I see Kashmir in my rear-view mirror.

They walk very fast. With their breath wheezing out in a puff of gray smoke. The steps match their purpose. They have somewhere to go. Something to do. With every hurried step, perhaps, they leave the scars behind. Or try to run away

Their hands forever hidden in 'pherans,' much like their wounds. The young boys whiz past on bikes laughing as they stop on the shores of Dal. Thumping backs, punching and chasing each other.

Running away from anger with every smile.

******

They play cricket on the roads to Hazrat bal. The pitch lay across two concrete paths. The high shots seem dangerous to chase. But it isn't dangerous for them. They have seen death in the eyes. With only stones in their hands.

The eyes are sad. Or maybe their color is. Just like the winter. Beautiful and gray. Or maybe the land's quiet grief has entered their pupils.

******

Squirrels. Pretty and wary. But when they trust you, they come near.

******

The car is moving fast towards the end of the visit. The mothers are at the bus stops with cheeks red from the morning breeze and cherubs clinging to their limbs for that last waft of scent & warmth before they board the yellow bus.

The women, perfectly beautiful women, clicking away on high heels, smart coats over the traditional salwar-kamiz and stylishly worn head scarfs. Most always, a phone attached to their ears.

The car stops at the signal near Jhelum, a man hugs another in a police uniform, shakes his hands, keeps his palm on his heart.

******

The car is speeding up now and I am looking at the houses with triangle tops, chimneys and red bricks.

And I am suddenly a six year old, wildly moving a red crayon over a house with a triangle top, chimney and red bricks. Always the triangle top, chimney and red bricks.

I hear my Aunt teasing me,"Again a house? Always the same shape? There are no houses with such shapes!"

"There are,"I hear a six year old self muttering stubbornly.

"Where?"

The crayon is fast reducing to a stub and the chimney is coming alive on the paper. I pick a gray crayon for the smoke.

"Where are such houses?" My Aunt asks.

"Somewhere," I said at six. "I will find them."

******

I did.

Unwritten.

"Aankhon ko visa nahi lagta, sapnon ki sarhad hoti nahi, bandd aankhon sey roz main sarhad paar chala jata hoon" ~ Gulzar

Time is a frontier too.

*****

While I was attending "Raavi paar: The readings from Punjab" session in Jaipur Literature Festival, I realized the attendees ranged from the age of 3 months to 65 years and above. Emotionally charged words and audiences from both sides of the border. The whole tent felt like one raw open throbbing wound, coming alive with every breeze of wit and every hint of tears.

I was sitting there with Punjabi verses -- old and new flying around me, only half getting what was being said. Feeling bewildered and partly sidelined. I drifted away into memories. Suddenly, I found myself back in time, inside one cool, steely wintery holiday that I spend with Badi Ma and Badey Papa in Ludhiana.

*****

I could almost see Badey papa there with me. Sitting with his white pajama Kurta and black half jacket, wrinkled hands resting on his sheesham walking stick, wise experienced eyes twinkling with humor and understanding. He would have filled up the blanks. He would have told me more than what was being said. The prologues and the epilogues.

*****

Badey Papa and Badi Ma were to us JUST what we called them. Father and Mother. Honorary grandparents. Guiding hands of Father and two Aunts. All I know is, they took in , a trio of steel spined youngsters, whose freedom fighter father left the world too soon, and whose mother who was to this world what fish is without water. The trio dint want any help but they took the love with a hunger that was never appeased. They carved their future and a name for themselves and led a comfortable life.

*****

Badey Papa would force me to write him letters. I squirmed and sulked but filled the pages with tales of a co-ed secondary school and the neighborhood. How I fell down from my Nth attempt to ride a cycle, How Rohan called another "Mota Gorilla" and spent the day perched up on the bench looking like one! How cruel this world is to an 11 year old, with social studies dividing itself like amoeba into Civics, History & Geography and Science into Physics, Chemistry and Biology. SIX extra subjects Badey Papa?! Why dint anyone warn me?! Do you know what this mean?! TENSION. I am very tensed Badey Papa of losing my only childhood. And Math is still haunting like the last tale of the peepal ghost.

And so I carried on

Dear Badey Papa,

The report card came today. With the same effects of an earthquake.

***

Dear Badey Papa,

Is there a Grade better than A+++ ? Papa wants me to earn that grade :-/

***

Dear Badey Papa,

Why don't you adopt me? And Mamma too! Then I will write letters to you from your own desk.

***

Dear Badey Papa....

***

I wrote till I realized I liked writing all those seemingly mundane things in school, the injustice, the pressures, the confusions, the problems -- real & imaginary, down on a piece of paper, because then I saw them from Badey papa's eyes. And they seem small if not insignificant.

He replied to each of the, I could almost see him on his writing desk at 7:00 AM every morning. Face concentrating to find the right words for all those who write to him. But I knew he would smile at this, purse his lips at that and then laugh out aloud at this sentence. I played with him.

He played right back.

*****

Dear Badey Papa,

You would have loved this. You would have told me the meaning of all these words that are reminding me so much of you. I know what you were doing when you asked me to write to you.

***

The crowd's collective laughter brought me back to the tent from my reverie.

***

Dear Badey Papa,

I miss you.