I relived my past…

Some looked just the same, while the others were hard to identify. Some had receding hairline (to say the least!), while the others had streaks of grey. Some had expanded around the waist, while the others had pulled in a bit. The young girls (as we knew them) were more like mid aged (yet charming) ladies. But we all relived our school days just for a few hours.

The Springdales (Dhaula Kuan) batch of 1990 met a few days ago, and what a blast that was. The evening started with pleasantries as if we were meeting strangers – and I thought it was going to be one long evening! But soon, a few (actually much more than a few!) drinks down, folks were just like school kids – pulling each others’ legs, using more than a generous dose of the four-letter-word in conversations, bitching about folks who could not make it to the meet, talking about "ex-flames," etc. It seemed as if 19 years between our school graduation and that evening had vanished in high (and rather heavy doses of) spirits! There were doctors, salesmen, bankers, business men, exporters, consultants in the group; but for those few hours it seemed we were a bunch of heady high school kids.

And then after early excitement, the conversation turned to more mundane topics such as who was doing what, and how had life treated individuals in the interim. Thank god, however, no body pulled out their visiting cards; otherwise it would have just turned into celebration-of-professional-success for some, and a feeling that they had lost-out-in-professional-life for the others.

As folks got high on nostalgia and “spirits,” and as guys ran out of conversation topics, the mood turned to singing and music. We shouted slogans of our school groups (“houses”), cheered as some even sang our school songs, and posed for pics as cameras flashed all over.

Post dinner and after a zillion phone calls from spouses, some (like me) left the party (at 12:00 AM), while (I heard) some others stayed for a few hours more, downed more drinks, and eventually had to be assisted to their cars and even dropped home.

We all promised to meet each other regularly, and keep in touch. A few weeks later, I at least see a lot of e-mails floating around the group. The next meet (with family) is already on the cards.

Cheers to Apul, Sumit, and Gautam, who took the initiative to set that evening up. Thanks folks, you made me relive my past for those few hours…