Ruskin Bond and Autumn Sky

September 2015

Ruskin Bond and Autumn Sky

Ruskin Bond? Yes, the great Indian children’s writer who wrote scores of beautiful countryside tales and short stories like The Cherry Tree & Garland of Memories etc. This afternoon, while walking in the autumn sun, I just thought of Ruskin Bond out of nowhere. He had great love and appreciation for the Himalayas and hill stations like Shimla. Reading his short stories would make one immerse into a blissful display of imagery words.  In short he loved simple things in nature and found beauty even in a dried, crumbled leaf!

Wearing the immortal literary eyes of Ruskin Bond, I went to a solitary walk last week end. With a camera in hand and keeping the senses open to enjoy every bit and piece of small yet beautiful things and events occurring in the nature.  As I walked by the river side, the feel of grass on my grey converse was different. The river had become less noisy and more peaceful. It no longer was dragging logs and boulders like it did a few months ago. In the air around, a faint smell of lemon grass from ‘round the hills mixed with aroma of pine leaves being carried by the fateful wind came to the delight of my senses.

Crossing the wooden bridge and following the deserted road when the sun was almost saying sayonara for the day, I came across hosts of cosmos flowers, white and pink, lined up by the road side. Adjusting the settings of my camera for a perfect picture, I captured a lucky group of the flower among hundreds of it to be saved into posterity. Later when I grow into a funky old man, I would like to see the pictures, read my own writings, recollect the bygone days and rejoice for a life well lived enjoying small things nature has offered me.

Reaching the hill on which a tall Buddha is constructed of metals, sand & cement mixed with love and compassion & hard work, I looked to my country’s capital town that we proudly call a city. The rushing cars on the expressway reminded me of my mama’s words when I first ventured out of my little beautiful hamlet of Yue Pemachen in search of a confusion called life. “In Thimphu, be careful on the roads. Cars may crush you to death”, she had said. Looking back, it brought me a smile a genuine smile.

Taking few more pictures, saying a silent prayer, breathing a lungful of fresh cool air of my motherland Drukyul, I walked back home. The dusk air was fused with rattles of autumn insects and chirps of birds heading home. Listening to George Strait’s “Chill of an early Fall” by my ear phones, hands in the pockets I walked by the river. My heart beating happily and the song played by:

“There's a storm coming on,

it won't be too long till the snow falls.

Oh I'll be sobersome,

 But when October comes and goes and no time at all

 I'll begin to feel the chill of an early fall.

 Oh how quick they slip away, here today and gone tomorrow.”