Lost Pieces of Self

What does it mean to be a kid at heart?

Do you remember those small arms and small legs that once used to carry your small self?



Dancing and singing through life, playing all those beautiful games, mingling among innocent thoughts, laughing and making others laugh in the process. Childhood is an exceptional time of life, and once in a while when we come across a photograph or some clothes or a piece of a broken toy from back then, we for a moment reunite with that feeling, rejoicing the kid that still remains inside us behind a wall which unknowingly we built.



The wall begins to appear soon after we start to grasp more meaning behind the life we are living. A balance is certainly required between both worlds for a child to remain child up to a certain age, although that may not be the case for many parents nowadays who want their children to show less of childlike traits and more traits of a genius right from childhood.



As we grow, as we learn, as we try building a life for ourselves and see parts of it fall apart, we forget the kid, who waits within, who never left but was forgotten and became unseen behind the wall that grew taller and taller as we made our lives more complex than what was required.



Nivan had reached a point of early saturation in life. He felt as if his life had come to a halt. Perhaps he was overworked but then again that’s what he thought he was supposed to do.



Nivan was in a time when the numbers which appeared in the bank account at the end of the month mattered more than what a person actually felt good in doing. There were pre-decided fields which everyone was told to work in and there were pre decided paths to get there and that is what most people were busy doing.



Nivan was one of those people who got caught in this system and followed the path and found himself a well-paying job but was never satisfied with it. He loved to play games on his PC and had thought of doing something with it, but sadly it was a time when video streaming wasn’t popular and the internet was not cheap and neither were the means to become a dedicated game streamer. The most complex part of it was that even if he did become a game streamer what would he tell people about what he did. What would the society think? What would the people who didn’t actually matter but for some reason their thoughts mattered on this particular subject, think?



Nivan didn’t want to talk about this halt to his parents but he knew what they would say, “got meet friends” and he knew what friends would say “let’s go out and party”. Even if he did those things in that manner, he would still end up with this emptiness of being unsatisfied at the end of the day.



Hence, Nivan decided to take a stroll outside on this Saturday evening. He proceeded towards the park and just as he turned right from the lane of his house. He saw a dog, running away. A pet dog, white colour, mixed breed, and he knew who the dog belonged to. Mrs Chakyar stood worried, calling for the dog whose name was Chhaya and who was in no mood to listen.



Mrs Chakyar looked helplessly at Nivan. She used to be very energetic and active until she experienced pain in the knee and it had only got worse over the time.



“I will get her,” said Nivan as he started walking speedily towards the dog who was interested in perhaps everything out there but what interested her the most was tyre of a car and Navin stealthily approached her to catch her, but what is human stealth to an animal with far more superior senses.



The dog ran away into the park and Nivan followed her with a light jog. Nivan had already begun to feel tired.



‘I am clearly not in shape and sitting eight hours on my office desk has made it worse,’ he thought



Nivan entered the park and saw the dog running around for no apparent humanely understandable reason and she was still not responding to her name.



Nivan slowly jogged to where she was and she sprinted away running in long circles.



“If you are planning to catch that dog, you have to move faster, start running,” said old Mr Goyal who was out for his evening walk and was sitting on a bench.



“I will try,” said Nivan as he waited for the dog to come to this side after running a circle and just as she did, Nivan started running right behind her, almost disbalancing himself in the beginning, making a few kids playing laugh. The kids also decided to accompany Nivan in his catching the dog activity.



So, the dog ran at a pace far superior and followed Nivan who felt his soul might leave the body at any moment and he was followed by the kids who were having an enjoyable time.



The dog came to a stop near a bush and Nivan thought, ‘this is it, the end of my backbreaking efforts’, but at the moment nearing its end the dog looked back at Nivan and hopped over the bush and in an attempt to catch it, so did Nivan.



Nivan had started the hop on his legs but he ended it on his shoulders. He fell with a sound that a grown man makes when they physically fall on earth. For a second there he felt and smelt what he did so many years before when he was a kid, he just wished it didn’t hurt so much now that he had to worry about something breaking inside.



“Are you alright?” asked one of the kids.



“Maybe… Wait, I am alright,” Nivan said as he got up brushing his clothes. A few bruised were visible here and there.



“The dog got scared when you fell and it ran back to Mrs Chakyar,” said another kid



“It went back home then, good,” said Nivan



The kids went away to continue on with their playing except for one kid. He said, “my elder mother said you play games, can I come by sometimes to play”



“Yeah sure, why not. Come this Sunday morning,” said Nivan with a smile and the kid ran away smiling as Nivan headed home limping a little.

Written by Anuran Chatterji

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