"Au Revoir, School Life"

College is going to start this week. School life ends here, finally. I had a most marvellous school life, totally free from bullying, problems like inability to fit in, like getting lost in the crowd, being not able to perform brilliantly in academics. I never really had problems in school, apart from my teachers never being too pleased with my antics, my clowning around in class, my unstoppable blabbering, my hanging around with girls, my not being adequately respectful towards them etc. And yes, I’ve also been let down by several friends, cheated on, manipulated, lied to, hated by many, envied by many more(several people have complained that I’ve done the same to them, and some of these allegations were definitely very true)…. And though these had really hit me hard towards the end of Class 10(and had caused me to sober down totally in Classes 11 and 12), I decide to forget all of that today. I will carry forward all the good memories (they are the ones that dominate), and will never regret anything about this part of my life. For every blunder I made, every person that tricked me, everyone I befriended, every Physics period I spent trying to take over school-journal-distributio

n duties- all of these have opened up newer avenues of realization, of hope, of triumph, of understanding life to me. I’m grateful for all of it, I’m grateful to all the people I met, I’m grateful to the several people I loved in this journey (and there were many), I’m grateful for every dreaded butt-pinch I’ve received as punishments from Mr. P.T.Thomas, and every ‘put eet een a baux’ I’ve heard from Mr.S.Chakrabarty. I’m grateful for every Aloo-Bhujia I’ve shared with Nancy Rakhroy at the back of the classroom, for every bulletin-board chart-paper I’ve brought from the Book-Store, for every Volley Ball match I’ve witnessed supporting my house, for every overnight camp I’ve participated in, for every ‘Iced Eskimo’ I’ve had, discussing things as diverse as Mamata Banerji to our life-secrets, with Arvind Rajagopal and Ikshaku Bezbaroa at Ballygunge Circular Road CCD… I’ve loved it all. And nothing will ever erase any of these from my memory….