looking back

im on a blog low. all time low. not because i dont have anything to say. i have A LOT to say. but not enough mind space to sit and collect my thoughts. ever felt that way? like so much is happening, like everything is zipping past you and you cant get a grip on anything. like you're just getting carried away with the flow of everything. like you want the world to slow down. or stop. so you can take a breather. sigh..

so im alive. no broken anythings. long story, maybe il explain sometime.

in the meantime, here's something off the old blog. i just felt like revisiting and reading it, so thought id post it up..

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i feel like we've come a long way, as a generation. we're placed exactly in the middle of the turning point of the past 2 decades..and in a way we've seen so much. we've seen everything that changed, everything thats ceased to exist or transformed itself into something new, more suited to the 'changing times'. from cricket in the gullys to endless hours of lagori, to the coming of star tv and coke and pepsi and rising inflation, pizza delivered to our doorsteps, the IT boom, terrorist attacks, riots, coke in cans [!!]...i could keep going on..

take me back to when i was 6. when i was one among the crazy, noisy gang of about 20+ children, all varying ages, screaming our guts out on a sunny afternoon. lagoreeeeee!!! what a thrill. oblivious to the cranky granny who came out to her balcony, every afternoon, religiously, to tell us to cut it out. 'afternoons are for us to nap!'

i suddenly remember the day i spent with older cousins, on a terrace..painstkingly and tediously painting an entire race track. precise and perfect to the T..trying so hard to make is as real as possible. down on all fours, black paint from tiny glass bottles. white paint to mark the track with arrows and signs. wow. and the remainder of the day was spent sitting by it watching it, waiting for it to dry. we only got to 'use' it the next day. and we spent all day carefully driving dinky cars around the track. manually.

i spent entire vacations, eagerly waking up everyday to join the rest of the gang downstairs. our day began early and somehow we managed to keep ourselves occupied all day, returning home only for meal time. cricket, hide n seek, dodge ball, monopoly, picnics to sankey tank, treasure hunts, cycling around the neighbourhood. we never got bored or tired of ourselves. it didnt matter that i was the only 6 year old amidst so many children older than me. i tagged along everywehere and i dont remember being neglected or left out. i remember being so engrossed in a game of monopoly, that i lost track of the time, only to return home at 9 pm. way past my 7 o clock curfew. but somehow it was understandable and i was quickly forgiven.

we made bike rides, a convoy of bicycles, equipped with picnic food, to sankey tank. i was too little to cycle my way there, so i endured the entire ride poised on the back of someones bike. they fought over who was more responsible and should be the one i should ride with.

school was a happy place. it was a time when you were allowed to sit beside your friend, just so you'd have someone to talk to and not feel lost and lonely on the first day of school. it was a time when you got red stars stamped on your palm at the end of the day, for being good. a time when getting to the slide before everyone else did was the greatest challenge of every day. it was a time when homework was a 10 minute affair and you came home to sing the songs you learnt at school, before your parents.

i came home to a happy home, where my new born baby sister was the centre of everyones attention, including mine. i remember how i resented being moved to another bedroom and thereby not getting to sneakily watch tv from under my covers, when i was supposed to be asleep. i didnt have the internet to log onto, no mood swings that kept me locked up in my room, no music to cut myself off from the rest of the world, only my parents and lots of time to talk and spend with them, lots of love and lots of books to occupy myself, paints and crayons and a stack of art paper on top of the refridgerator that i had to climb onto a chair to access, make shift home-made substitutes for fancy toys and loads of satisfaction and a whole lot of happy times.

days of simple pleasures. eating oranges in bed. reading myself to sleep. endless saturday afternoons engrossed in the endless world of pretend-play. i could be anything/anybody/anywhere i wanted. a time when going out for a meal with family was a special treat saved for special occasions. when i didnt know what it was to want something really bad. when i was just so happy with things the way they were. when i didnt know what growing up felt like. when recreation almost always meant being outdoors with lots of other children. everything we did, we did together. age - no bar. there was always room for everyone.

whats happened to children today? where is the community spirit? everyone and everything seems to be growing up too fast. everything has become compartmentalised and exclusive. children too rapt in their virtual worlds of play station and beyblades, computer games and cartoon network..wanting and demanding things i never imagined i could have, back when i was 6 or 7. i feel so alienated and so removed from todays reality. is this what they call a generation gap?

i watch younger cousins, neices and nephews and shudder to think what the world might come to, when i have children of my own..

where have all the children gone?