The Beginning of An End

It's odd that one should speak of beginnings and endings when in fact it is impossible to separate one from the other. It still hasn't sunk in that there won't be another semester of NID to go back to.But now, going back will mean new ways of seeing. Looking at the same spaces and being amazed at how powerful a drug nostalgia really is. Memory hinges on the permanence of these spaces so that even when familiar faces are few and far between the past is never too far away. Nevertheless you sense change, a callous disregard for the old and an unabashed acceptance of anything that reeks of the new. It's a bitter pill to swallow but you learn to take it in your stride. The spaces you once laid claim to are now populated by the hopes, aspirations and miseries of a new set of people. Ferociously territorial once you were about that one desk by the window in your studio. You return to it anxious to find a trace that betrays your presence. Instead you find an intruder in YOUR space. Eager to reclaim what you consider to be yours you make your presence felt. But then you recognise the intruder. It could have been you.

Sometimes the memory of a place and the time spent within it is so strong that you want to posess it in its entirety. And so when you go back you look for confirmation - a sign that tells you "Look here - this brick is exactly the way you left it!" Sometimes you find it so and it's enough for the time being.

(photography by: Sanjay ; Holi at NID)