An era has ended, the seven years that affected me a lot since mine inception, popularly called the 'teen-age', have left me. Drilling his pace through the woes of life, man often forgets what his past was, what its glory was and just aims to have a good future. Likewise, in 2 or 3 years, I will forget what my teenage was like and then regret that why has my foolish mind, the holder of short-tenured memory been so rude in storing and cherishing the past memories. But the sole reason is that your mind is so preoccupied with the present, that it has no room left for the past good memories. The urge to attain worldly benefits, outweighs the importance to remember one's past , to cherish , to thank Lord for all his blisses.
I had entered my teenage when I was in my eighth standard, the class, the standard that set my soar towards hard work. Before that in the school, I had long survived as a diligent but unconscious mind, who was involved in the mischiefs with the bad boys of the class. Good company and my teacher's timely scolding turned my path. It was in eighth standard, I knew what hard work is. Though the inference from the word 'hard work' was merely spending more time with the books, it was indeed an important development that was to guide me to the precise definition. Yatish, the class topper was inspiration for me. When he used to say that he would not sleep for days, myself, who had not seen the world after 10 pm, got something to ponder upon. I also began sleeping for sometime in the evening, then waking up late at night, increasing my wakening range up to midnight. Studying in the outer veranda (chaar-divaari), I enjoyed studying for the first time. That year was to give much to me. I got second position in the class after Aditi, and left him behind. It was like an unseeded player beating the champion unexpectedly. I was placed on the merit list, at stunning fifth position. I had realized that I could do something better to leave all behind. Kavita Anand madame's that scolding in the seventh standard also had made me full of fear. I had unnecessarily stretched the word 'madame' as 'mai-dum', which she heard and resorted strongly against it. She called me in the front of the whole class, made me stand besides the window and told Yatish to call Sandhu madame (Vice-Principal). The word 'Principal' had much more fear those days than 'Director' has these days. I began to cry, she stopped him from going and further scolded me and forbade me to do it again ever. Her fear terrorized me, I never did it again in her class. I tried to be erect. Realizing the efforts she undertook to teach us Social Sciences, I tried to study her subject with devout honesty. In the eighth final exams, in Social Studies paper, we had got two questions from out of syllabus , which I had studied and wrote confidently in the paper. But such narrow a line is, that separates confidence and over-confidence, I missed two in-syllabus questions. I wonder how come I even didn't see them....... how bad I felt, I missed 100 marks. It's not geeky nature of me, but I just wanted to give my best to the faith, she had shown in me. Hope I always honour her, and never forget any of my teachers. School is the best organization, I've ever entered into. The other teachers that taught me were Mathur madame - Science, Amarjit Madame - English, Anita Arora - Maths, Monica Arora - Hindi, Manju Bhardwaj Madame - Punjabi. Mathur mam, too, had full faith in me as I had studied from her in fifth standard as well. Even now, when I go to the school she meets with same eyes of faith in me, always rating me as a genius. I, sometimes, feel that I have done nothing to earn that faith in me. ALL HIS BOUNTY. Manju mam is into government job now. Amarjit mam teaches in the branch school, my sisters study from her. Whatever English, I know is because of the firm base she built. I recall when we used to collect 2 Rs fine, from the one who spoke in hindi or punjabi in the school premesis, even when there was no teacher. How honest we used to be. That era never comes again..
