A slow reminiscent smile steals over my face as I walk briskly along the platform, lugging my suitcase. My mind is flooded with memories of the days when the station was still called Madras Central.
The memories are so vivid, I can almost smell the tamarind rice my mother used to hand over to me while I sat cross-legged in the window seat with a book on my lap. I marvel at the superpowers with which our mothers and aunts managed to pack and push around a miniature canteen, complete with all the paraphernalia, no matter how short or long the journey. We seem to have always travelled without ever relying on the expectation of any external provision of amenities and to have roamed about like tortoises with our own self-sufficient little habitat strapped right on to our backs.
And oh, the food! Lemon rice, chapatis with tomato thokku, idlies with generous coats of molagai podi seeping through their pores - dishes that lasted long and tasted better with time. They were always accompanied by those simple potato wafers we used to feast on, before chips in general became glamorous - back when all packets used to be transparent, brimming to the top with flavourful chips that actually tasted like potatoes, as opposed to the puffed up air cushions piled up in supermarkets nowadays. (You get lured by their bright colours into buying one, only to open it and have a tornado of nitrogen blow past your face as you peep into its dark abyss with one eye closed, while you grope around your pockets, get hold of a magnifying glass and finally spot the chips lurking at the bottom. You think to yourself "no, how could this possibly be a half eaten packet when I just opened the seal?" as you munch on the little corrugated discs that, for their taste, may as well be malleable plastics covered with spices.)
By the time these ramblings drift past my subconscious, I have settled into a seat. It is vacation time in schools and there are quite a lot of kids coming aboard. I fondly recollect how, as a child, the joy of train journeys used to get doubled when other families with children were present. Once the adults had got a little acquainted and had aided the kids in breaking the ice by asking and answering questions on their behalf about their school and class, the inhibitions used to gradually melt away and after a while only merriment prevailed as the children played, chatted and shared food with each other. Guessing the name of the next station, memorising and reciting in order the names of those already gone by, hollering everytime the train enters a tunnel, climbing on different berths to pretend to be in different houses, antakshari, word games.. the list of things to do on a train used to be so creative. However fleeting train friendships can prove to be, they do form a part of some chapter of our life experiences stowed away in the recesses of our minds.
Now, there is a seemingly quiet and diffident young fellow sitting across from me, impatiently drumming his fingers on the seat. As I try to catch his eyes in order to greet him, he diligently avoids my gaze and looks as if he is desperately waiting for something. To this end, he keeps repeatedly petitioning his grandfather by pulling at his sleeve and planting hurried whispers in the latter's ear. I understand they are by themselves, and am in the middle of offering my assistance to the kind looking grandfather, when two more kids thunderously tumble in with their parents.
Amidst the clamour, we adults manage to throw in some quick hellos. Remembering my childhood and to what extent the window seat had always been coveted, I sit fully expecting a war to break out any moment now, over the only empty one available. I wonder if the shy grandson will fight his corner when it comes to it.
A war does break out, and with a knowing 'here-we-go' smile, I glance at the squabbling siblings, only to have my smile replaced with a quiet 'oh!' as I realise that they are rowing over the single unused electrical socket above the window. It turns out that each is in dire need of recharging their personal Tab.
After some intense bickering, their mother finally steps in and gives the verdict - as the brother is in 10th standard, he may have a greater need for it and gets to use it first . The sister, though unconvinced that a board exam at the end of the year gives anybody the right to use a socket first, detects the sinister tone in her mother's voice and evidently deeming it unwise to push it any further, storms off in a huff and settles with her device on an upper berth. The board exam candidate, with all possible smugness, gets comfortable near the window and soon, computer game sounds reach my ears.
Meanwhile, the elderly gentleman, having arranged his things, offers his grandson a snack and tries to engage him in noticing the names of the stations whizzing past outside. I look at the kid hoping that he finally got what he was waiting for. But he brushes the snacks aside and continues to coax his grandpa, who finally relents and hands him the iPad from his backpack. The kid grabs it, turns to sit facing the back of his seat and is soon oblivious to his surroundings.
It is twilight and a light rain starts pattering on the windows. The train temporarily halts near a beautiful pond covered with water lilies, reeds swaying in the breeze and ducks gliding across the surface. The hues of sunset reflected on the rippled surface of the water together with the rain and surrounding verdure completely mesmerise me. The train starts moving, chugging past distant hills and numerous fields each in its own unique shade of green. When viewed through the raindrops rolling down the glass, they look like a crayon coloured chess board of parallelograms. It is a sort of meditation in itself to sit and stare out the window of a moving train. How many hours of our childhood have been spent in this manner! It has always had a decidedly therapeutic effect on my mind, and when the train picks up speed and it has grown darker, I peel my eyes off from the outside view with a satisfied sigh.
But the scene reflected on the glass windows from within shows an indifferent compartment - the grandson on YouTube, the parents glued to their own devices, the now reconciled siblings both on the upper berth playing an online multiplayer game..
Sorry, Nature. It's not that we don't have time to stand and stare, we no longer want to. While the woods are lovely, dark and deep, we have notifications that beep, and loads to troll before we sleep, and much to forward before we sleep..