A historian who painted

It goes back to those days when I was a painter. Being a painter was not really a hip thing back then but still I persisted with it. I don't know why today I am not one but in those rather my days I sure was a painter. Looking back I realize I definitely was a bad painter because if I wasn't I still would have been painting. The reality however, is quite different from what I thought then would be like. That means, I failed. In a slightly brutal way of expressing the same thing, I am a loser. I mean no shame in acknowledging the fact that I lost. And not that I lost to someone who went on to become another M.F.Hussain! Still at the back of my mind it reminds me of my inability to do something nicely which was really close to my heart. They say that all good things come to an end. In my case, even the bad ones came to an end pretty fast. So that was good for me, right? Who wants to throw good money after bad? I don't; so I quit.

Talking about painting reminds me of why exactly I started painting in the first place. If you guys are thinking, my early promise caught the eyes of either my school teacher or my neighbour or my mom's best friend (because as it is early signs of brilliance never catch fancy of parents at least), you are thinking on the wrong course. Once upon a time, when I was really small, like a small kid or something, I caught fever. Now I forget if the fever caught me or I caught the fever. Some experts in some really unique state of their minds had discussed on a similar if not the same topic at length in a very futile manner with potentially dangerous outcomes. So, being a good student of history, and taking a learning from what has happened in the past I would much rather leave this issue aside. We'll have a secret discussion or an anonymous post some other day. Ah, from this I remember, I am a historian these days. I studied history after I quit painting. Not the brightest of choices but even I wasn't bright enough to have made a bright choice and then managed to survive with the choice I made. Allow me to draw a small analogy here. Imagine what could have happened to Sachin Tendulkar's fragile back if he continued his dream to be another Malcolm Marshall. At least one job pretty well done. Wait for a second while I finish giving myself a pat on the back for doing what I did. That was truly smart!

This little brain of mine gives me a hell lot of trouble. It is so vibrant that I lose what I am supposed to be holding on to. Like I forgot my own history where I was telling you guys why and when I started painting and stuff like that. Coming back to where I was, I caught fever or the other way round and I was really small. Suddenly I had the entire house looking after me. I was the prince, I thought so at least. So, one good afternoon while I was truly enjoying my illness in the comforts of my home and away from the sick and boring school that I was in, my grand father got me a surprise gift. It was a sketchpen set which could write from both the ends. That gift still is the best gift I ever got in my life. And it ranks higher than the suit my father got me after a lot of resistance for my school farewell. Well, that suit hardly even qualifies as a gift. I loved my grandfather so much and that sketchpen set had a great role to play there. But sometimes I think, I would have loved him anyway. He was a nice gentle yet very firm man. I played with his moustache. I had access to his trunk. He counted his money right in my presence and even showed me the hidden corner where he kept all the cash. No one else had that privilege in my house. And I never stole from my grandfather. Later, I did steal from my father but he never counted his money in my presence or to be more precise, only in my presence. So whenever I got an opportunity, I stole from his pockets. I even got beaten once. Yet, it is my greatness that I never carried any grudge against him. I mean who keeps a grudge against one's own father. That is the bare minimum a son is supposed to do. But my grandfather was definitely a rockstar.

The very same evening, I started sketching. Random sketching I did. I took the newspaper and made moustache and beard on the faces of all the pretty heroines. I gave hair to the baldies. Bald is definitely beautiful! If you are reading this, this previous line is for you my friend! Then I filled the letters in the news headlines with red colour. Red was my instant favourite. I filled the As, the Bs, the Ps and the Qs. Oh! how could I forget telling about the Os. But for some reasons, I ignored the Ds. I could do nothing with the Gs even though I wanted to. I hated learning the letter G while I was in kindergarden. I just did not know how to move my pencil. I don't even know if my teacher back then thought I was dyslexic or something or some kind of a bloody retard. Hell, I was not a child prodigy but definitely not a retard! I am sure she must had thought so. I don't know if she still teaches there in that school I went to. Then I started sketching in my school too. Like all good things, this one also came to an end. I think I used this cliche twice. How does it even matter if I used it twice or thrice or totally ignored it. A cliche remains a cliche irrespective of how many times one uses it. Its like you murder one guy or a hundred of them, still the punishment stays the same! So my fellow students were pretty jealous of my prized possession and I sure showed off. I tell you I was one hell of a nasty little prick. I did enjoy my superlative state back then. Some of those people on whose cost I had fun went to great colleges. They are rich now. It makes me real sick. Not really sick but I don't really feel great about it at all. It sort of shows me who I am and how much could I achieve and all those stupid things you see in movies these days where guys hit depression like the ecnomies and never recover and end their lives having a heavy dose of some white coloured pills whose stock I don't know why the hell do they always keep in the closet at the backside of their bathroom mirrors. I also can't understand why they have those pills with the tap water from the basin right below the mirror. I mean they can always go to the kitchen or the fridge and get potable water to have those pills. They seem to have enough time for they keep looking at their boring emotionless (John Abrahim like) faces forever before making that great move.

Anyway, so my sketchpen set got lost. I am sure somebody stole it. I remember keeping it in my bag and going to the bathroom to take a leak only to find the whole thing gone when I came back after two minutes. I cried a lot. My eyes were all red, I remember. That is one of those days, I lost something for the first time. That day was the beginning of the story of how I became such a big loser. That story some other day. Today, I feel a little happy and liberated. I am feeling pretty light in my heart today for sure. Still my love for painting did not die. Soon, my father got me a new set but I wrote from only one end and every other guy in the class had the same thing. My advantage was brought back to deuce; thanks dad! Then I started making sceneries. Not my original idea though. I stole it from my uncle who once did an exceptional work in my art pad. My teacher saw that and I was an instant star. But again, as destiny would have had it, like all good.................(you know what is there beneath the dots :)) But I kept trying not by improving my painting but by changing schools. It used to be great till I dropped out and with it my painting story came to an end. But even that end was short lived. I went to school again but never got the chance to paint with a sketchpen set. All we got were oil pastels to do the work from. Oil pastels look like wax crayons which I always found very childish and hated them. I never graduated to the water colour level.

Then I realized that I need to look beyond the obvious things, I need to be an historian. I need to look back at myself to know what I am meant to do. That is precisely the reason I became a historian, to look back and look back long till I know what I want to know. In between I tried my hands at many more things but those stories....not now...some other day..today I am happy :)