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Saturday, February 05, 2005
The Many Loves of Atticus - Vol II of CCXXI - Growing Pains
[Part-II of a series... Part-I found here]Junior School is a strange place. It's that phase where life is full of thrilling possibilities. You get stronger.You get wiser.With time, you get wise enough to realise getting wiser doesn't make things any easier.You are not unlike an eaglet standing on the edge of your eyrie, ready to jump into a bottomless canyon - puny wings all aflap and eyes closed tight in fervent prayer. You try hard to hide those last fluffy feathers from your fledgling days, draw yourself to full height (which isn't much) and look brave even as you tremble at the prospect of never mastering flight! You look desperately for the promise of deliverance from this limbo - an additional inch, one whisker on that barren upper-lip, a semblance of muscle in your arm. Amid all this soul-searching, the distaff side of the class just shifts gears into a pace of its own, like Ethiopians in the last lap of an Olympic 10000m race!
All around you, girls grow taller - and shapely ;). They are no longer the familiar faces you'd bullied in Primary School. They tower above you, smile disparagingly as you pass by, make jokes among themselves and giggle out loud. It was, thus, an unfair world... Just when young Atticus was moving away from his first romantic tryst onto bigger things, the said things had literally gotten too big for his 140-cm frame to handle. And to make it worse, this phase of my humble existence was when Miss M stormed in!
With a nasal voice, a perpetual scowl and a temper that was lost forever, Miss M was the kind of school-teacher who should have stuck to ill-treating David Copperfields and Nicholas Nickelbys in Dickensian public schools. But there she was in flesh and blood - my class-VI teacher. For some reason, M and I just never got along (Among other things, she didn't quite approve of the last-row enterprise I ran trading football-star picture-cards for goodies and cash). I had managed to negotiate one touchy half-term in these treacherous waters when M struck - merciless and fatal!
Poor Atticus was lifted from his all-male last-bench bastion and dropped unceremoniously between the two tallest girls in class!!! There I sat... dwarfed, unloved and ridiculed. Every attempt at small talk during the morning study-hour was greeted with hushes which came from a good 3 inches above my ears. Strict boundaries were marked in the desk giving me just about enough space to get one foot in. Any attempt to pass notes, comment at teachers or throw chalk was met with and exchange of fateful looks and at times, severe warnings.
Those were days when my fears confronted me - the ominous possibility of remaining shorter than every girl in the neighbourhood, the ever-present threat of being bullied and beaten up by girls, the possibility of burning to ashes in M's stares during English class.Those were also days when I learnt more about the girls next to me... That barring a particularly unimaginative way of dealing with rules (man, they actually studied during study hours and prayed during prayer), they were pretty cool people... That they too liked making ink-devils, watched cricket and hated M... That they were as worried about growth as I was about the lack of it...!
In the next two terms, I got real friendly with my neighbours. So much so that M had to shift me back to Boyland. But, for those three years in Junior School, romance was never in the schoolroom air. May be I was so obsessed with flying that whom I flew with didn't matter temporarily. May be I didn't like the idea of craning my neck for a smooch. For whatever reason, that's how things remained - loveless and quiet as young Atticus awaited adulthood and deliverance...!
 | | | Atticus
February 14, 2005 12:41 PM PST
@Medha:
Harmless...Hmmm, lemme see for myself at the CBM... :|
Thanx and happy VDay to you too buddy :))
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| | | Atticus
February 14, 2005 12:32 PM PST
@Pradeep:
Welcome Buddy!!! :)
And yeah, Trichy indeed was OH-SO-WONDERFUL!!!!!!! :) | |
| | | ...:MEDHA:...
February 14, 2005 11:06 AM PST
oh no way..am like harmless...*snort* hehe....happi vday buddy | |
| | | Pradeep
February 14, 2005 02:46 AM PST
Hey... stumbled upon this site by accident. Totally amazing!!!! As an RSKite and a student of Prema Juney and a guy who went through a string of crushes right from 4th Std, I am really moved by your writings! It made me go on a Oh-Trichy-was-so-good rant yday! Do drop by my nascent blog sometime. What's ur real name btw? I might have seen you in the cricket grounds:P | |
| | | Atticus
February 13, 2005 08:26 PM PST
@Angel:
Hugs to you too Sis :) | |
| | | Atticus
February 13, 2005 08:25 PM PST
@CrazyGal:
Hope you don't have a mean-street past like Phoebe :D
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| | | Angel
February 13, 2005 02:52 PM PST
giving my early hugs for the Vday :) | |
| | | Crazygal
February 12, 2005 11:06 AM PST
:)) rolling on the floor laughing :)) me thinks me shud bring along a katori too :D and a sarangi and sing in such an of key soprano that ppl would pay me just to shut up!!!! :D *do i sound very phoebe like? * hehe..maybe i should bone up on a desi version of smelly cat :)) | |
| | | Atticus
February 11, 2005 03:42 PM PST
@Crazygal:
Will come there with a big bag to collect contributions... Hope you all contribute liberally to the cause of feeding a penniless student :(... | |
| | | Crazygal
February 11, 2005 01:13 PM PST
hee hee nitid is or procrastinating co ordinator :D flurys at 5 19th feb, sat. b thre..with ur wallet intact...nitids proclaimed that it is ur treat :D | |
| | | Atticus
February 10, 2005 02:40 PM PST
@Nitid:
Dude, please don't put off the few readers of this blog with brand-management jargon...! X-(
Save all that for placement-week :) | |
| | | Atticus
February 10, 2005 02:34 PM PST
@CrazyGal:
Haven't done much blog-hopping of late buddy... Will catch up with my reading shortly... :|
Whatz with the CBM? Postponed again? | |
| | | Nitid
February 10, 2005 10:10 AM PST
@lakesidey
Well friend..those were the days when nitid used to get warned by his class teacher to get a haircut or else....not for me those 0.5 cm hair...alas dats the default lenght now...of whatever little remains of my crowning glory ;))
but seriously dude....will be we what we r today wihtout that.....
in the Kapferer's prism of brand Lakesidey and brand Nitid...that is a the most importnt element of physique :p
ok ok..have read a wee bit too much last night!! | |
| | | Angeline
February 10, 2005 08:42 AM PST
Atticus,
cheers to 0.5cm hairlenght then!!!! | |
| | | Crazygal
February 9, 2005 04:59 PM PST
hehehe...been a while since i saw you around mine..and now i think i'm gonna be old grey and withered by the time cbm happens :) | |
| | | Atticus
February 8, 2005 10:16 AM PST
@Rapunzel:
I DID grow... Pretty much above-average by my region's standards...
So now, the problem's the other way round... ;) | |
| | | Atticus
February 8, 2005 10:10 AM PST
@Angel:
Hmmm... Given the thick mat of curly, unmaintenable hair I have now, 0.5cm still seems a good idea... :))
If only I weren't too lazy to visit the hairdresser... :( | |
| | | rapunzel
February 8, 2005 09:47 AM PST
awwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwww!!!!!my sympathies!!or no wait...maybe i'm being too liberal with that....the point is...did u grow much taller after that??perfeckly understand the ignominy if u dint :-| | |
| | | Angel
February 8, 2005 09:05 AM PST
LOL! hair lenght LOL! loved that. anyways, you were innocent then and not minding how dorky you look like.. you'd even adore the guy next door or your folks for dressing you up and always fixing your hair. nah! :p ;) | |
| | | lakesidey
February 7, 2005 07:47 PM PST
I also had the 0.5 cm hair length problem....but now people like Nitid and myself would surely look back to those golden days with nostalgia, at least we had a full head of hair, however short ;) What say Nitid boy? | |
| | | Atticus
February 7, 2005 01:44 PM PST
@Osty:
Deliverance did happen... ;)
Adulthood...hmmm... as you said, Atticus is still a "sensible kid" with "kid" being the operative word :D | |
| | | Ostrich
February 7, 2005 01:34 PM PST
... and did 'deliverance' happen? :)
P.S: If it were not for my good karma phase, I would've also asked if 'adulthood' had! :) Though, it would be a silly thing to do, cos Atticus is a very sensible kid! :))) | |
| | | Angel
February 7, 2005 12:48 PM PST
atticus,
yes bro.. got that =) | |
| | | Atticus
February 7, 2005 12:08 PM PST
@Bhavya:
Am glad you liked it, Ma'am :) | |
| | | Atticus
February 7, 2005 12:05 PM PST
@Angel:
Hugggsssss Sis! Strolled by your place this morning after a while.. :)
Ponytails... I wudn't have minded ponytails... My parents ensured my head always looked like an overgrazed meadow - never had hair longer than 0.5cm in all those years :(( | |
| | | Atticus
February 7, 2005 12:01 PM PST
@pLasma: Thanx again... will check it out... :) | |
| | | Bhavya
February 7, 2005 10:22 AM PST
very good read sirjee..
Enjoyed it as usual....:) | |
| | | Angel
February 7, 2005 09:31 AM PST
hey atticus, sup buddy? ;) =) love this one..
also the time when one looks dorky and with all those clothes folks try to dress you up with hair in ponytail and you are damn proud of.
whatta face! i mean phase :p hugsssss | |
| | | pLasma
February 7, 2005 03:43 AM PST
Here's some more goodies for you. Check this out: http://uffen.org/calvin/index.htm | |
| | | Atticus
February 7, 2005 12:34 AM PST
@Rhea:
Thanx...
But, pray, whatever does it explain...? | |
| | | Atticus
February 7, 2005 12:33 AM PST
@pLasma:
Checked out the link... So Bill did go to Kenyon... and odds are, he did make that speech :) | |
| | | Rhea
February 6, 2005 07:51 PM PST
good post...explains a lot of things;) | |
| | | pLasma
February 6, 2005 05:21 PM PST
I've come across those "commencement" speeches too.
This one is from Wikipedia, at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bill_Watterson So, should be true. | |
| | | Atticus
February 6, 2005 03:39 PM PST
@pLasma:
Big time Bill W fan yes... The most treasurest part of my hard-disc is the 330 MB "Entiire Calvin & Hobbes" folder :)
Thanx for the link... Nice speech! BTW, is this "commencement speech" true...? Have read the Sunscreen one attributed to Kurt Vonnegut and another by Larry Ellison. Both extremely good... both never happened :) | |
| | | pLasma
February 6, 2005 11:37 AM PST
Lofty heights of flight-
Forgotten;
Pangs of love
(terrible haiku :-(; great post :-)))
P.S: Since you seem to ba a Bill W fan, here is something: http://home3.inet.tele.dk/stadil/spe_kc.htm
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| | | Atticus
February 6, 2005 02:58 AM PST
@Ashi:
Welcome to this space, Buddy... Glad you liked it :) | |
| | | Atticus
February 6, 2005 02:55 AM PST
@Nitid:
Things do change, don't they...?!
Oh..had I only known I'd be 5'10" and all-muscle one day :p | |
| | | ashi
February 6, 2005 12:32 AM PST
hey..i came by from ossie's...:) liked your chronicles here atticus.. | |
| | | Nitid
February 5, 2005 11:29 PM PST
great post!!
maan how things change.....;)) | |
| | | Atticus
February 5, 2005 11:26 PM PST
@C.S.:
Hmmm.... Now I know :))
Welcome to this space, C.S. !!! | |
| | | Atticus
February 5, 2005 10:52 PM PST
@Yoss:
LOL!!! You have plenty of time now... Shift into turbo mode soldier :))
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| | | Atticus
February 5, 2005 10:49 PM PST
@Crazygal:
Thanx for the "er" added to "young"... So considerate :D
Sigh... How I wish the Miss Ms of this world visit me with similar punishments now ... ;) | |
| | | C.S.
February 5, 2005 10:22 PM PST
Yessir! I am....a rather silent fan :D
Nitid will vouch for that ;-) | |
| | | yossarian
February 5, 2005 10:18 PM PST
i could not speak to girls untill i was seventeen..........!!!!!!!!!!1 | |
| | | Atticus
February 5, 2005 09:40 PM PST
@C.S.:
Thanx buddy...:)
"As usual"..? Hmmm...You a regular here?? | |
| | | crazygal
February 5, 2005 08:12 PM PST
wow atticus...this was simply amazing :) i can just picture a young(er) atticus, dropped unceremoniously amidst these girls, casting wistful looks back to his luckier(?) mates at the back :)
good going buddy :) | |
| | | C.S.
February 5, 2005 08:02 PM PST
Fabulous! ......as usual :) | |
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