We settle down with our mugs of peach ice tea –that’s the fancy drink for a supposedly spring-summer-storm-thunder-rain-wind weather, now that weathers have started becoming less season-based and more like my moods – and look out into the darkening skies.[break]
It’s all thunderstorms out there, with lightning bolts piercing through the dark clouds and bringing out the silhouettes of the green hills. The jacaranda branches are swaying along with the storm right outside the window.
We talk about childhood that seems to be the most prominent of our conversations and about how those were times when we were all up to some mischief and adventures.
It was like we were on a sugar rush and all we could think of, as children, was how to get into trouble. Discover a cave, bury your school uniform socks in the mud, run all the way down the stairs, climb trees, jump off the trees, break your leg – the list is infinite.
You see, it wasn’t about the fact that we missed our childhood but more about how we haven’t yet grown up to be “adults” and somehow we both feel like we’re locked up in these bodies that are supposed to act in particular ways and think in particular ways.
All the while, the jacarandas are swaying helplessly; surrendering to the wild wind outside. The lavender-ish flowers are flying around all over the streets and I wish for some of it to shower over me. They smell divine.
We decide we’re going to take a break from all the worldly occupations for once; not talk about or worry over things that are seemingly so important in our lives right now, and wander.
He looks at me and I see the kid in him. That kid has convinced me to grow back into a kid.
We step outside the café; the peach ice tea all settled in and ready to go. It’s raining like someone is throwing buckets over buckets of water from the seventh floor; with bouts of raindrops that hit our heads with determination. But we’re determined to beat nature for once and wander; wander through the jacaranda-covered streets.
It’s already six p.m. We decide to enter a bookshop; all the while our steps are crushing the fallen jacaranda flowers and our conversation is never meeting an end.
We step into the bookshop, ready to be wiped clean with a warm towel, welcomed with hot green tea of some sort. But instead, there are columns and rows of books, being browsed through or bought.
We’ve entered heaven. We’re all wet, shivering, and slightly hungry after all the talking (maybe that was just me) but it is comforting to be surrounded by some of the things that you love the most: books, a likeminded friend, and more books.
We get back to our conversation. Amidst the preserved old wisdoms and below the tungsten glow, we start to share our dreams.
It’s very difficult, I would say almost impossible, if I were to be my regular cynical self to find someone in our lovely capital who thinks somewhat like you.
It’s much more difficult to find someone who thinks somewhat like you to actually listen to what you’ve to say. But time just flies by when you do find that someone who thinks like you and listens to you.
In no time, it’s time. As we rush back to the bus stop, I notice the jacarandas and the silver hue they have taken on in the darkness.
For more on Sisakalam, visit sisakalam.wordpress.com.
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