Shadows and sunshine.

My father is at the gate looking worried. It is mid-morning and he should have been at work. My Second PUC results have been announced in the college premises.

His usual confident gait is slow and measured. We are waiting-mother and daughter united in the urgent need to know my fate. He comes inside and says,” I had sent a junior officer to check the results. He returned saying you have failed. I will go and see it for myself”. He drinks a glass of water and leaves. It is a journey of maybe 25 km from our house to the college( in the days before the results began arriving on your laptop). The worst nightmare of a student had come true for me and my world with all its dreams disintegrated with that announcement.

It was as if I had been thrown off a great height. I began to cry –shock and disbelief shaking words and sobs from my heart. Amma began crying too. My mind raced over various possibilities: Had I not written my roll number correctly? Had I failed in Hindi, a subject neglected in my pursuit of science and maths? That seemed like a plausible explanation. I was sure I had done well in all the other subjects. I began telling my mother that I had been a fool to neglect Hindi. Now what should I do? The shame and taunting I imagined a close community would throw at me when word got around that I had failed, threw me into further despair. I had lived all my 17 years here and we knew almost everybody.

A carpenter was at work in the garage hammering out huge crates from sheets of plywood. He stopped his work and looked at us questioningly but resumed his work when the two crying women went indoors to weep within the privacy of closed doors. We were moving to Mysore in the anticipation of my getting an engineering seat there. How futile and over confident it seemed now. Amma soon collected herself together and consoled me saying we should wait for my father. In the worst case, she said I would just have to write the Hindi paper again in the supplementary exams.

When I saw my father at the gate again he was still not smiling. He looked tired. As I ran down the path I saw a large bar of chocolate in his shirt pocket and turned to his beaming face. The irresponsible chap in his office had seen the results of a number above mine and had not thought it necessary double check.

What a great relief it was to eat chocolate and laugh once more! But I had come so close to despair and the world had seemed a closed dark space pressing on me from all around. If the nightmare had been real I would have just given the exam again and tried harder. My parents would still have been supportive. Of this I am hundred percent sure. I am 27 years further down the road from that day but no matter what life has thrown at me I have taken it. Maybe I stood with my head down, letting the tears flow unhindered, mourning the loss of a shattered dream; but I always pick up the pieces and start again.