I first remember time by the length of the class periods in school... They used to be so long. Social sciences the longest of them all. Then I knew time by summers. Mangoes, road trips, spinning tops and playing marbles and summer assignments at the end of it all... Crushes came and went, followed by relationships... College degrees and graduations... Jobs, relocations...
Weddings, births, deaths... And then at one point, relative time ceases to be of any meaning. When my age doesnt seem to matter to me any more. When people I know start dying. When I realize that the rope has reached the end for people around me and I have no clue how long my own is...
It is strange to see somebody's name in the obituary. Not a close friend who died by accident or by a freak heammorage or something that shakes you, leaves you crying till your tears dry out, not a relative who has been suffering for the longest time with a renal failure or cancer, with life slowly but surely slipping out of the body. A name of a random person whose existence you have taken for granted... Somebody of unremarkable significance in your life - somebody who has just been there, you know... And then their picture comes up one fine day in the hindu obituaries column. And you know that you have turned a page. From now, you have one more marker for time, baby...
