Something Fishy

It is really a funny world.Tricky too. Difficult to read the minds of people. Difficult to know or guess as to what they keep in their minds even while talking with someone  over the table. Because even if the people  whom you meet too often, talk with them, exchange thoughts, you will find them  at times indifferent to you. When at certain times, you desire to hear from them a word or two, you are bound to feel bad and get annoyed or frustrated. At certain times, it becomes something awkward too. It is really difficult to experience such human traits when you find even strangers sometimes behave more humanly . I may be wrong also in coming to such a conclusion as I cannot claim that whatever I say is correct.

But a recent experience of a different kind has compelled me to think like that. Before going to the heart of the matter, I would like to mention that many newspapers and magazines now a days publish the phone numbers of the writers or authors at the end of their write-ups. Readers, if they desire to ring up their favourite writers , and talk to them, appreciate them, or become friends of a strange nature without anyone seeing each other. It is like the bond we once experienced through pen friendship which was in vogue at a time when there was no mobile phones or  internet. Seeing  addresses of people , boys or girls, young or old ones desiring to make friendship through special advertisement  columns,  people used to communicate with them when some people turned up as real good friends in due course of time. I had the same experience more than once when strangers used to call me, applaud me or appreciate me  for whatever blah blah  I used to write  that met their mental requirements. This small piece is based on such a small experience.
Recently, while taking food, a fish bone got stuck  at my throat. I had a hell of a time  and applied all sorts of means  like gulping down rice balls, unripe bananas or whatever was suggested.Someone suggested to go for homeopathy . I did not think that it would do anything good. But curiously enough, the fish bone vanished next morning though I took only a few doses as prescribed by the homeopath. Somehow, the matter came to the knowledge of some of our close ones. On the same day, an article of mine appeared  in a popular magazine. When phones started coming,every time I thought the caller to be someone wanting to appreciate my writing. Believe it or not, about fifteen calls were received but not a single one was about the article.The callers did not even utter a word about that article but simply wanted to know how the fish bone disappeared, warning me at the same time to be more careful while relishing fish in view of my , what they said “old age”. Every time the phone rang, I imagined some friend of the bygone days wanting to reestablish contacts . But no, no  unknown friend  or long lost ‘ heart burns’  talked to me that day except  those wanting to know about the fish bone’s disappearance. There were so many  suggestions for me to be careful while eating fish. Was it that I failed  to make people laugh through whatever I wrote, I pondered for a while.Or was it that I became a laughing stock myself ? When the phone rang for the last  time, I did not receive thinking that to be another  'temper producer ‘.
When I received the first call next day, lo’ ‘ it was a rain of angry words mixed with wet sentiments from a real long lost college day friend who said, she was frantically  trying to talk to me  the previous day and also earlier. She said she wanted to say a word of appreciation for whatever I used to write in that magazine  of which she too was an avowed reader.Strange no doubt. But what happened suddenly during our talk was that at a lighter reference I burst into a loud laughter that resulted in a sudden pinch in my throat again. The fish bone reappeared as it was settling somewhere around and my laughter helped it come out again. The phone abruptly got snapped and I rushed again to the nearby homeopath finding no other way whatsoever.

(The author is a senior writer, journalist and a story teller, e mail. aswini.k.boruah@gmail.com)