61 Winters and an Invincible Summer Within - A sneak preview...

Preface

My mother named me ‘Anand’ (which literally means happy and peaceful) the day I was born since I came forth into the world as calm as a calf. A couple of years later, she sure did regret choosing that name because by then I had turned into a raging bull!

And henceforth, I was constantly admonished by all the elders in my family to “only speak when spoken to” and to remain as ceaselessly silent as possible as there was “Power in Silence” (that was my grandfather’s constant banter).

For a raging bull, this was a feat impossible to achieve. I could never understand why I had to persistently remain silent when the most of me raged to express every iota of thought that crossed my mind. Therefore, the more they tried to suppress the ‘bull’ the more bullish did I get.

But as the years meandered by and the ‘raging bull’ began to putter down to a ‘not so raging bull’ leaving behind a series of mangled ‘china shops’ way behind, the Power of Silence became to be progressively understood. In due course of time, I began to realize that the more I spoke, the less I learned because I was only repeating what I already knew. But when I remained silent and only listened, the entire knowledge of the Universe would seep through me - empowering me in a manner nothing really could.

It is only at this point, when logical reasoning became a considerable part of my life after having lived for over 6 decades on this planet, that I started looking back into the past for the first time since I was born. And boy oh boy, I just couldn’t help rolling over with laughter at myself and the antics that I had most ‘bullishly’ accomplished!

61 Winters And An Invincible Summer Within is a kaleidoscope  of true short stories of my incredulous past which I am most delighted to share with you. This is, assuredly, a journey encapsulating candidly some of the most ridiculous things I have done in my life described with an ample amount of humour. It also includes some of the most fascinating incidents in my life (written with a much tapered down sense of humour) most often as a result of some blunderous act nonchalantly, but innocently, committed by ‘yours truly’.

And yet, there is so much to gain from each of these stories as we ramble through them. The most exciting part of life is not necessarily what we have done or committed (good, bad or ugly) but what we have learned out of it. When we were born, we didn’t pop out with a rule book in our hands. So in a way, all of us have been ‘raging bulls’ at some time or the other. All of us have tried hiding the several skeletons in our cupboards. All of us have tried to carry our humanness on our sleeves for whatever they were worth. Well now it’s time to throw away the mask, let the skeletons fall out and reflect, just as I did while writing these true-life stories just for you, without flinching for even an instant. After all, we do what we do and most of what we do can’t be undone once they are done.

I hope to delight you with every chapter of this book crafted with as much reflection, truthfulness and mirth possible. So dear Reader, slink into a cosy and comfortable chair, pour yourself your best elixir and let’s embark on a journey that I promise will keep you enmeshed till the very end.