grade 8 students, they were going to attend classes with the grade 9 teachers, their teachers for next year. The grade 9s themselves were out for the day at the Take Your Child To Work Day initiative. I walked with the 3 other teachers and a large group of students. This was the first day we would see them leave. This is where I always felt a tug at the heartstrings every year when they stand there, wide eyed, over-awed, suddenly at the bottom of the ladder from being the oldest in elementary school. There is more to teaching than IEPs, Progress Reports and Staff Meetings, beloved as they are. There is the human connection that makes me get up one more day,simply because they show up. They walk through the snow, with all their teenaged angst behind them. All they ask is that I be there and do my best for them. Surely I can do that much.
We walked back after a few hours there. The breeze was cool, the sun was high in the sky. We went in to lunch and finished the day with our literacy block. So far so good.
Just a little around 3 pm, minutes before I was to leave, I lost consciousness and had to be revived by my colleagues. At the doctor`s office where a co-worker drove me, I was poked and prodded and prescribed rest and tests. Diwali weekend ahead, besan laddoos and chivda to be made and lots of family fun planned. How could this happen?
And so I sat there, referrals in hand trying not to think ahead. `Just rest`is what I was supposed to do which is not easy for someone like me whose mind runs a mile a minute ( I think we are called Type A, B will just not do.)
Diwali morning, abhyang snana only a fond memory. I woke to see the tops of the pine trees in my front yard waving against the blue sky and the words came. They have not stopped, 7 pages at a sitting tonight between 10 and 11 pm. And even now at 3 am, I am still writing.
That was it, thoughts bottled up perhaps, as I hurtled with every passing day into the next, putting myself where I could not even see myself. That must be it,
I have another day of rest to go before I get back to my students. I have carried around a 48 hour monitor ( that did not pick up my memories, only heart beats) a test that filled what seemed like innumerable bottles of pure Hattangadi-Karnad blood, a stress echo ( which I aced thanks to my afternoons and evenings at the gym: silver hair is just a guise my friend, I mentally smirked at the technician who marvelled at my heart rate)
Just around 3 pm as I write this, I think to myself. I am awake because I can be. I can nap tomorrow. Carpe Diem, the words won`t stay tomorrow. They will disappear like mist in the rising sun. Write them now.
A wise friend had recommended that the way to heal and to move forward through any stage in life is to `do what you love`. This is perhaps the first step. And while I am at it, also realign my expectations or suspend them completely. The Buddha, now He was really onto something here.
Koi atka hua hai pal shayad
Waqt mein pad gaya hai bal shayad
Dil hai toh dard bhi hoga
Iska koi nahin hai hal shayad
My favourite poet, Gulzar Sahab reminds me of this. (I hesitate to translate this as I do not think I can do justice to his thoughts and words)
Last week, Wednesday was a beautiful crisp almost winter day. We were to go to the high school with our grade 8 students, they were going to attend classes with the grade 9 teachers, their teachers for next year. The grade 9s themselves were out for the day at the Take Your Child To Work Day initiative. I walked with the 3 other teachers and a large group of students. This was the first day we would see them leave. This is where I always felt a tug at the heartstrings every year when they stand there, wide eyed, over-awed, suddenly at the bottom of the ladder from being the oldest in elementary school. There is more to teaching than IEPs, Progress Reports and Staff Meetings, beloved as they are. There is the human connection that makes me get up one more day,simply because they show up. They walk through the snow, with all their teenaged angst behind them. All they ask is that I be there and do my best for them. Surely I can do that much.
We walked back after a few hours there. The breeze was cool, the sun was high in the sky. We went in to lunch and finished the day with our literacy block. So far so good.
Just a little around 3 pm, minutes before I was to leave, I lost consciousness and had to be revived by my colleagues. At the doctor`s office where a co-worker drove me, I was poked and prodded and prescribed rest and tests. Diwali weekend ahead, besan laddoos and chivda to be made and lots of family fun planned. How could this happen?
And so I sat there, referrals in hand trying not to think ahead. `Just rest`is what I was supposed to do which is not easy for someone like me whose mind runs a mile a minute ( I think we are called Type A, B will just not do.)
Diwali morning, abhyang snana only a fond memory. I woke to see the tops of the pine trees in my front yard waving against the blue sky and the words came. They have not stopped, 7 pages at a sitting tonight between 10 and 11 pm. And even now at 3 am, I am still writing.
That was it, thoughts bottled up perhaps, as I hurtled with every passing day into the next, putting myself where I could not even see myself. That must be it,
I have another day of rest to go before I get back to my students. I have carried around a 48 hour monitor ( that did not pick up my memories, only heart beats) a test that filled what seemed like innumerable bottles of pure Hattangadi-Karnad blood, a stress echo ( which I aced thanks to my afternoons and evenings at the gym: silver hair is just a guise my friend, I mentally smirked at the technician who marvelled at my heart rate)
Just around 3 pm as I write this, I think to myself. I am awake because I can be. I can nap tomorrow. Carpe Diem, the words won`t stay tomorrow. They will disappear like mist in the rising sun. Write them now.
A wise friend had recommended that the way to heal and to move forward through any stage in life is to `do what you love`. This is perhaps the first step. And while I am at it, also realign my expectations or suspend them completely. The Buddha, now He was really onto something here.
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