By: Ganesh Saili
Sooner or later, it was bound to happen. When we finished college, some grew wings and flew to distant lands; a few like me, sprouted roots. Shuffling around the college office, I realized on that day that the dice had been cast: henceforth Landour was where life for me was going to unfold. All I had to do was brace myself for the ride.
‘New teacher?’ short and stout Jagdish Babu asked. ‘Date of birth?’
Taking my school leaving certificate, he uttered a date, adding sixty years, and like a soothsayer, said: ‘That’s the day you retire.’
And he was right, as correct as a broken clock which gets the time right twice a day. Quietly, without fanfare, age had snuck up on me as I joined the ranks of the half-pay pensioners of the world. The following morning found myself all dressed up with nowhere to go.
‘Going somewhere?’ teased Tulika, our firstborn, giving me a cup of tea.
‘I’m off to my desk!’ I lied through my teeth. The kind girl that she is, she made sure I got there.
Though I admit, sometimes I feel tired, and even feel retired. Whenever I am in need of expert advice, I usually commune with myself, and the lovingly curated books in my library. Every once in a while I use the ‘dial-a-friend’ option, with interesting, albeit somewhat depressing results.
‘Give me a few minutes,’ the friend replies. ‘I’ll call you back!’
But he never does. ‘Ah! He must be extremely busy!’ I console myself.
At times like these, how I wish growing old had taken a tad longer. As it did for Balwant, a hard-working clerk at the Mussoorie Bank. You would have found him there working six days a week all the days of his life. Steadfastly, he refused promotions or transfers, hanging on for many years until he had become a fixture as permanent as those old brass switches fixed on the walls of the Bank that were hazardous to touch on damp, rainy days.
His colleagues had decided to give him a grand farewell. It was anything but grand; a simple chips-and-chai affair. I saw it all firsthand when our genial Bank Manager, Vishal Ohri, invited me to attend the after-office-hours-celebrations. From the tenor of the farewell speeches, one could easily be deluded into mistaking this for a welcome party for a fresher about to join the bank. It was definitely not a get-rid party for some over-the-hill fuddy-duddy being pitch-forked out, and trussed up in knotted Chinese whispers:
‘Imagine the loan counter without Balwant?’
‘How do we carry on without him?’
‘What is going to happen from tomorrow without him?’
The trouble was Balwant took these whispers a little too seriously. A few days later, visiting the Cambridge Book Depot opposite the bank, I bumped into his son who groaned: ‘My father gets all dressed up in the morning and heads to the bank, where he sits down on a bench on the veranda. I have to go there every evening and bring him home.’
So far no one has come to fetch me yet, as friends reassure me: ‘Age is just a number. Sixty is the new forty these days, Ganesh!’
How well I know that those twinges in the hinges are not growing-up pains, especially after I wake up on the wrong side of the bed. Thirteen-year-old Niharika suggests with a twinkle in her eyes: ‘Nana! Let’s give you a spin in the dryer! It’ll rid you of those wrinkles and, who knows, might shrink you a few sizes too.’
But spinning makes me giddy. So I chase her away, stubbing my toe against a table as I do so. Alone at last, I bolt the door and settle down to a bit of undisturbed scribbling, only to realize that the Muses have fled.
I reassure myself: ‘Slow down, old boy.’
Instead, I peer over those green hedges and listen to the faint music emanating from the Greyhead’s Club. Whether you’re tired or just re-tired, you may not be able to choose your own music, but the last dance is always yours. Though some of us arrive with a skid!
Ganesh Saili born and home-grown in the hills belongs to those select few whose words are illustrated by their pictures. Author of two dozen books; some translated into twenty languages, his work has found recognition worldwide.
