A memory with a watermark.

Many a times in life I wanted to leave the past behind me and start afresh, I’d want to leave everything that reminds me of a certain period of my life and move on seeking greener pastures. To an extent  I have been successful is phasing out all erstwhile memories each time they flash before me, but the naked truth is that, the more I try to cut loose of something, the more I attach strings to it, the more entangled it would get.
This is an tribute to someone who inspired me to write, to read more, told me that pitfalls now are Gods way of saying there is something better in store, who  taught me life isn’t all that easy and there were seldom any half volleys, with whom I’ve cut myself adrift these days. He is Istanbul.
I had met Istanbul on a cold February night in a virtual world when I got largely enamored by something he had written about a particular childhood hero of mine. A conversation was stuck and voila! Sparks flew and within minutes of conversing I realized that whatever I was going through in life at the moment, Istanbul had been though long back and for him, he could see and lot of himself in me. We spoke of The English Patient, his tryst with Istanbul as a Scouser, his travelogues, The Che, he being born on The Che’s birthday, my escapades, our love for Kerala food, beef, porotta, chicken, Tarantino, Woody Allen.
He would write for me, read out poems in his accented English, and sing hopelessly. He loved me reading out to him, lying in his arm chair eyes half closed perceiving every word I utter. I took him to his erstwhile life where in the midst of desperate Machine Drawing he sought relief in Keats, Shelly and Neruda. I sought refuge in him, from my monotonous world of writing codes to a whimsy world where in a magic carpet I’d fly around and see the world I long to be in. Life in general was cat whiskers, all bright, shiny, and full of life, not a tinge of gray to be spotted.
I sit and reminisce those times; I’d wait in the dusty balcony of my room waiting for him to call, and gaze at the stars, finding the brightest among them. Threads were woven between us and they animated patterns of love only that they were blurry and out of shape. I knew Istanbul was the forbidden. Anything that is forbidden has a special charm that it releases way too much pheromone for mortals to show any disdain. To me Istanbul was the forbidden apple and I being Adam wanted the apple for not for the apples sake, like Mark Twain said, but because it was forbidden.
Rational and ethical thinking eclipsed my impulsive naive self invariably and I knew I had to go. I went. Far away from his existence for his good and mine. He knew this was coming; he had anticipated that I’d press the panic button and flee. He felt heaviness within himself for dragging me through his marshy life and soiling my vesture. We parted ways. I made myself believe this wasn’t going to change the normal course of life, a minor turbulence in the roguery called life and I wasn’t going to succumb. I do not miss him yet, his memories still linger – the days we’d finish the cross word puzzle in Mint together, the day I sketched his portrait listening to his voice miles away from where I was, the Champions League final where Barca won…all that…