Perception

 

It was almost 12.30 PM and the Coimbatore Shatabdi express had reached Erode junction. The chair car coaches were almost vacant and I was enjoying the beauty of day time journey by occupying a window seat, leaning backward and looking through the wide glass window panes.

The platform was crowded and I was just watching the moving population. It was at that instance that my eyes got struck on a lady who was busily coming out of a shop. She was trying to canvas the people to the shop by her pleasing smile and was talking something while moving along with them. I presumed that she could be a shopkeeper lady.

She was a tall thin lady with short hair and was wearing a cream and red printed kurthi with a black bottom. The left leg of her bottom was rolled up to the knee and I just wondered why she had done like that. She was happily moving towards the people offering them something, inviting them to the shop and once they passed by she just waited for the next person to come. I understood from her gestures that at times she was asking them whether they had their lunch, whether they would like to drink some water and all. I couldn’t hear what she was talking as I was sitting inside a closed compartment. All I can do was to see through the glass window what she was doing and make my own interpretations for that. I was actually feeling like watching a mime drama.

She was even asking a police constable whether he had his lunch and in turn he just looked and smiled at her. Probably she could have been there since a long time and may be that is the reason why people are showing a familiar face to her. A lady with her husband was passing through and she hurried towards them with the same gestures and smile. The lady just looked at her and waived her hands telling ’No’. But, she kept on talking to that lady, holding her hands, blessing and moving along with her. At last, the man with that lady took a ten rupees note from his pocket and gave it to her and moved away.

Well...I had a questioning look on my face…Why?

On getting this money she became extremely happy. She just ran into the shop like a small kid showing that note to the person sitting inside. While coming out of the shop, that note was not there in her hand. Again, she was into the same process. Welcoming people, greeting them, talking to them, bidding good bye… Two-three people had again given her the money. I just had a feeling, something is wrong somewhere. She ran into the shop like a baby who got a new piece of toy, came out enthusiastically, looked at the sky, just raised her hands and acted as if she is going to fly. Then she started dancing… Dancing at the middle of the platform… Dancing in the ecstatic state…!!!

‘Dancing with joy’… I had heard of this phrase, but had not experienced it before. On that day I saw what this ‘dancing with joy’ was. Still, I could sense that something was wrong somewhere. Why should a lady of her age do such things like an abnormal lady? Or is she really of that nature? Well… within a second or so I got answers for all my questions. She stopped her dancing, hid her face inside her hands and started sobbing.

Oh My God!!! So, that is it. The lady whom I had positioned as a shopkeeper, the business lady who was smartly making use of the marketing and selling techniques was actually an insane-abnormal lady. Whatever she had been doing was just her abnormal acts. It took three-four seconds for me to come back to the reality and again started watching her movements-this time with a new realization and with a new interpretation from the other end.

She wiped away her tears as if she had decided something, moved back to her old position and started her task again. Then I saw her washing the colourful saris under the drinking water pipe, just soaking it in the water and taking it out, spreading it over the platform bench, happily coming back to talk to the people. Again she started crying, this time leaning on the sink looking up and down. Suddenly she waived her hands at someone nodding her head, telling she is not crying. She waived hands at them as if bidding good bye with the expression ‘I am alright. You take care’. I eagerly turned back to see who that person was but couldn’t find anyone and then I understood that it could be an imaginary person from her fantasy world or perhaps it could be some broken pieces of memories from her splendid or tragic past. She stood there with the impression of a determined lady who was ready to face the challenges of the world.

She again kept herself busy in soaking the saris and I couldn’t believe that she was not normal. She had that realization in her mind that made her to behave so naturally. She took a green and red sari out of the sink and went to spread it on a platform bench for drying. She was doing that task with the seriousness and perfection of a home maker. Behind the pillars of the platform she was busily drying her clothes and I just waited to see what she would be going to do next.

The train was about to leave the station. It started moving slowly. I tried to see that lady who entertained me for the last ten minutes. I just tried to get a glimpse of her for one last time but, by that time she had gone out of my sight.

I did not want to waive good bye to her.

I did not want to gift an adieu smile to her.

I was not even ready to step out of the train to give her a few coins.

 Then why did I allow my eyes to search for that lady behind the pillars?

Within the ticking of six hundred seconds that lady had got into my mind, made me realize how things could be changed and how perceptions would differ. And for that reason, may be my mind wanted to thank her and was searching out for her. In that case, I believe, it could be called as heartfelt thanks.