Dear 123Greetings subscriber,

Missed me buddies ?! I don’t ! Wonder why ?! To miss a person whom you loved so much is called Fate alright, but if you give a chance to miss a person who loved you so much is a Mistake ! I don’t dare "miss you." So here I am, and let’s go Zooooooommm…

Well, I don’t purposefully crack a joke a day people, but there comes a phone call everyday to lure me to buy one commodity or another and I tried yelling at all possible decibels…never worked. And then I tried this…

Ring. Ring.

"Hello ?"

"Good Morning Sir, I am calling on behalf of The MAS Bank and…."

"MAS ? Never heard of that" Confused.

"Sir, we are debuting in the market and we offer…"

I got it…this guy is not gonna hang up for an hour now.

"Sir, the interest rates are the best in ….."

"I was just wondering about the war you know…" I started.

"Err….Sir…,of course, it’s bad" He mumbled.

"Nah ! the Civil War, I don’t know what would happen, look at Lincoln…he is taking decisions by minute"

"Sir…that’s history" Shocked

"But tell me, why should my Old Man shout at me for not coming to Christmas ?"

"I’m sorry Sir, I’m not able to follow you"

"You a stalker, Mr. ?"

"No, Sir…I mean,"

"Kong, come here….please talk to Mr. Kong…

Whoof…bark….grrrrrrrrr….

Click.

Relief ! Not exactly good manners, but if you get 15 calls a day like this, you tend to become sadistic. But here too, humor helps !

It was a record of sorts ! I couldn’t chat up, neither meet up with Aaliyah for one full week…hmm….ask me why ?! Well, I will squarely blame it on Hawaii ! Hey, now don’t go shaking your head in disbelief. A week-long camp out at Hawaii is irresistible, wont you agree ? And to add sauce to the steak, Mr. B cut some slack for us and booked Business class. Good Man !

Hawaii. The bubbling tide, sunbathing dames, colorful people, and exotic drinks…..! The point is, I didn’t call Aaliyah for a week now and she is being indifferent to me…sigh ! I don’t blame her. Fine ! Here I go…need to mend this one, how about sandcastle and sculptures ? Now what was that…nah ! Then how about flowers…hmmm…cookies..? how about a card…? ….well, how about everything…..okay, let’s make it big. I got it all and knocked her door. She bid me in half-heartedly. Felt like a stranger. And they say absence makes the heart grow fonder. Idiots ! Tried to put up my charming best….gave her the flowers… For starters, she looked in my direction…it always works. Then the cookies…okay, now do I see a smile. And then the card….I had her full attention now. Still not her usual self…tried to chat up, but she wouldn’t budge. Finally, she looked straight at me,

"You could’ve called once”

I know

I started to mumble some explanation and she cut me short…”I, you know, errr….”

"Bob…it’s just that you didn’t even think about me, I mean…I’m here waiting for you…checking the voice mail every few minutes, blaming the phone, blaming my friends…blaming myself….going crazy…”

Now, that’s unfair…I screw up and she blames herself…!

Moved beside her on the couch…put my arms around her…..and started blurting out…

"Aaliyah, yup, I should have…I know, I’m sorry, alright ?! I’m at wrong n’ I accept that, but it isn’t like I forgot you or something….when you are there at that exotic island…you meet a lot of people, interesting people….yeah ! They talk, they impress and they move away….and I’m genuinely happy to meet these people and we exchange names and pleasantries. When I’m back to my shack and back to being Bob, then all these people whom I met all day seem like a mirage…almost a blur….the only thought I have then is of You. Yeah ! That has to be something, isn’t it ? I should’ve called then…but I knew there is a week to go and some irrational logic said it would be nice to treasure these moments of longing….and tell you all about it when we meet. I told you now !”

I was literally short of breath when we parted away from the kiss. Well, the rest, as they say, is history ! Yeah, Absence makes heart grow fonder.

I get reminded of the fun we had last Friendship Week. Yours truly came out with the idea, "Why don’t we all hit the road in our pickups with no plans whatsoever on where we go…said something in the lines of "it’s not the destination that’s important, but the travel.” Well, everyone was sold. So we set out on our trip on the Friendship Weekend and hit the highway. It was a loud journey, 50 cents to Bon Jovi music blared…come to think of it; Steve even got some vintage Beatles along. We were on empty roads, of course, at an ungodly hour you expect the mass to stay at home with kids, but here we were having unadulterated Fun ! We equipped ourselves with a few six-packs and all the exotic bottled spirits as much as we could afford, and all the necessary cookies for the women folk (do we have a choice ?), and hit the road at around 1 o’clock in the night. After a few gulps of beer and the food, we moved around the night in the shivering cold; faced the kissing clouds, ohmigod; bliss ! We took turns to drive and visited places, we knew existed only in the map. The patrol cops pulled us over twice or thrice only to find out we were law-abiding citizens except that we were carrying along an extra-terrestrial being; Steve, of course (pun intended) ! We laid down to rest along a rough patch of a place on the dew drop adorned grass. That’s the best part, we loved to roll on the grass and felt them nuzzle and prick us at places; gazing at the sky together, we as a gang, could see the first rays of light coming into the world and they suck up the dew where we are dozing and the slow evaporation of the drops would give us goosebumps and make us smile for no reason. In that world, we created at that moment, there would be these early morning birds chirping by, and the feeling of nothing that engulfs us……those were days…..!

I look at the old man who leans by the sidewalk to strum his guitar. His music is sound, though he is blind. The stray dog, a homeless animal, which accompanies him wherever he goes, is his first loyal fan. It eggs him on by barking a warn when he misses a note….He whistles a tune, strums a warm-up stroke, and then settles into the melody. The sincerity with which he goes about it is what makes me like him more than his music. He’s a man of small needs, I guess…he never breaks his rhythm to count the cents and dollars. Twilight time it was and I happen to pass by with Meggy….we just stood transfixed as the old man was passionately belting out his wares gleefully. Foot tapping, we patiently heard it all. Then Meggy, the kind-hearted soul, dropped a dollar. Once he was through, he seemed to be in a hurry. Against his nature, he counted the money with his fumbling fingers and felt his way guided by his poodle. He was out of the Mac with a piping hot coffee and some delicacy. He immediately spread the buffet and made way for his poodle to whet its appetite. When the dog feasted on making a slurpy noise, he leaned on to the pavement, closed his eyes, patted its mane and smiled…maybe his first of the day. Looked an Angel. Yeah ! We still have people like this.

Peace,

Bob
Editor, 123Greetings
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