Saket 11/03/2012 5:25
am
Only
recently I read somewhere that blue is the color of productivity and red is the
color for money, yellow is to calm and pink is for health. On my way to the Trade
Street, I was thinking if Purple would be for expressions then what would be
the color of love or pain. Were there enough colors to paint all human
emotions? And how would it all be if we could feel in colors?
It was
a calm and study morning and spring had just set in. The Trade Street or Money
Lane as they called it and as dad always said, ‘that’s where the money is son’,
was the busiest Street up here. My dad always thought that I was a business
guy, ‘because you know the numbers son’, he would say when I asked why he thought
so.
Trade Street was everything I was not. It was
a place where life ran in numbers and figures in big logs and ledgers and a
place where everything ended up in a deal. A dry and hard space beyond the repair of design
that could never manage a soul for itself. I loved to see the street. It gave
me a feeling of an outsider, a rebel, of someone who chose otherwise. I loved
the feeling of solitude right in the middle of this chaos. I could always
relate to it, write about it but could never imagine to be a part of it.
So on that early spring morning, I was
thinking of colors and what they really mean in life. I had been here for the
last three months now. Living in a
rented studio and was thinking of moving down South to be on a beach and finish
the rest of my book. The thought of being on the beach somewhere close to the
sea made me smile.
On the
third block from my studio, there is an old couple that run a craft shop in the
front of their house. In their mid fifties, old Joe and aunt Jenney had both
retired early and spent most of their time molding clay and wood into beautiful
things.
On my last visit they told me that there was a
student artist who had written to them and wanted to work with them for a month
as a part of some school program and that they were expecting her the day
before. While crossing their house old Joe invited me inside to meet our new
friend. I went in and saw her sitting and sharing some pictures with aunt
Jenney and it looked like to me as if they knew each other for ages. She had deep
brown eyes and short black hair and was dressed like she was here for a long refreshing
holiday.
When we were being introduced, I was thinking,
how could she be so effortlessly beautiful as if she didn’t even care. ‘Hi I am
Ron’. God her smile! ‘Hi! I am Kavya’. After that I asked her a little abut
her, but couldn’t speak to her much and just piled on Joe’s remarks. As I
finished my coffee and started for my walk, she said, ‘we are planning to paint
the walls of the store tomorrow.
‘Do you think Green will put a fresh sole in the store?’
I was trying to say something that won’t make me look like a
fool when she asked; ’ You do believe that colors have a soul, right?’
I
said, ‘I think there is definitely life in colors, but you would know better if
its Green or Red on the walls. I am sure whatever you choose will brighten up
the place.’
For the whole walk I was evaluating if this was the best
thing to say or was I sounded like a complete dork. On my way back, I offered
to help with the change over from across the wall. She said ‘we are only
interested either in skilled help or good company, where do you fit?’ They all
laughed. I was not skilled to paint a wall and what she meant by good company
so I kept silent, gave a shy smile and left saying,
‘So see you tomorrow then.’ She smiled.
On reaching home,
I got fresh, spoke to a few people, arranged my stuff, checked mails and sat
down on my desk to continue writing about Dog and his post war life in Ladakh,
when to my amazement there were no more words I could put down on the page. I
was facing a blank page and just couldn’t write. Last time such a thing had
happened to me was in the barrack when I was covering a war story and for 8
days on the line of control, I wrote about everything but could not write a
sentence on war. This was the time I composed, ‘The bleeding virgin’ and ‘The
unintended Chaiwala’.
The next morning, I woke up remembering her
smile. It had a freshness that is hard to express in words. I realized it was
not just words; I was also getting out of expressions. On reaching Old Joe’s I
saw the crafts were already out, packed in small paper bags and as I entered I
saw Kavya trying different shades she had mixed in small mugs. ‘Hey! Morning’,
you slept well last night’?
She shot a quick glance at me and pointing at the shades on
the wall she said,
‘Hey morning. Tell me, the
Green or the Red.’
I looked blankly at the colors still not comfortable of her
close presence and almost heard myself say, ‘Green I think will go well as a
background of the colorful display’. She gave me a short, keen stare and said,
‘Green it is then’.
‘ So did you find out the color of your sole?’
By the time old Joe and aunt Jenney came back
from church, we had started with a small corner of the wall. ‘Already. Kavya,
my child, you should have rested for a couple of hours more.’ ‘Aren’t you tired
from your journey’?
She refused to rest and told her how she had been longing
for this experience and how well she slept and she was so excited to start. To which old Joe
replied,’ Oh! If you love us like this, we will never let you go.’ We all
laughed and got to the little painted Green spot on the corner wall. May be it
will have a sole then I thought.
For some time we
painted silently, She with flat, bold strokes like someone who knew what she
wanted and I trying as much not to color my hands with the paint. It was fine
to a point but after sometime it started to be an awkward silence,
‘So what do you think is the color of your sole?’
She was startled and with a glance that was half mocking and
half pity said,
‘Usually its pink, but right now I think it had gone to a
deeper shade of Red’
I did not dig more
into this, as I was not sure what she really meant. Or I was just keeping my check
not to say something really stupid. I was just trying to be good company and if
possible a skilled help.
‘Old Joe tells me you are writing a book! Interesting! What
is it about?’
Well, I knew this was coming and was my mark to get into the
colors and poetry of words. I was looking forward to discuss things that
interest me and was wondering what would she think of them. I wanted to know
her, her views and especially the person she was hiding behind her casualness
and her infatuating smile. I explained to her,
‘ It’s a story revolving around a character in post war
Ladakh. You know, like about the constant struggle in him, that is the only
thing that keeps him going.’
‘Will you get me that clean brush please’? ‘ What is his
struggle about’?
‘Its more of his decision never to part with a Ranch his
father had made back in the day in his village, while all his family members
have left for the cities before the war. He is somehow fixated to some close moments of his
life at the Ranch which he is not able to let go and so the story unfolds’.
‘I would like to read it’.
I did not know what to say. No one had ever read my piece
before it was finished. I was suddenly not sure if my words were really
expressive. It’s a writer’s thing, which has more to do with his poor social
skills and nothing at all with his expressions.
‘Its not finished yet’ I managed sounding convincing.
‘Well! You can narrate the end to me’, she demanded.
‘If you like it sure and as such, I would not like to miss a chance to do a narration.’ I smiled to her and we both were back to the wall.
It’s a nice feeling when you are painting a
wall. There is the calmness of colors, the will to get a work done well and the
wait for the end result. By now the one of the walls was almost done and the
room smelled of paint and turpentine. Kavya was fully absorbed in the strokes
of her brush and her ears turned to Pink Floyd, playing in her earphones. It
was a portrait of a girl with glimpses of a defining woman who was constantly
evolving in her thoughts and expressions.
I could never actually
come out of the colors and the new identity Kavya had given to it. To think of
her soul in Pink was difficult to visualize. Yet it gave a new meaning for
colors to my paperback life of Black and White writing.
‘I wonder what is the color of my soul’?
I asked, trying to make it casual and not
looking at her. I have lately realized that the thought process that goes into
a statement we make is most of the times, ugly or at least not as interesting,
to be rimed in an innocent love story.
‘Well, I feel its Blue, Persian Blue.’
‘And what is the
story of Persian Blue’? I asked in a similar but more effort fully attained
manner.
She turned to me,
looked keenly at me for a while and as if thinking of it from the movements of
her hand holding a brush she said,
’ It’s a calm color, thinks a lot and expresses in very
unusual ways’.
‘Wow’, I asked, ‘What do you mean by unusual ways of
expressions?’
She was working on the wall again and without looking
around, she said,
‘Its like Persian
Blue is not a very social color, it keeps more to itself and is most of the
time observing an environment, rather then being a part of it’. ‘ It will not
be seen much and carefully choses where to express the radiance it beholds’.
The character
frame of Kavya that was so far shaping in my mind was distorting and she was
not the art inspired student on a vacation any more, she was much deeper. I was
very interested in what she had just said. It was like a strong vibration
putting me close to discovering something.
She continued,
‘Like when old Joe told me you were a writer I thought you will have a lot to
express, but I forgot altogether that you have a different medium of expression
and you keenly choose your audience’. ‘ So, do you think you are this Blue’?
‘Yes, its close’. I
said as a submission to her empowering presence that had evolved in the brief
time we had known each other. It has been 2 years since I have been in a
relationship, more then a year since I have been staying alone at places where
no one knew me and here I was at the brink of willingly loosing the solitude I
cherished so much.
Aunt Jenney was
calling from the kitchen for Kavya,
‘Baby do you want to
help me set the lunch for everyone’?
She had made a space in this house and aunt Jenney’s kitchen
where old Joe and me were strictly not welcome. When we were washing our paint
stained hands with oil, Kavya told me how lucky she felt to have met this
family and I shared a similar view. While going inside she peeped at the
finished corner of the wall, it was Green and drying in patches. She asked me,
‘should we have done it Blue, your Blue’.
‘Its just fine’, I
said smiling. On the table, we all had the delicious ravioli in white sauce with
wine that had all the love of aunt Jenney’s heart blended with old Joe’s remarks
that still made her blush. Old Joe
recounted the days when all their children would live together and told us how
this lunch was so nostalgic to them as a family. Old Joe also brought an old
record of John Denver from his room and dedicated a number to aunt Jenney from
their college days that old Joe had played while expressing his love to her for
the first time. The lyrics of the dedication went something like this:
“You fill up me senses
like a night in a forest,
Like the
mountains in springtime, like a walk in the rain
Like a storm in
the desert, like a sleepy blue ocean
You fill up my
senses come fill me again.
Come let me love
you, let me give my life to you
Let me drown in
your laughter, let me die in your arms
Let me lay down
beside you let me always be with you
Come let me love
you, come love me again.”
I could feel the
fulfillment in old Joe’s eyes as he asked aunt Jenney for a dance. She couldn’t
hide her tears and looking at the man who has given her a lifetime of
happiness, she gave him her hand and smiled in submission. This was a couple who had fallen in love in
their youth, travelled across the world together for about twenty years and had
retired to the basic existence of craftsmanship that they discovered together.
These were two people in their mid fifties searching for happiness in small
things and living on a togetherness that was still so young and fresh. I envied
old Joe that day so much.
Back home standing
at my window, I was wondering if there was more to life then what old Joe and
aunt Jenney had discovered and if all the things I was running behind like
publishing my books, writing and directing a film, starting a retreat in my
village were really worth it? I was picturing myself in mid fifties and
wondered if it was true that there is someone made for everyone and will I
someday, somewhere discover a blissful togetherness to grow old with?
That night I dreamt of Kavya.
eMONK
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