Poles apart ..

For a week or so I have been a lone occupant of the hotel room provided to me by Aviva. A couple of years back, most of my nights were spent like this only, on the top floor of MMH at NIT, lonely and thoughtful nights. The constant humming of fellow mates with occasional shrills from the ground floor reminded me of the world out of my surreal thoughts. For a better part of my stay I had the company of Mr. X, who has to be my next door neighbor and Mr. Y, who has to be my classmate.

Mr. X and I had hardly anything in common, it was just that by simple game of chance he and I got the next door rooms. Mr. X (was then) an eternal disbeliever in himself and subject of constant influence. Mr. Y on the other hand was one of the most extrovert and influential personalities of the campus. His character's ability to sought humour out of any non-comic subject or event garnered him a prolific post and a strong network of friends.

Any boarding institution develops its own ecosystem and order. The entirety of NIT was particularly notable, we had good and bad, we had good impostering as bad, we had women and womanizers, we had many who disliked women and womanizers, we had addicts, we had humble welcoming groups and we had some cliques. The chemistry or interrelationship of these groups and individuals was complex and variable with time.The mere realization of fact that we are studying in NIT was sufficient and good enough to deter us from any productive activity which has any far off concern with studies. The 80% of college which was in this state most of the time, depserately awaited the annual cultural fest, out of them 90% ( like me and Mr. X) had no clue what so enthralling is there for us, but still were deeply enthralled. Well the rest of 10% obviously had some ulterior motives and were right on the shot when it came to fairer sex. Mr. Y who due to his positional powers, was probably most visible and pretentiously most active person during this part of the year. The closer the dates of event got, the grimmer his face grew, just as to reaffirm to us all that its near. A week before the event, Mr. X probably under influence of someone or just because of sheer boredom took refuge in alcohol and started having drinking sessions. During one of these drinking sessions Mr. X and company felt an imminent need to show the whole college, that they too exist (well not all of them). So now Mr. Y had the worst kept surprise of the event, Mr. X and the band will perform. The daily round of practice sessions began.

I am, as mentioned in the begining an unsolved riddle even for myself. Lost in books (absolutely random) and movies (die hard romantic), I took evening rounds of the campus and morning jogs of a nearby village. During this phase I was discovering my love for nature and solitude. My contemptous attitude towards all the happenings in the campus didn't find any concerns around, as for others probably everyone was busy.

Coming back to Mr. X and Mr. Y, the event was as eventful as it could have been. Mr. X had fun and Mr. Y had honours. Amidst these eventful nights, I joined everyone. Far away from my lonely thoughts, here I was crumbling the floor below my feet with my random moves. Mr. X was inebriated and probably oblivious of everything, and made me to think how easily he can be lost in any group and for me it is the toughest job, like a black swan theres always a feeling of being out of place.I am not sure, I enjoyed it or not, but in hindisght I repent joining the party, but I don't know what best could have been done, but it was not appropriate for me. As for Mr.Y the star of event, he was well aware with eyes open wide of proceedings, probably looking for some pretty faces in his audience.

There are always two extremes, two poles. For me Mr. X and Mr. Y were such two poles. Life is not lived in extremes I saw them changing with time. The days at NIT will always be bittersweet for me, but as for now I miss two letters X and Y. I can write volumes about what happend and what should have happened, but for all of us its, "what you sow is what you reap". And what I am reaping today is what I have sown, I can see two trees around me marked X and Y.