The Sands of Time..

“I’m not a girl

Not yet a woman..

All I need is time,

A moment that is mine”
----Britney Spears

Time.
It is strange how it becomes our master. And we seem to accept its existence in our life without much ado.
Last night I was reading the book “A Place Called Freedom” for the umpteenth time (there…that word again!!) and it suddenly dawned on me that the protagonists who were in search of freedom do succeed in their quest but even they have to bow down to the eternal servitude of this non spatial continuum thus named!! Fact is indeed stranger than fiction. In spite of the author’s tryst 2 portray that freedom is achievable, the ending tells a different story. There is no “happily ever after”… Time makes sure it has a say!!!!
So is no one free?? Are we all in a perpetual race against time to finally submit ourselves to that devious entity? Is nothing blessed and free enough to simply flee?? I wonder how we call ourselves liberated…if in reality we are eternally under the bondage of time!! Is it emancipation to sit with your textbook during the mid-summer afternoons and learn how the Kharia tribe got married even if all you wish to do is sit by the window and paint the sky blue? Is it freedom to wake up @ sharp 5.30 on bitterly cold winter mornings so that you are not even a minute late for school in which event you’ll be sent back home?? Sometimes I really wish I was disentangled from the coils of Time.
Well.. I guess I complained of my daily school-going routine a bit too much, yearned far more than was necessary for that fabled “me-time”.. so that now I’m free to spend afternoons wishing I could paint the sky blue (which actually is quite a definite shade of blue right now..it being winter and all) and free enough to wake up whenever I feel like..err, almost! Because you see, while I was busy complaining that I had too much to do and too lil’ time, Time kept slipping away…the sand depleting slowly but surely in the Hour Glass of the 1st chapter of my life, so that when I finally looked up long enough to see, all I saw was Time that had flown away..yet again, leaving in its wake only flashes and snippets of friends, school and the life I had unknowingly grown to know and love. And now, since I want it all back, since I wish to revisit good ol’ school life and don’t want to let go..Time will not adhere to my plea. It’ll keep flying, taking me farther and farther away till all I’m left with is beautiful memories of those glorious seasons spend under the Sun.
But then, Time has also given me those sunny days, those beautiful hours and moments replete with craziness, fun, songs & dances, shared dreams, stupid pranks, tears and laughter in the company of friends…It has stood faithfully by my side, always giving me the chance to embrace the present…letting me admire the blooming flower, the bumble-bee, the floating clouds and the morning dew. O sweet Life!
My love-hate relation with Time continues at this very second..even as I write this, I can hear the clock tick, hear my mum’s footsteps as she comes up to check on me & chide me for “wasting TIME instead of studying for the upcoming pre-boards”.. sometimes the love is more, sometimes the hate…but Time will ne'er agree to being ignored, will it?