Just a bus journey?

It was a cold foggy morning in December 2006. I had come early to the pick up point as it was the first day and I didn’t want to turn in late.

I felt like a school kid on her first day, only difference was that now I was alone. I was lost in my thoughts as to how time had gone by and things that will never come back , like holding my mother's hand before crossing the road or waving her bye from the school bus.

Occasionally I saw some old men walking on the road going for their morning walks, on taking closer look I recognized that one of them was Menon uncle...he had become … old. I still remember his thick black hair and the smile in his eyes when he used to call me Kunyi Lakshmi :) (Small Lakshmi as my elder sister’s name is Lakshmi) ... now there were wrinkles on his face and there was still hair on his head but it was as white as snow.

Time had changed not only me but everyone...

By now it was 6:30 am and still no one showed up ... I was getting worried whether I had missed my bus on the first day to office. It brought back the memory of the day missed my bus when coming from school. I was little over 5 years old and I managed to reach home with Sheena chechi who dropped me on her cycle. My sister was worried dead for me :)...The thought of her brought a smile on my face.

It was 6:35 am now, I saw a lady walk toward me and she had the company badge on her. I went up to her and asked her if the bus was delayed. She replied that the usual time was 6:40 am. I asked her few questions about the company and for how long she was with the company , she answered my questions but didn’t want to take the conversation forward, she seemed preoccupied with her own thoughts. I went back to thiniking about time, family, friends...

At last the bus arrived at 6:41 am and I was happy that I hadn’t missed it. I got into the bus and took a seat in the 4th row

My pick up point is almost the first one so there were hardly any people in the bus and all seemed to be in their own world... no one spoke much. I assumed that it might be coz there were not many people; but even as the bus moved ahead and more people got in there was hardly any conversation , i looked around and saw people either sleeping or reading or just lost in their world with their ear phones plugged in. I wondered why there was no chattering, no pleasantries exchanged…there as nothing…

Just fresh out of college and training i was expecting a lot of fun in the bus as the travel was around 2 hrs, but it was just silence. I tried to strike a conversation with the lady next to me but she seemed to be brushing me off as she wanted to read a book. I had not carried a book with me or the paper and I didn’t have a cell phone with FM so I just sat and thought about the life that lay ahead of me... was it going to be like this at office ...a mechanical life?

For the next few days this was the situation during every journey. Finally one day I got a new cell phone with FM and joined the crowd...

Time has changed everyone including me...