The toilet is a very strange place indeed! Some of the best creative ideas strike in the loo when one is doing one of the most mechanical jobs one can imagine.
When I was in the loo I was transported in the past this time…precisely 7 years ago. I was in Ruparel College in the first year, science stream. My subjects were Physics, Stats and Maths. But looking at those please don’t jump to the conclusion that I was good at studies. I was basically crazy about Einstein and his theory of relativity and I loved astronomy in general. That’s why I followed Physics into Degree College too. Well, but by this time even the Guitar had entered my life and I was totally in love with it and the twist in the story is that I had begun hating my science-student life from the bottom of my heart! That’s because my whole day was spent in completing journals and in the dark physics lab! I hated it because it kept me away from my guitar. BINGO! It finally struck me that I am an artist and not a science freak! When I used to read my science texts and see that the current flows from Point A to Point B or when it proclaimed that the earth goes around and the oceans are held on the earth’s surface because of a certain Centrifugal and Centripetal force, I thought,

“How does that matter to me and my guitar?! The only force that keeps the
guitar stuck on me is Love!”

I changed my stream. I took up Arts; Psychology, Philosophy and History. !
I had joined a guitar class by then. But it would not suffice for my hunger for guitar knowledge. I wanted more. So, one day I left from home for college. But instead of reaching college, at 8 A.M. I reached my guitar tutor’s home and told him, “I want to be a musician. Please help me.” He sent me to a more serious tutor called Mr. Rodriguez. I travelled to his home and told him that I wanted to learn more. He gave me a guitar and asked me to play. He was a stout old gentleman with really big stern eyes. He told me that if I kept playing like that, he would slap me! Then he told me a big list of things that I SHOULD learn…while two other guys with guitars looked meekly at me. Perhaps they too were at this stage in the recent past. From there I went straight to the Mumbai University to find out about music courses offered there. It was lunch time there so I was sent somewhere else…ultimately I did not find what I wanted.
But the point is that at that time, there was no ‘fear’, no inhibitions or hesitations! The mind was so full of innocence that I could just go out and search for what I wanted. It was so easy to change paths, try something new or do something which the heart desires.
*sigh* I so love those days…