One word, gone --- gone in sixty seconds, gone with the
wind, or just, gone. School days are just a blob on the timeline. Perhaps, it’s
the biggest blob. But what makes that blob? It is a spicy mixture for some, for
another it is a gummy one meant to stretch, for yet another it could be bitter.
But one thing it is for all; a thing to turn to as an excuse or comfort at the
slightest pretext. It is who we are. We grow up getting assaulted and loved by
our teachers, and then when we do finally step out into the world,
miraculously, things they said that we probably never let seep into our brains
then, pop up and haunt, taunt or dictate as the situation may be. School life
is like a shell that thickens through the years. Later, some shatter it and get
carried away by the lures of the world (like the spider and the fly in the
nursery rhyme, so to speak) and some, neatly leave behind a beautiful piece on
the sand for collection.
Mine I would liken to that pensieve in Dumbledore’s office
that one has to peer into to see chosen memories and relive them. I have bits
and pieces of stories to tell from all of the eight schools I have been to in
my days spent in that blob. Fortunately, the largest chunks would come off the
days spent in this school. The foundations for my life, the choices I knew I
would go on to make were all fixed in junior school. But how I would grow to
make them real was taught by this school. I grew up very fast in my time here.
Forced or facilitated, I can’t say; probably both. I was too young and immature
to be shaped till I came here. Here, luck gave me teachers, friends and
opportunities that chiseled and sculpted me into who I am. Added to that lies
the fact that I never fit in. Not being a part of that world gives you a third
person critical eye that can survey life as it comes and your own character for
that matter. When I stepped out into the world and had to begin living my life
on a daily basis alone, it was as easy as ABC. I have been polished well. I
cannot be chipped that easily --- at least I say this much with confidence.
What ingredient in that mixture made me fit in to where I am today, as I sit
contemplating and writing this, I cannot say. Well, then, let’s say it blends
in so well with the mixture of the blob, that it is like that one defining
material that lies low and does not gloat of its contribution till, once, it
isn’t there and we realise its worth and admire it.
In the last days of school, all of us were frustrated that
we were stuck in school for so long and at the same time, we were a bit
apprehensive of what life was to come in future and a fear that we may miss
“the best part of a person’s life” as the “older” people around us put it lay
low and growling at the back of our minds. I think that we go to school, learn
all kinds of mischief, eventually become expert at all kinds of mischief and by the time we
reach our senior year, we are ready to unleash our devilry into the world. That
is what our school life trains us most for --- wrecking the world without
wrecking yourself. College is the time to take it to the next level. Those who
can, survive; those who fail, (well, there is no sweet way to say it) wish they
were back in school. At school everybody is a superstar.
If I tried to narrate incidents from my school life, then
“memory burns on a short fuse” (Ngangom, Robin S., “The Strange Affair of Robin
S. Ngangom”), for that is not how I think of it when I do. But, my school life at DPS, DJN is the
tastiest part of that blob because it made me who I am. Everywhere else I was
only told who I am. Miranda House college building is, literally, a Hogwarts
castle. I like to think of myself as the customized witch living the Hogwarts
dream and I have my school life, especially the last four years, to thank for
that!
