Some days of life are like a passing train, beautiful in its transience. You stand at the railway gate, straddling your bike between your knees and wait impatiently for the train to pass, so that your life can go ahead. But sometimes, you lose yourself in the beauty of a hundred faces that you can see through the window, in the beauty of those faces becoming one with the speed of the train and therefore the face of the train itself. Train number 12606? Oh, that's Pallavan express. He's in his 40s, with the greys winning against the black hairs on his temple. His specs peer through the morning's newspaper, and his wet hair is adorned with flowers. The he is also a she, her forehead centered with a vermillion dot. And you admire the shapely nose those specs sit on. You wonder if she laughs like the echo of the train's rattling on the checkpost that stops you from joining her. You wait by, hoping that one day you will join her, to live those days you have always been wanting to live in.
And yet, before you know it, the train rattles past, the checkpost lifts and you are allowed to move on. Only that you no longer want to. Somewhere down the length of the train, somewhere where the fragrance of the day's flowers hit you, your hands had decided to hold on. The train of your days has gone by, but you don't know it. You stand at the checkpost, waiting, waiting for that meeting, for a hug from those bony hands, for a clutch-ridden drive, for those laughs, for those steaming idlis which melt solid ghee, to hear the musical vibrations in a voice you know so well, to make plans and have those plans stabbed by the sharp hands of the clock as the train departs.
You are no longer permitted to be on at the checkpost. The train has gone and so should you. You pedal on, cross over the tracks of memory and go over to the other side of life. Turning back, you see the dust left behind by the train lingering. You imagine it to be the cloud of an oncoming train, not the trail of one that has gone. "It is coming, it is coming", you tell yourself. Until a gentle prod from reality tells you that you have seen it already, you have been there already and that you were fortunate to have your wishes become memories.
It is time to pedal on, expectantly, but slowly. The next railway crossing is there, near or far, we do not know, but it is there. Waiting for us, to stand on the other side of the checkpost and watch the faces on the train become the face of the train and remain out of our reach until it becomes, but a dust trail on our memory.
