A Bleak Childhood

I started for work very late that morning. That was a beautiful morning. Birds were chirping; the fresh east wind was blowing, carrying the lifeless leaves with it. I saw friends playing on the passage outside my house. For a moment I thought of running away and spending the days with friends. It was all much tempting than going to work, but I had inescapable responsibilities on my shoulder, to feed my family, as we didn't have sufficient money to survive a day without going to work, so I resisted the temptations and hurried of to work.

When I was passing the bus stop, I saw a bunch of boys like me with their fancy bags and spiral notebooks, guffawing and discussing something that I couldn't understand. Probably, they were waiting for the school bus. After looking at them, for a moment I started daydreaming of me in the tidy school uniform, discussing homework, doubts with my friends and complaining about the teachers. As I was lost in the dream, someone in his formal carrying suitcase came and hit hard to move me away and started to abuse me angrily "don't you have clothes to wear? why do you smell so bad".

At that point, I thought of him as an educated illiterate who was just selfish enough to survive for himself only. Doing the same monotonous and drab tasks each day and thinking of himself educated, but his education couldn't teach him humility, kindness, morals, and humanity. These dreadful incidents had stopped bothering me. Forgetting this, I reached the construction site, where I worked. We built a flyover to connect the main city to the nearest railway station.

Usually, at the construction site, there used to be a bustle, which could be heard from the distances, the fainted horn of trains from the nearby station, the lifting of cement planks by the crane, supervisors instructing the workers loudly, workers singing their regional songs, fumes of petrol burning in the generator, which was creating deafening noise, tractors carrying the bricks, cement and other raw materials. I observed my coworkers, who started their work. After giving instructions, I heard the supervisor saying "Raju, what are you doing here? Don't you have to go to school instead of carrying these bricks and cement?" Probably he was new in the field and gentler than the previous one and got my name from the fellow workmen but completely unaware of my conditions. I told him how my whole family lives in a single room with crumbling walls, wobbly iron doors, and no windows which become inhabitable in rainy days and we all have to do labor for having a day meal. I answered our parents couldn't afford me, education. It is just a dream that gets crushed every day through the wait of premature responsibilities.

Before him, nobody cared about me. No one had the courage to listen to my story with much patience that he had. My life's reality put the cruelty of this true world into his head at one stroke. I looked up and saw, he was sitting motionless in his chair, gazing at me, probably imagining himself as worn socks in my shoes. For a moment it felt like he wanted to give me all his sympathy and support to tie back my crushed dreams. All of a sudden, the noise of the fellow workmen breaks his chain of thoughts. He stood up, very pale, in his chair pats on my shoulder. It felt like he comforted my impeccable shoulder that was tired of holding the heavy responsibilities at this tender age.

He left me there with his doleful thoughts, which were already there in every corner of my bleak world. Probably, he would have also accepted the fact like others, that food is more important for survival than education. After slogging the daylight amidst the dust of the field, I left the place when the sun comes down. On my way to home, I passed through the place where I used to work previously, they have turned that dusty place into a clean and well-lighted restaurant contrary to the place where I used to stay. I saw the cheerful faces, eating burgers and pizza, that I always wanted to taste. But the person who is struggling for a day meal couldn't afford the diverse taste of food.

Probably, it's a rule of nature, a candle has to live in the dark to lighten the world. With these thoughts in mind, I reached my home and entered the half-built shack, where my mother in her tattered saris was making evening meal, kneading the dough with her tears that never stopped for her entire life. I saw my brother playing with the dog in that stinking lane chocked with garbage. I was looking the same dream in his eyes that used to be mine back in the days, looming in that flickering light of the street lamp. I always wanted a decent life for my brother that I couldn't have, but the destiny had some other plans.

Yes, probably there was no visible way to get out of this hell and the depth of despair but there was hope rooted to my deep subconscious mind that one day I will come out of this cave of misery to live my dream in the real world. The dream, where my little brother with those fancy bags would be waiting for his school bus at the bus stop. The dream, where I would be looking at the cheerful face of the mother. Yes, this was merely a hope to live life with dignity and out of misery but as the great said:

"Hope is a good thing, maybe the best thing and the best thing never dies".