I was reading J Krishnamurthy’s book – The first and last freedom where he talks about seeking and finding happiness or gratification. Something about what he had written, sparked a memory somewhere.
It was probably 1997. We had organized our very first book exhibition at the college campus. It was a very busy 3 days and of course several days of pre-work that had gone into it. There were a lot of things that happened during this time, however, today I shall relate one incident.
It was the end of day 2 I think. We were cleaning up, taking stock of things, just sitting around and enjoying the end of the day. I remember sitting on the stage with 2 other friends looking down on a whole lot of shelves in which a whole lot of books were displayed. We sat in a circle and had picked a few books to read out. Reading books out aloud has a whole different magic to it. It feels like you are traveling together and sharing an experience together. I remember reading Vikram Seth’s – The Golden Gate – a collection of his poems I remember reading those verses aloud and really absorbing each word, enjoying each turn that the poet took us through. I felt like we had shared an understanding, a feeling of exhilaration, of achievement – of just having enjoyed the moment. I felt like we had all jut shared happiness. That’s all. It was just a random incident. It just came back so suddenly, I had to write it down.