soldiers and lone rangers

We all have memories of some long forgotten chapters of our lives, which bring back an ecstatic feeling. I don’t know whether the feeling can be narrowed down to ecstasy or it is a river of emotions. It is the kind of mixed feeling when you eyes are a bit wet, but your heart is happy and it keeps pounding. Your hands are trembling and your hairs are standing.

There is the first kiss…..oh it’s so sweet always, as I have been by a lot of people. Then there is our first time sex. Mine I clearly remember, I was smiling like a fool the whole time, while pushing it in, stopping only after I got a tight playful slap. I was joyful and triumphant at the same time, thinking mine was the first one there. I don’t know what gives men this feeling of victory being the first one.

There is one encounter which completely surpasses all the others. It is of men in uniform bidding farewell to their families at the railway station. We are shown this in a lot of movies and described a lot in our popular culture. I haven’t seen many such scenes in real life, but they always crop up in movies here and there, just to get the kind of feeling I am talking about here, out of the audiences’ system. Train is about to leave, an infant is being handed over by the father to it’s mother, a son is taking blessing from his old father touching his feet, another one is hugging his sisters advising her to do well in exams, yet another one is wiping his mothers tears.  A very emotional music is in the air, making you forget of all the hullabaloo of any given railway station, anywhere in the world.

These are the men in uniform parting with their families, only to return 6 months later and repeat the process all over again. Do we really need to glamorize this such an extent, that when these men in uniform return to their bases and encounter such scenes in a movie, they are actually ashamed of themselves for not getting the kind of treatment they deserve, going by the movies.

Has anyone given a thought to the lonely small time businessman, going out of his home, for maybe a year or more? He will be staying in a dingy hotel room, with no place to go if he is free and has no work till the next meeting, because he cannot waste money. He will be tempted to enjoy some other woman’s company to forget his loneliness but will be stopped by the memories of his lovely wife and his kid.