Existence

One day my kid asked me a question - Dad are you famous? Were you well known in your college or school?" I just used one of my usual responses to avoid an unwanted question i.e to just give a smirk and ask a counter question to dodge the original question.

Apart from the class toppers, merit list holders and a few notorious ones, majority of the folks go un-noticed in their school or college lives. Barring your close friends, other batch-mates remember only a beautiful face (only applicable to girls) or may be if someone scored well on humour quotient. At our recently conducted school reunion, one of such beautiful face in turn thought of me being a DJ at the event and asked me to play a song. Nothing can beat this embarrassment in front of your other school friends :P :D :D :D

Me and one of my other school friend then pondered over a glass of beer - "Seriously! how useless were we in school and college, hardly any one remembers us nor we have any heroics to boast about".

2 days back however came an aberration in my usual know-how low existence thingy.

Me and one of my close school friends had gone to visit an art exhibition held by 3 of our school teachers. We were awed by the paintings done by our beloved teachers again teaching us on how to deal with your passions in the second innings. In one of the section by Kolatkar madam, saw a very peculiar "csk" short initials signature of hers on each of her paintings. Kolatkar madam was my class teacher in 5th std. (Our very first foray into the high school world) and till date remains one of my most favourite class teachers. Her "csk" signature in our diary, a few good remarks that I got during that year, brought some fond memories. After going through all the paintings we decided to meet our teachers.

Our main art teacher Pathak madam had no reasons to remember me at all, me being 1-2 on the scale of 10 on drawing and painting. I then went on to meet Kolatkar madam. She had a question mark on her face, trying to figure out my name. I told her, I know you might slightly remember my face but certainly not my name. But the moment I called out my name - ma'm smiled back and said "Akashwani, Adwait Patankar aaplyala baatmya det ahet!'. It stunned me ...totally. That was a dialog, my entry line in her directorial drama - "Highlab" in our annual social school gathering. That was year 1991, 31 years back and Kolatkar madam with her razor sharp memory remembered me, not just my face or name but something very different and unexpected. It truly made my day.. and yes I proudly told my kid that day... "Aah you know what.. I was not famous or well known in my school or college days... but yes at least I did something good that my beloved teacher still remembers me, even after 31 years".

I did exist....