Anniversaries of the heart..

“The holiest of all holidays are those
Kept by ourselves in silence and apart,
The secret anniversaries of the heart”

-Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

The sun rays slant across the dry field coating it copper gold.The earth was dry, ,brown, and crusty. Blooming bougainvilleas blazed here and there. Fluffy white clouds wandered lazily across the sky.

I listened to a group of teenagers playing cricket on the other side of the field. Their shrieks and yell filling the warm summer air. Exams were over..


My mind floated back lazily to those long lost summer hols at my Amminja’s with my brood of cousins and neighboring kids.

Thirty years have vanished.

I can feel the hot summer sun burning my skin. I can hear my uncle talking, my Aminja’s laughter leading the rest.

Those mad days

Hot sunny days, Summer frocks, Lush juicy mangoes, Burgeoning jack-fruits, iced lemonades ,fragrance of jasmines blooming at dusk, summer storms.

Playing Cricket, badminton and football, the hot sun burning our brown, sweating, grimy bodies.

Ice-sticks, red yellow and milky white.. bought and savored secretly from the ice-cream man

Raw mangoes cut and mixed liberally with chilly, salt and coconut oil shared in damp dark leafy corners our tongues burning, our eyes watering.

Watching the thunderclouds build up with excitement and impatience … jumping and leaping around in abandon and delight as the heavens open and the rain lashed across drenching the dry crusty earth.

Balmy summer nights performing plays in the portico as adoring adults clapped and cheered.

Dark- Room pillow fights…

Make believe tree houses…. picnics….swimming, fishing.

The excitement. the wonder ,the love the sharing,the security.

The delights of childhood celebrated those long lost summers.

Captured forever in the fragrance of jasmine,the mangoes, the lemonades, the balmy summer nights. the fresh morning air following a night of summer storm.

One summer and many summers after that, a red rose was found every morning at the bottom of the huge flight of steps that led to my grandparents home . We came to know that it was from a secret admirer. A lanky teenager in the neighborhood who adored a lovely cousin of mine.

This made our summer hols all the more exciting. I remember running down the steps early morning giggling and laughing as we spotted the rose.

We are now spread out in different parts of the globe leading different lives.

But those shared summer hols bonds us forever permitting us to pick up where we had left off on the rare occasions we meet

We are kids again, giggling as we remember this…teasing as we remember that…thoughtful as we remind each other that the lanky teenager still remain a bachelor supposedly pining for my lovely cousin.

The sun had dropped below the rim of land. The boys had finished their game and gone home. A faint breeze cooled my skin .The trees were turning an ominous black.

’ Sweet are the memories you left behind’

I silently thanked my long gone Amminja as I walked back home for accommodating the whole brood with pleasure.

Gifting us beautiful summers.. Holidays of the heart that are remembered every summer..not restricted by the passage of time.