SPIRIT SCENTED THOUGHTS

                                                                  SPIRIT SCENTED THOUGHTS..

Lying on my back I am scrutinizing the ceiling for bedbugs. Who would have thought these minuscule creatures with destruction capability more than perhaps the combined effect of “little boy” and “fat man” , existed in spot like holes carved out of concrete as well.. not me anyways…The fallibilistic decision, which made me discard the comforts of my native( which had lulled me to a pathetic delirium )and settle in the garden city of India, to turn over a new leaf, has reached me here. It is like I am pegged to this stage of life. Sharp boosts of ambitions beginning to wane out??? No way…hold that thought.. I am still young, still blessed with the greatest assets of life: time, energy and a great family- stuff like “mere paas ma hain” as they say in bollywood. Yet I am here in this stagnated poise of life unsure of the next step, expecting a very hard boxing on my ears, knocking me down. But then again, is not that the beauty of life, the greatest enigma? One year back, a spacious room and a whiff of coconut in the side dishes were hardly-found luxuries. The deep felt craving towards those grew itself up with the delicate sides of my stomach, leaving me a cripple. It must be the lack of ventilation stiffening this cynic air around me. Let me steer my flow of thoughts to something bright. Time has passed. This absolute nothingness has elevated me to a strangely blissful level. I feel light. Now I sense some sort of a déjà vu…I have been in this state of mind before..I blink my eyes..as  I let the reel of my memory roll, many spirit tainted scenes flashed by and paused at a dimly lit hostel room. Five girls were huddled in the midst of the room staring down at a DELL laptop bag. “shall we open it? “ anu asked in a hushed voice as if we were all kneeling in front of some holy casket. I interjected “ oh cut the crap!! Let us start it all” I pulled out a sleek bottle labeled “jawan”. A honey colored liquid gleamed inside. I kissed it triumphantly and placed it firmly on the floor. Riya rushed to the latched door “I think I heard something”. We all shuddered. It was midnight, officially the last night in our hostel. It was Chitra who expressed one fine day, the desire to taste some liquor, hot stuff as we have heard them all say. We had all been exposed to various stories from many wannabe engineers whose life at that point, were driven by the passion not toward technology but methyl alcohol in various disguises. We got charged up. We wanted to explore the euphoria promised by liquor; well at least for once. Putting our blame on the patriarchal society (when the truth was that none of us had the courage to walk up to the counter of the local beverages and buy stuff), we cajoled this friend of ours into buying us booze. “so which one do you want?” he implored knowingly. I boasted “vodka”. He looked up at me.” You need minimum 500 bucks for classy stuff”. That shut me up. “ we want to get the kick” meera said tentatively. He nodded kindly. “I know the right one..costs just 150 bucks and you will get the kick before  you finish the first peg, you being first timers and all” that brightened us all up. After listening to him carefully about pudinharas  to conceal the stench of breath and how to measure a peg and all we felt prepared. By the time it was evening the excitement could not be bottled up any more. We noticed a few raised brows from fellow inmates of the hostel. We could not afford the leakage of the news at any cost. “Consumption of alcohol is prohibited” had not been even included in the rules and regulations of the women’s hostel obviously because the possibility of even thinking about it, let alone breaching that rule was NULL. At dusk our faithful friend kept his promise and we somehow managed to sneak the bottle hidden laptop bag into the hostel. We all waited until midnight for everybody to fall asleep.  Meera arranged five plastic glasses on the floor. Anu fished out small packets of lemon pickles. I poured the brown liquid and carefully measured it up to two third of my forefinger and topped up each glass with water. This is it. With the jubilant feeling of conquering something we all took our respective glasses and declared in unison “CHEERS”. Well the unpleasant smell had ticked my taste buds off as well. I remembered the aftereffect of polyjuice potion detailed by Rowling. But here instead of my insides churning and bubbling, I had my pharynx and esophagus burned out. The protests raised by my body for forcing my digestive system out of serene virginity came out as a burp. I looked around. Riya mumbled in disgust “ I can’t believe that people actually get addicted to this” I noticed that chitra had just tilted her glass with to her pursed lips. Meera kept quiet for some reason. I wheeled around to check out anu. She had already finished half of her share. “My head is spinning” her words were slurred. As if that was a cue, everybody started drinking. I peered down into my glass. I did not want to end up sober in this little party. I braced myself up and drained-well- not full but three fourths of the glass. I slammed the glass down. I gagged. I leaned back and relaxed. I felt light both inside and outside. May be this feeling can be christened “kick”. Anu had already lied down and meera was draining her glass. The other two hadn’t touched their glasses pretty much. I tried to get up. My body picked up my brains command too fast. I stumbled. “okay..gravity is teasing me” I thought. I tried again. It took me hardly a second to fall flat on my back. Anu and meera started giggling. I opened my mouth to snap at them. But what burst out was a rather loud fit of laughter. “My alcohol-numbed brain must be so confused to hand out different instructions.” The whole situation was turning funnier each minute except for two people riya and chitra. They shushed us down. “whom should we be scared of ? This is our room” slurred anu rather loudly. We three started our second peg.  Soon we were residing in that state of mind filled with alcohol-brought happiness only without us being aware of that factor. A strange peaceful bliss…

Something sharp has been poking my back for some time. I roll across and spot a fat bedbug. I have been brought back to the sober solemn reality by this hateful insect. I suppress my smile as some heavily embarrassing and puke smelling incidents peak in my mind. I contemplate on continuing my thoughts but on second thought I think it is wise to retire.