love at far site
The Love at Far Site
Reading T N Madan‘s ‘Everybody a Gainer’, December 4th India today, about his student days in Lucknow University in the 1950s`, he wrote ` …the class room was an enigma of gender space: there were 20 boys and just four girls in our MA class. We kept a respectful distance….’’, brought back, my own memories of Lucknow, from the same period. I was then a student of MSc Physics, with no girls in the class, we had to content ourselves by just looking at them, from a distance, moving in impregnable clusters. Some of them, more bold and forward, returned the favour by peering through the chinks in the chick, hanging on the door of the Girl’s room, facing our class, a few eyes searching for someone in particular, others just looking out at us and keeping us riveted.
My brother, senior to me and a student of MA Politics on the other hand eight girls in his class, all very pretty, one even a Miss Mussoorie. He did have a crush on one, if I am not wrong, as he confided in me, by the name of Rao. Problem once again was of distance, lack of courage or better sense prevailing and it remained only as ‘The Love at Far Site’.
Come the Annual Exhibition of the Physics department, Satish and I, detailed to man the stalls allotted to us, found to his delight and my constraint and added confusion, saddled with partners, from the BSc Class, both girls.
The short contact of few hours in his case developed into a full-fledged romance over the year. Promises were made, some were kept others fell by the wayside, courtesy, ambitions and different personal priorities. One took the path to higher science, the other diverted to a career in Army. However, the old fires continued to burn in both, the flames coming to surface of and on at chance meetings, till she lost herself, sadly, to Cancer.
I, being less bold and adventurous also possibly less romantic or practical, post exhibition the contact continued with just fleeting meetings, of crossing each other, some times by chance at others deliberate, in the corridors or the dark galleries of the physics department, with occasional few words exchanged, all accompanied with, I confess, heightened pulse rate and increased heartbeat The last time I saw her was, on the final day in the university, when she asked for my notes and the Practical Note Book. I left with a heavy heart, mixed feelings and a
Goodbye, never to see her again.
The positive fallout of these, few and far between, crossings was the habit of daily shave and extra effort at grooming, not being sure of when and where the next contact would chance. To continue with the story, while earlier in BSc, there were four girls in the class, of the group one was a Bengal beauty, with pretty face and a mane of a luxurious growth of hair, fully conscious her assets and her effect on the class. The whole class was in love with her. I in awe of her and nervous, if ever happened to be near her, would consciously, keep a good distance away from her in space. Her aura was such that if one happened to cross her in Hazarat Gang or was lucky enough to see her from near, in the Coffee House, one felt her presence lighting-up the whole place, promptly going dark once again when she left.
One day, sadly, she broke the joint hearts of the class and got married to a young Captain. Changing from Miss Choudhry to Mrs Bose
I crossed her, only once more, nearly ten years later, in Mhow. Mhow in MP is where most of the Army officers go either to be a trainee or taught.
The passing encounter was at the Club, RSI as it was then called, she, now the wife of a senior Major and I, a young Lieutenant, accompanied by my stunningly beautiful wife, my ‘Love at First Sight’. There was a brief flicker of recognition, passing between the two of us. Sadly, my class mate of yore had lost her pride: the luxurious main of past, was now a withered rope of life-less braided hair. I could feel, from the fleeting change in her expression that possibly she was aware of her lost aura.
Time can be so cruel especially to victims of ’Love at Far Site’ bls31
