Four years later…….
It was that time when the vacation was coming to an end. I was a 16 year old kid and hated every second of the day as I had to leave my aunt’s place to go back home for school. I was looking at the train ticket that my Dad sent me through mail with an empty look in the eye. I started packing and knowing that in just a day’s time I will be going back to reality. It was time for me to start yet another year of unfathomable course work, astronomical home works, painfully slow commutes to the school and text books making you want to hunt down the author and kill.
I carefully placed my luggage under my seat and sat with all the sadness upon my face. An old man interrupted my gloomy thoughts and told me to get off the seat rudely. He claimed it was his seat and that he had it reserved. I was already extremely irritated and this old man was talking to me as if I had stolen his house. He was so loud that the little girl sitting next to me and enjoying her samosas almost fell off her seat. Well, if you could shout using all your intestines at 60, then I’ll show you what decibel levels younger material can generate.
“I respect people based on merit and not age. So don’t expect me to let go off the seat just because you are older. I reserved this seat two months in advance, just leave me alone!”
The little girl probably did not see this coming from the petite 16 year old kid that I was, because she started choking on one of her somosas. I had beat the old man at his own game, 1-0.
The old man took out his ticket and showed me the seat number. It was 15A, the seat on which I was sitting. I was utterly shocked. He was waiting for me to show him mine. I was terrified and started having all the doubts just like I do when it is time for some class test results. I slowly took out the ticket and even before I could look at it the old man grabbed it out of my hand victoriously. His face turned pale and I thought he was having a stroke. I looked at the seat number and it said 15A. The scores were even this time, but overall I ruled 1.5- 0.5.
Enter ticket collector, “What is going on here. Let me look at your tickets. The train will leave in about 5 minutes and you guys are still fighting about the seats?”
Old man: “The whole system is corrupt. How could you give away two tickets for one seat? I’ll take this to the press.”
I was sitting there calmly because I knew that if you pissed the ticket collector off you hit a dead end. It was very simple; there had been a miscalculation about the seats. So they gave off two. But only one had to get the seat. This means that the ticket collector will chose one of the two to stay. Since I was calm and not pissing him off I would stay. Game over: 2.5 – 0.5
Ticket collector: “Look here boy. Today is 11th and your ticket is for the 12th.”
I don’t know if it has ever happened to you but sometimes your brain just shuts off and you start doing things without thinking. It happened to me at that instant. I just took out my luggage and got off the train without thinking anything except this: Old man: ticket on the train, me: getting off the train. So the game is indeed over!
My Aunt started scolding me for being so dumb and she asked me how I managed to be so dumb. It was my moment. Considering my dumbness, I can never live my dream and use that expression, so I might as well try to improvise the expression and use it in this nightmare.
“Well, it is all about being in the right place at the wrong time.”
