The beauty underlying your make up

    As i sat there on my favourite stone by that familiar beach, the wind kissed me for a millionth time. But for some reason today, i felt it would never turn up again, it felt as though this was the last time she had embraced me and the last time she lit the spark within me.

      The setting sun, took me two years back, when on a similar Saturday evening i was here by this beach waiting for an answer. An answer to all the troubles god had openly bestowed upon my shoulders-the fact that he had me landing up in an unknown place filled with strange faces, the fact that my parents now lived miles apart, the fact that the friend i could not live without, now had to live without me and the fact that i did not fit into this new world of superfluity and superficiality.Yes, that was my perspective 24 months back, of Mumbai.
 
       With tears rolling down, I continued to stare into infinity when suddenly my eyes fell upon that family which had come probably for some photoshoot- yes that's what they do most of the times here. Self obssesed fools!! I had just decided not to pay attention, when a familiar voice startled me.

   "We would have a family picture now" said the lady,  pointing to her daughter and her little clueless son.
"Sure Ma'am, if only you could call your husband. I mean the frame looks incomplete otherwise". came the photographer's quick reply.

    
"It has always been this way" I heard the girl's voice, "Papa lives among the stars now, he cannot come here". She added.
With that statement,I could not help but notice the woman standing there beside her children.Only then did I realise, it was Ahana ma'am speaking all this while.And when  realisation finally dawned upon me, I saw goosebumps all over. The question of this world even existing seemed to collapse there right in front of my eyes.Her words seemed to push me deep into the endless sea.
         
        Where do I begin with? Well, Aahana ma'am is my Teacher at school for Mathematics. To end her description with that sentence is beyond my existence. She is the reason why I can sit with that subject for hours, she is the reason why her students drown in guilt for missing a single moment of the class, she is the reason why all our lives feel so "full of life". She is Aahana, the "Ohh My Ggod " factor of Rubel International, Mumbai. The most prominent memory of hers that I have is a smiling face sweating in some corridor and consoling another "wanderer" like the thousands of us with her "all so true" words. Yes, all that she ever says seems to be a cent percent reality and , it is, I believe.

     When I joined this school in the first place, it took her a week to tell me how much she loved new aspirers of my kind. To show her love, well, she hadn't taken a day. That was who she was supposed to mean to me, the only person whose reality I knew to the core for she had loved and guided me without any bounds. But uh-huh, this could never be the case.  To me, she was all superficial, showing the world her majestic skills and pretending to be someone she was not. Captivating her true self within layers of make up, and that fake feeling of concern, when in reality she did not really care.
     
         People say the lessons she taught came to life, I mean as soon as her words enter within you, electricity compels you to love every Mathematical venture of the world.That is the extent of her goodness.
    
        Every day, when she walked in, applauses and cheers would fill the "glamorous" atmosphere.Nobody had seen such good sense of fashion-her eye liner seemed like an inscription with nothing but perfection, her attire was the most beautiful form of sophistication and style, every single day. The boys would eye her. And some of the girls, well they would scowl."How does she afford those dresses, is her husband a business tycoon?" I had heard them say once. And to be honest, I could not agree to them more.

      If only he was alive!! My mind screamed that day while the trio was busy deciding their poses for the "family" photo. Glancing away from her and all those memories I have ever had in her classes(which I never really thought of as memories), my eyes fell upon her children. Her daughter was the sweetest child I had ever seen, the warrior and survivor I had worked with in so many scholastic events.          
         Initially i thought her parents must be divine, but then one day i saw her addressing her mother. And I knew who was behind that upbringing. That fascinated me somehow, but again I thought, her traits might be her "individual choices" or perhaps, she had mastered the act of "pretending" too.

        So, on that fine day,burdened with my own worries, I came to know that this lady  , whom I presumed to be all artificial, was true to the core. Whispering souls someday, reported that she had lost her husband and her family to a calamity, some five years ago .And then, all Aahana had were two children to look after and a job which paid her roughly 25000 rupees, a month.

          One month after that reality check, there I was ,in an extra class sitting face to face with ma'am, discussing straight lines. As the chapter ended, she finally told me," I wish there were only straight lines in this world.Life would be much simpler then." For the first time in months, her words did not appear to be "seasoned", and indeed, they never really were.
     I wish I had not so willed to see her real face. "Ma'am, how do you do it?" I asked. "Do what?"she asked. Well, on that day, I did not need to explain. On that day she knew I had finally faced her real world, because I never speak straight to the eyes of a person unless I know them enough. And she, of all people, now knew that enough. The drops of water peeping through her shimmering eyes told a different story.
          "The Mathematics of life".
I did not say a word after that. I knew she would speak.
     
      "There is no point crying over what is done. I cannot change anything but i can make it better with all that i have left."
I did not dare look at her.
"By all I mean them"- she showed a picture of her children embraced to her.
           And then I knew the reason why she loved all of with such desperation.
"They are the ones who give me the strength to stand against all the world's comments on my attire, their attitude towards mine and their appreciation which i know in most cases is unreal. I have to give all of myself that is there to the place I survive in. And the opinion of others, it matters at times, but again it hardly makes a difference to my demeanour. So that is every answer to the  million questions you have".
         She forced me to smile again.
And after that day, I never had the strength to complain. Whenever I even thought about something not being the way it should be, Aahana ma'am flashed in my mind. And again I could see things being perfectly alright.
      
       Two years have passed now. Ma'am has decided to leave. "I have to be with my parents" she says. Just an hour ago, I met her here right in front of that stone, and a hug was all she gave me again with a million reasons to smile. She will never come back and neither will that gust of wind which once changed my life. And that is how it should be, there is always one turning point which changes your life.

To end with it, I still remember that final *click* when all she did in that photograph was smile. There was no make up that day, but all I could see was beauty in its most majestic and beautiful form.

©All Rights Reserved