Ya, it was such great fun. We had grown up together and now it was suddenly time to go separate ways into the unknown. For much of our lives we had known little other than the daily school routines. Most folks (I guess) liked coming to school, I hated it. Mondays were the worst. The day seemed unimaginably long. The eighth (& final) period seemed nowhere in sight and the periods seemed to trudge through the day without any sense of urgency.
The short-break offered me some respite and hope of eventually escaping for home. The two periods after that brought in old sentiments..of never breaking the shackles of academia. Lunch was like nirvana: 40 minutes of bliss out of which 20 were spent in talking, playing and scheming against classmates of the rival gang. It was great fun! And we had only 3 more periods to go before we were through for the day. There was indeed hope!
We felt dreadfully sleepy immediately after lunch. The swirling fan drowned whatever silly ramblings the teacher would venture into. Daydreaming about the pretty girl in class becoming famous some day was what hogged my powers of imagination. I'm pretty sure the other pupils had thoughts very similar to mine.
Of course, we ran through this routine for many years and as we evolved, so did our thoughts, our feelings, our dispositions and our priorities. We had all grown up under the same environment, the same teachers, the same punishments, the same giggles, the same influences and the same routines. It was hard to let go of all of that in one swift severing of ties we had failed to acknowledge had bonded us together. The autograph book surfaced all of a sudden and we found people furiously scribbling notes for each other. I bought my own, and circulated it. I got to write my own stuff on the books of others, some silly, some straight from the heart and some outright squeezed out of nowhere when I fell short of words.
Of special significance was the little episode that took place when my book finally reached my love interest! Mysteriously, it disappeared and couldn't be traced! Bads (one of my best friends) managed to cull it out of her (I guess) and literally forced a generic note out of the lady of my dreams! I feel so sorry for her: she faced so many embarrassing moments simply because she had unintentionally managed to grab my interest! Wonder where she is now.
My book is carefully preserved to this day. I seldom go through it. But when I do, old memories come flooding through. Memories of my wonder years!
(I was reminded of the silly rants & raves while penning my own thoughts for Anand's autograph book today.)
The short-break offered me some respite and hope of eventually escaping for home. The two periods after that brought in old sentiments..of never breaking the shackles of academia. Lunch was like nirvana: 40 minutes of bliss out of which 20 were spent in talking, playing and scheming against classmates of the rival gang. It was great fun! And we had only 3 more periods to go before we were through for the day. There was indeed hope!
We felt dreadfully sleepy immediately after lunch. The swirling fan drowned whatever silly ramblings the teacher would venture into. Daydreaming about the pretty girl in class becoming famous some day was what hogged my powers of imagination. I'm pretty sure the other pupils had thoughts very similar to mine.
Of course, we ran through this routine for many years and as we evolved, so did our thoughts, our feelings, our dispositions and our priorities. We had all grown up under the same environment, the same teachers, the same punishments, the same giggles, the same influences and the same routines. It was hard to let go of all of that in one swift severing of ties we had failed to acknowledge had bonded us together. The autograph book surfaced all of a sudden and we found people furiously scribbling notes for each other. I bought my own, and circulated it. I got to write my own stuff on the books of others, some silly, some straight from the heart and some outright squeezed out of nowhere when I fell short of words.
Of special significance was the little episode that took place when my book finally reached my love interest! Mysteriously, it disappeared and couldn't be traced! Bads (one of my best friends) managed to cull it out of her (I guess) and literally forced a generic note out of the lady of my dreams! I feel so sorry for her: she faced so many embarrassing moments simply because she had unintentionally managed to grab my interest! Wonder where she is now.
My book is carefully preserved to this day. I seldom go through it. But when I do, old memories come flooding through. Memories of my wonder years!
(I was reminded of the silly rants & raves while penning my own thoughts for Anand's autograph book today.)
Comments