21 February 2009

Sights, Air, and Sound

A very short one.
One of the places that I have regularly been going to once Joe discovered it some years ago, and told Guha about it is Prophet's Town of course. Every time I go there, there is always some moment, which always sticks in my head, and makes the trip somehow stand out.
Once Joe, Guha, and I had skated on the frozen lake at 10 at night.

Another time, also at night, there had been this one moment when I had been looking up, and heard the tall trees shimmering, shivering, and swaying in the wind against a dense, liquid blue sky.

Another time while Guha and Joe were walking along the trail, I had ventured off and found the small stream which becomes the 15 feet deep lake (it might be 9 feet...) within some yards. I sat beside the stream and looked at the stream and heard the water trickling and gurgling over the rocks and the pebbles. The stream, the small pebbles, and rocks, the white snow. I remember that still. But most of all I remember the sound of the water rushing, trickling, plopping in waves.
Guha and Joe joined me some minutes later, and we threw large clumps of snow into the flowing stream and we cheered the clumps till they were swiftly carried off by the stream...

The last time there was a moment when I was skidding across the very narrow and hardly shin deep part of the stream when I broke through the ice and nearly landed on my face into the stream amidst Guha's chuckles.

Another thing I've noticed:
Joe looks. He looks through his binoculars, he looks without them, he looks all around him. He observes.
Guha breathes. He breathes deeply. He breathes and he breathes and fills his lungs in, and he keeps breathing in the blue and green air.
I listen.

Enough for now, I guess.

2 comments:

Suvro Chatterjee said...

Attagirl. Good to see you back.

I envy you. And I wish I had been there. Wouldn't mind landing on my face in the snow, even. Maybe I wouldn't have been bad company for Guha and Joe...

Shilpi said...

Thank you.
No you don't.
So, do I.
Never been to Prophet's Town without thinking about Pupu, boudi, and you.

I'm sure you would have been more careful...unless you were deliberately pushed into the snow.
No, you wouldn't have been. You'd have been very good company for Guha (Joe's the one who's left for Arizona).