To Presi, with Love..

 Dearest Alma Mater,

While penning this letter to you, I am already inundated by a plethora of emotions, which are likely to hold sway over my faculty of articulation. Cohesion, even though unwarranted in an informal write-up, is utterly imperative as it bespeaks perspicuity. However, as foretold, one can shun it while pouring one’s heart - some things are better left incoherent, for grey lets one delve deeper. Hence, pardon if you may, for the way I will be jotting this for you. You have always been accommodative, warm, and clement - this time too it should not be an exception, or so my expectations tell me. 

You are turning 208-year-young today. Aging like a fine wine, you have still managed to hold your head high amidst all the different kinds of debris that has been surrounding you all along this journey, ensuring your existence as the red oleander that you are. For all that, I was initially of the view that your presence must be very overbearing, intimidating. But, the more I had the privilege to explore, I realised it was never you, rather a select class of people that roam about your premises, the ones that carry your name to create an identity of their own, hitherto nonexistent. Certainly, the association with you is not merely an academic one, but also that of legacy, of history, of resistance, of the many voices that culminated into the collective consciousness that places you at an elevated altar of identity. Still, if an individual’s identity is replaced by that of you, then it is a bit problematic, and that leads to a different kind of socio-cultural intimidation, an identity elitism. Anyway, that is a lot of rant. I warned you, this is not going to be very cohesive. 

When I first stepped into the campus through that black iron-gate, which has now become a thing of yore - I felt very, very much at home. Yes, that certainly sounds very cliché, I know. But it is what it is. You did feel like home. Home, where there is comfort. But who knew that so-called would be so short-lived?

Before I could properly settle with the dynamic life that you offered, my reverie was shattered and I was stabbed with the sharp knife that reality is. The ones I considered friends, turned into foes overnight - or were they ever ‘friends’ per se? Maybe it was my naivety that I mistook amiability with friendship, smile with trust. And, as one must, I too had to pay for my naivety. I shifted the burden of blame on your shoulder and held you accountable for pushing me to my nadir. 

And then it rained. The rain of grief. Grief, that indicates the thawing of the Winter-snow of melancholia and embraces the Spring of acceptance that follows. Peace came dropping slowly, and I found myself lying on your ever-embracing comfortable lap. The quads (erstwhile basins) where I spent most of my time inside your premises, actually felt like your lap. It had that warmth, that coziness, that comfort, that motherly affection. It still has, I presume. It’s been long since I went there. I don’t think I belong there anymore. Nevertheless, that warmth of yours opened my eyes and epiphanic realisations hit me harder than my notion of reality that I knitted inside my head. 

You are not at all home. At least, to me, you are not home. Maybe to a lot of pretentious people you are, but to me, you are not home. Home is where comfort is, where peace is. And, lest one forgets, home is not just a construction of cement-sand-mortar-bricks. Such a lifeless building can never be a ‘home’. It’s always the people. It has always been like this. The people that you are surrounded with nowadays are the most toxic people one can even conceive of. Their actions, regardless of the intentions, ensure that the premises are never, never comfortable and homely for an individual. 

But, even if not home, you posed yourself as a mother to me. The suburb kid, with a head full of unrealistic expectations, was saved by you. Had you not exposed the true colours of what goes around and the so-called ‘Presidencians’, the journey of enlightenment would have been quite cumbersome. You always pushed me to waddle, but also watched my steps and carefully tagged along so that if I fell, I fell into your lap. Not sure if I should be grateful to you, or happy, or indifferent for this. Should I take you for granted, or should I thank you for your thankless role? 

Nonetheless - toast to the ‘mother’ who taught me to introspect, to alter my perspective and take things with a pinch of salt, and to keep my friends close - but enemies closer, so that they are befooled by the masquerade that I put on. The mother who taught me what 'life' really is. 

Once again, a very happy birthday to you, Presidency. It would have been quite impossible to have come this far. It really would have been. 

To infinity and beyond.

Love, 

Archisman