Meandering Melancholy

Here we are then…the joie de vivre of another scintillating vacation nearing its twilight. We enter the studious get-back-to-school month of June with a refreshingly tepid sun setting in, which carries with it a new dawn…a new beginning. This is the month I initially despise, for it brings to me the unpleasant reality of ending a 60 day-long honeymoon. And henceforth, I will have to return to the place where I am shrieked at sometimes, lauded overtly sometimes, hosting programmes with panache sometimes, subjected to the harsh side effects of being a member of the School Cabinet sometimes…yet I do not complain. This is the wonderful place that has sculpted me scrupulously to perfection. I did often get the sensation that I wholly belonged to the place, that I was responsible in some miniscule manner in orchestrating at times the proceeding around me.

Until last year, getting back to my domicile was the prospect I had longed for towards the end of each summer. The very feel of getting back to school and starting another academic year from scratch was encouraging to say the least, and its effervescent essence that filled the air around me, brought me bliss. One of the sole substrates in this wondrous reaction was my fervent penchant for reuniting with my friends and investing with them quality time.

I wouldn’t get as quixotic as to saying the essence has evaporated this year. But I’ll have to confess, I don’t feel the quintessence this time around. Maybe it’s too early to state indefatigably but there are factors that enervate my zest.

Owing to the fact that tag of ‘X Class’ is so paramount in the perceptions of School Principals, the fag end of the last academic year implied early commencement of Class X. Early conduction of IX class Annual Examinations…and that’s it…it’s almost as if the teachers of Class X expected us to read from their face-‘That’s it folks...your hostilities begin now…non study for a day will prove exorbitantly costly…’

One thing I can state indefatigably is that the much accentuated over-importance attributed to education in Class X is aggrandized in our schools. It is no delusion that this perception paves way for self destruction and the much-talked-of ‘pressure’. This is the one aspect of our educational system I can’t stop ruing about.

I couldn’t but notice a paradigm shift in the style of education and hospitality, in my short stint as a Class X student. The approach of the teaching faculty was a lot more ‘business-like’ and ‘no-nonsense’, strikingly contrary to the occasional perkiness that was a part of everyday lifestyle. There was sudden, almost unexplained hostility in the scheme of things. Normal aberrations were aggrandized to the threshold of severe admonishments. The mahaul of a normal school day that previously lit up the mood of otherwise torpid and lethargic students seemed to have paved way for something of an entirely different variant. To add salt to the burning wound, our school for the first time in its history implemented this policy of ‘shuffling’ students of various sections of a class. The policy, which brings about plenary regrouping of the students of various classes (irrespective of varying lingual preferences) predictably was given the thumbs down by tetchy students, who understandably were in no mood to part with their pals (with whom they had spent 11 years of amusement and joy). However, the policy did take pragmatic manifestation and the deed was done. Students of Class IX were shuffled arbitrarily into 4 different sections. The idea transcends my realm of comprehension and has thrown the emotional quotient of students into complete disarray. I couldn’t see any logic whatsoever in the move, save for the lone fact that all sections would be equally disciplined/undisciplined in conduct. At first, most of us reckoned it was just another threat from authorities in order to ensure sanity and regimentation in the behavior of students. Little did any of us expect it to take shape. However when it did, most of us were shattered…some beyond repair. When some of us (the members of the Cabinet) were summoned for our view on the idea, I did plainly state that it would have a catastrophic influence on the minds of almost all the students to whom existing surroundings and friends are of vital support. Not just me, even a few of my friends belonging to other sections with prominent portfolios in the Cabinet were averse to the idea and subscribed to the same view. However, the initial insurrections that were initiated by a few of us students were cowardly (that’s the best that could be mustered) and had zero tangible impact. However, we were assuaged later by ostensibly benevolent authorities who said it was for ‘the greater good’ that the step was being taken and that we’d be doing ourselves a whole lot of good acclimatizing to the change as swiftly as possible. Most of my fellow classmates are still of the view that this was an indomitable speed breaker of harmony and joy, although I personally have gotten over it.

All said and done, the endeavour of education is the catalyst of this wonderful exercise of school going, and that (thankfully) shall never die. Until last year, the morning of every school day meant sprightly and ebullient interactions with those memorable comrades who’ve infused joy in my life.

Wish those mornings would just stay.