The Road Not Taken

80, and still counting. Although, so far, I had been reveling in false merriment of still being able to maintain a healthy weight, that is, even with such an unhealthy sit-on-a-chair-and-keep-on-hitting-keys-until-you-die lifestyle, the digital weighing scale brought my world crashing down. 80.96 Kilograms - it said, and no matter, how hard you try to convince yourself, all things digital have such an aura of accuracy about them, that you eventually end up accepting the truth in red (ever wondered, why all these weighing scales have red displays?). And so, a guy like me, who had never imagined even in his wildest dreams (and I have had some really wild ones) that he would be worrying about his waistline, today finds himself engrossed in a daily supervision of rising and falling numbers. Lol, that was just an exaggeration, but there is definitely a certain element of self-consciousness, taking roots deep inside me right now. Else, how would I explain the umpteen things that I do now, that you generally do, when you are – what’s the euphemism – a “little bit on the healthier side”. And although, I like to believe otherwise, it was perhaps due to this changing scheme of things, that I finally decided to take the road seldom taken. The road to Pune University campus, where a 5 K “dream-run” was supposed to begin at 7:30 in the morning.

Waking up early can be a tough job, requiring some early planning from your side. For starters, you can place your alarm clock at least 5 feet away from your sleeping territory. Perhaps, that’s also the only thing that you can do. So, here I was, getting up, when it was still dark, giving a wake-up call to the other guy - Vishwa, when it was still dark, and staring out of the window, when it was still dark. The temptation of that I-will-sleep-for-just-5-more-minutes was always there, but the plunge had been taken, and there was no turning back. Comrades fell (read my room-mate going back on his promise to join me), the will was tested, but I continued, still fighting off the sweet seductive mistress that sleep is. To be true, the sight of dogs, that dot the road from my flat to office, barking at the top of their vocal capabilities, did dampen my spirit a little, but I risked them anyway. After all, one doesn’t come this far, every day. And so I reached, without any incident, the Baner road, where the other guy – Vishwa, joined me in my insane pursuit. A petite Bajaj auto (you see, I come from the land of Vikram, colloquially referred to as the Bada auto) came strolling along, and our journey to the University Gates began.

We landed at the Gates of Glory around 40 minutes before the scheduled start – something that might have gotten us into record books, if the world was populated only with 20-something engineers. The signs were encouraging – there were already some people huffing and puffing their way down the road. Some were young, some old, some even barefoot, all of them having a small white-chart cut-out stamped on their chests, proclaiming the enormity of their endeavor. We too, started in the opposite direction, towards the source of this intermittent stream of runners, hoping to reach there well in time. On the way, as it usually happens when you visit a college/university, our discussion veered towards general campus talk (for example, we discussed how a very tall building currently under construction, could become the default choice for anyone seeking pre-mature life termination). And so we ambled along, with the nonchalance of a drunkard, until we finally checked the time to find that it was 7:23 already. We looked as far as we could, but there still seemed to be no flag-off point in sight. And to compound it , there were not even any runners on the road this time. Somehow - talkative, busy creatures that we are - we had failed to take notice of the fact that that intermittent stream of runners, had dried up completely, quite a while ago. So, here we were, after almost 90 minutes of gladiatorial efforts (it’s all relative!), stranded on a runner-less road, clueless about where to go. Seeing no point in going back, we continued forward, hoping to find someone to guide us to the flag-off point. Thankfully, very soon, we caught up with a middle-aged man (Somehow, like the beginning of a dream, I can’t remember when he entered our frame of sight), jogging along slowly. And before, we could pose him a question, he asked us back – “Ye 5 K dream run ka rasta yahin se jaata hai kya?”. To which, I retorted haplessly – “Ye 5 K start kahaan se ho rahi hai?”. At this point, the man changed to a more sympathetic tone, and said - “Wo to university gate par left-turn hai naa…Shivaji statue.. wahin se”. Flashing back came the image of the fork in the road at the university entrance, that we had so blissfully ignored to take the right turn. Following the anti-route of the runners looked like the most logical thing to do then, as all the runners poured down from the road on the right. However, in light of the recent revelation, we realized the fallacy of our assumption – those runners were probably on their way back to the starting point instead of the other way round. With a silent sigh, we turned back, and broke into a gentle run as the unsolicited advice of the middle-aged man on how to approach a 5 K run - “Bhago, chalo… Bhago, chalo… Dil ki dhadkan dheere dheere badhegi” – faded into the background. I was still hoping secretly, that the man was talking about some other left-turn – a left-turn that was nearer to where we were now. We continued to run, rather lukewarmly, asking at every turn about the starting point, lest we get lost again. But then, precious time had been lost in all this hara-kiri, and our enthusiasm began to drop as we realized that we won’t be able to make it in time. No sooner than later, we saw a whole bunch of runners coming down the road, which meant that the race had already begun; thus effectively shutting out any hope to participate this time. We switched back to Socrates-esque mode (For the uninitiated, Socrates used to discuss philosophy with his students while walking), and as a way to compensate for the missed race, we decided to walk back home the entire distance. We reached the university gates; the fork, and the guard posted there, very matter-of-factly, confirmed that we had indeed taken the wrong turn. We looked around to see if there were any pointers to the venue; and on finding none, concluded that the organizers had probably become bored of putting up the same pointers every month again and again. As Murphy would have put it – “Agar tum kisi cheez ko poore dil se chaho, toh saari qaynaat tumhe usse juda karne main jut jaati hai” and as Lennon-McCartney would have replied – “Let it be”, we sauntered back to our flats with a resolve to come back again. However, for now, it was time to give in to the antics of that eternal seductress that I mentioned before – Sleep.

So much so, for a Sunday morning, when I woke up, well, when it was still dark.