A Day in Winter

The sun-lit veranda has become a haven of comfort now. A strange chemistry goes on in the air between a lot of things, cherry trees and half-ripe oranges perhaps. One does not know whether it is the pink blossoms giving off that peculiar, dear scent of winter or the leaves felled by the winds, smouldering at nondescript street-corners and adding yet another element in the creation of this nostalgic season. The characteristic impact of Shillong’s winter upon the nose and therefore, the mind, is difficult to capture.
The other day, a walk along the road near the Civil Hospital drew my attention to the low hills in the distance, densely populated with houses perched like nervous birds upon even the most impossibly steep of slopes. The evening having been hastened by a short day, was turning the grey sky indigo, the fog had become even denser and just then, it seemed as though the hills had turned to water. For the hundreds of windows began glowing in a supple diffusion of their own light and the gliding fog transformed them into bobbing lamps that boatmen use while they are out fishing in the sea at night. But barely had I thought of how fog magically turns houses into boats, when I strayed into a different line of thought. I began thinking of the people who live in those houses and who assumedly were not at all aware of how beautiful a scene they were being a part of.
The part of Shillong’s winter that lingers in the mind, well after it has given way to spring, is simply mesmerising. The way-side scenes of ladies selling sohplang and oranges, the mind turning back again and again to corners where a heater has been lit, the breath of winter, its charcoal, the warmth and even the chill and the smoke are parts that play a significant role in making the beauty of winter immortal. The locales look as though they are pages from a collection of poems. There is that definitive air of languor written so large everywhere, one thinks of turning to a book with a mug of hot coffee, tucked into a warm blanket.
But just as I think of the beauty of winter I am sure the beggar who sits on one of the many busy footpaths of Police Bazaar, playing a duitara for his meagre share of coins, thinks of all these things albeit with the finger of heaven forbidding him to think about them or anything at all.