Is it possible to get attached to a house? To four walls and a roof? I realized it is.
We have been living in this house for 23 years. I was born here (in the hospital, actually. But I was later on brought here.) And this house has many fond memories.
As a kid, I used to scribble on the walls with a pencil. There are markings on the wall to record my height (was I really 3 feet 8 inches at some time?). There are the paint marks where, in my excitement I had started painting the windows too. There is the corner where I had hidden all the matchboxes (when my mother asked me why, I told her I collect them for the jokes written at the back). There’s the kitchen, the location for numerous experiments with different cuisines (some were good, most were horrible) the terrace where I was caught drunk by Akka on Diwali (she seemed to notice that all the crackers were bursting in my hands itself. When she asked me, I said “Happy Diwali” with a wide smile. That’d be my last smile for weeks to come!!)
And what’s a house without neighbours? The lady downstairs who was perennially pissed off. The lady next door who washes the stairs thrice a day. The old, bearded Postman chacha who has been delivering letters to the locality for 30 years now. The girl who is now is 9th standard that Pintu Bhai can’t take his eyes off (“Her face is like the moon…”). The road in front of our house and the cricket matches played there (I hold the record for bowling 14 wides in over)
This house has been with us through thick and thin. When the Super Cyclone was ravaging the region, my sister and mom were happily eating Dosa and Milkmaid!!
The balcony where I’d stand after a work-out, trying to show off my nearly invisible biceps. And the place where my grandmother would leave a few grains of rice everyday for the crows.
The jackfruit tree right in front of our balcony that the miserly owners would neither have themselves nor let anyone else has any.
The one person who made my life beautiful, Pintu Bhai. I remember the innumerable times I’ve appeared at his doorstep asking for toothpaste because I was drunk.
I have said goodbye to this house many times. After every holiday or when I left home to stay alone.
We are leaving this house permanently. It’s hard to believe that this house will not be home anymore. It’s only befitting that we are shifting on Friendship Day.
This house has been a very good friend.
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