A Room of One's Own

Her room is the best melange of any creator's inspirations. Because in her room you see her at her worst, in her element. I have lived my life shifts, changing my room every year. And I ensure I never grow any affection for any room. However I can't help a couple of memories in the cracks of my brain, left behind, by mistake.

There was once a room I lived in. Some four years ago. It was the one in which I fell badly sick for the first time and met a ghost. Probably a ghost, can't be sure. The room was stashed away in a corner of the top floor of a rickety old building. Overlooking the basketball court, overlooking a jungle. A jungle I wanted to walk in someday, but couldn't even once in those long years. And, it was in that room that I came into being, I believe. We all have some stages in our lives when we come into being. Post that I have been pretty much the same.

That room, you wouldn't like the vision that I would now give you. Summer must have been approaching quite like the devil. And it must have been a Saturday, a stolen Saturday of no work. Washed wet clothes hung from a plastic string running from corner to corner, incessantly dripping, filling the depressions in the uneven floor. Salwar kameezes and duppattas, of tens of hues, all washed, dipped in detergent and shown under a running tap, merely to ensure the smell of sweat went away, no qualms for the dirt. Wrung for the sake of it, and hung to dry across the room, squeezing into each others' space, sometimes overlapping, sometimes sliding off the string itself. In such a room, I whiled away the last chapters of adolescence, with my generous share of heartbreak. Waiting for the clothes to dry, so that they could be folded and stacked in a shelf in the wall.

But they never were. The life of my clothes ended on that very string. They were worn right from there and thrown back after use, probably awaiting another wash. Who knew! That string must have become the delicate balance of my life. Because one day the loose nails hammered into the walls that held it, gave in after some mild encouragement from a visitor, some random intruder. And down came the string, along with my world, thrown astray on the floor. I stood there, for a moment, celebrating the sheer shock of it.

9 comments:

Unknown said...

superb way to express the feelings!!

Jai HO Mangalmay HO

Aashayein said...

you are THE STORY TELLER...I love the way you create the surroundings with your words and make readers see what you want them to see. This comment is not for this post but for all the posts!

Miss D said...

I second Mansi!

wow!

wildflower said...

Vish
Oh! Really!

Mansi
Thanks, storytelling is a good escape for me. I love the way I lose myself in the process.

Enchanta
:-) Means a lot.

Richa said...

Amazing write! Simply amazing. Wow.

MothSmokeLover said...

One of the best posts I have read in a long time now.

Great imagery! Really awesome work!

wildflower said...

Richa
Thanks

MothSmokeLover
Though I wouldn't want to be sure, it's some kind of literary license that makes want that you see in this imagery what I have seen before I created it.

Lehari. said...

"Summer must have been approaching quite like the devil."

Your serenity pacifies even the most devilish...
Again in love with your writing..

wildflower said...

Be in Love Lehari. With anything for that matter. It's worth it.