Knowing Dr. Kashmir

“Dad, what happened next??”  She asked eagerly.

Ok ok, wait… last time I told you this story, I stopped right at this point because you wanted to go out and play, and now ten years later, I’m continuing it.

“Really, I don’t remember anything”, she said.

I added, “Just like your Mom”.

So her friends joined her. She just left and went to join them. I wasn’t thinking much about her. I started browsing and watched some episodes of House of Cards. Time went by, it was around 11… when something happened that I didn’t expect. Dr.Priya came and sat write in front of me.

“Why aren’t you with your friends??” I asked her.

“They all slept, I wasn’t getting any” She said.

“You wanna watch a movie? Have you watched 500 Days??” I asked her.

“No, is it good??” she asked.

“Then let’s watch it, you tell me ‘how’s it’, after watching it, Ok…” and we watched the movie. I love that movie, she also loved it…and she was explaining me, the things she liked in it. She loved that ‘Expectations/Reality’ part, and we ended up having an healthy conversation, as the night went on.

We were sleepy; I slept in the middle row. She slept in the lower seat, opposite to mine. She fell asleep, quickly as she was pretty tired with the conversation we had. I looked at her, and then I saw something…that I hadn’t noticed till then… She was beautiful, it wasn’t like the bollywood moment, where the wind flows and her hair flies over her face, and violinists around me. She was just beautiful, there wasn’t any light on her face, or any wind flowing, she was just beautiful. Maybe I liked her as a person, because the game we played and the answers she gave were pretty impressive, though I hadn’t told her that time. I knew her now; she wasn’t the same girl I had met in morning, because I didn’t know anything about her. It was like that poem by William Wordsworth, ‘Fairer than thee’-In which he tells his love that there is someone fairer than you, and that’s your inner self and don’t change that…It was something like that, Knowing her made her look beautiful…

“So you fell in love with her, Dad”

“No, I’ll tell you when I did”

When I wake up next day, she wasn’t there. She had left, and was back with her friends. Then she was with them, throughout the journey. They didn’t know about me, she hadn’t told them. And I watched a lot of movies along the journey, and we had reached our destination.

I got down, and looked at her. I smiled and just made a slight gesture of ‘bye’ and she responded and we went our separate ways…

“Dad was it like that ‘Hum Tum’ moment???”

“No! You have watched a lot of movies. All thanks to your Dad”, Priya said.

“Ok, then what happened, Dad??”

I had a long journey to make, from Jammu to Ladakh. And your Mom went to Jammu Government Hospital, where she had postings…

“Ok, what happened then…”

Couple of years later, my book got published. And I was doing a reading of it, in one of the Coffee Day outlets in Mangalore. After the reading, I spot this girl, in her black dress and I’m taken back to that night in the train. She was holding my book “Dr. Kashmir”, and she was with a girl and a guy…

“Dr. Kashmir, you wrote a book about Mom… and I haven’t read it. Who was that guy?? Was he her boyfriend??”

“Calm Down, dear… Even your mom thought it was about her, but it was about how Kashmir acts as cure to all your problems, and how it treated me, how it prevented my problems of writing and stuff… And that guy was her friend; you have met him right, Engineer uncle. And the girl was her sis, your Snighda aunty.

“Great Book, I thought it was about me”, she said.

She introduced me to her sis and her friend. Then she had to leave, but we exchanged numbers. We met a lot after that in that Coffee Day itself. We spoke a lot, about our views, ideas of life… played that game a lot… but we never quite thought about being in a relationship or getting married…

I even used to meet Snighda sometimes, she is a very sweet person, I must say… I got a lot of free checkups, as she was a dentist… and it’s because of her we are married today. She and Engineer were the ones who actually made us realize that we were in love, because we were lost in our conversations and I had a very different thought on love and marriage, but I must say marriage was the best thing that happened to me, and then you…

“Oh…but did your families accept your love, Dad??”

“There was a bit of drama, in both the families, but Snighda… she’s one person I thank always…the reason we all are together. Today she is coming right; ask her about all the drama and chaos that was created, because of our whole love story…. And today we will be to your granny’s place, ask her too…”

“Ok, Dad”

“You know, why I told you this story…It might have been fun listening to it, but you must have your own way of understanding and learn things from it. Do you know, what is the most beautiful thing about knowing a person??”

“No, Dad”

“You find that person more and more beautiful, as u start knowing them… so never hesitate to know people. It might not happen all the time, but when it does, you’ll know the importance of that….Just like I did”… and I look at Priya, looking as beautiful as ever, running around the house… as we were going to her house later that day, getting things ready for her, me and Aakansha as she always does……