Monsoon is

When my heart goes bonkers, when it refuses to get bound by walls or any physical confines. Can I run around arms outstretched feeling each drop drench not only my body but every emotion, wipe clean the slate of life and mind? Crisp and cold, pleasing and teasing, making me lose myself, and disappear in these looming clouds. They don’t daunt me (at least not till lighting goes bonkers and starts her feverish jiggle) and now I want to just get up and go, where I don’t know.

My mind though inside this room, this office, is busy flying far. Seated here I cannot see but can sense the trees outside, the sluggish birds struggling to hop onto the next branch, the grass which is sucking the moisture off the earth’s breast and who playfully waves an arm to call the clouds. The campus is empty but is so alive. I miss those Western Ghats where I discovered my fetish for green. Nature’s best colour, the colour of life. The cheeky blue tries to make her appearance only the puffy clouds pushed by impish winds are faster and dodge her around, smothering her in grey. Matheran, Lohgad, Tikona, Nane Ghat, Rajgad, all come rushing into my brains. Those treks, I relive them each second. Those cute little streams, your music courses in my blood. Monsoon is those mountains, where I find peace, joy, tranquillity.

Monsoon is Bombay, with her crowded streets and the view from my balcony. People huddling below the shop shutters, waving their colourful umbrellas to get the water drops off, drenching themselves and their neighbours more in the process. Monsoon is those children that hop on all puddles on the way back from school and wait by the road corners to let passing vehicles splash water on them. Monsoon is that beggar on the pavement seated on the cement ledge bordering a tree, wearing clothes of plastic bags to keep himself dry. Monsoon is that fluttering black plastic sheet, spread by the painter of signs atop his rack-shop, to keep his name boards dry. Monsoon is the smell of hot pakodas wafting from neighbours kitchen into my nose. Monsoon is those trees outside my window which shed their dusty skins of grey and don on luscious green natural makeup. Monsoon to me is an excuse to eat ice-creams and catch the drops with my tongue before the rain melts them and carries the drops to the ground.

Please tell me reasons why I should stay in this room.