Wanderlust, Astrophysics, and Unexpected Grace

The Beauty of Small Things: Writer’s Circle writing challenge

I went chasing sunrises and stone temples. But One Word from a Stranger is the Memory etched in me.

image made by author

It was back when I was a student at Pondicherry University. I had no time, a bicycle, and an insatiable wanderlust heart.

The campus was a few hilly hectares right by the South-East coast… a haven if you like to stray alone like me.

(Warning 😅 I’m going to unpack a whole rant now..! Don’t worry… there’s a TL;DR!)

Our department was a bit odd, in compare with the other departments. It was the smallest department. It only admitted 12 students each year. And only 7 of us were left after entrance exams, interview, admission process, and the first set of rigorous internal exams. We only had 3 or 4 professors each semester.

So yes… tiny department.

Now, that’s not the weird part… the weird thing is, that ours was also the most strict department.

Departments with 200–300 students were not as strict. We could see it before our eyes in hostels.

We, the Astrophysics students worrying about the 6 papers each semester… 3 internal exams each, in between, one semester finals, and endless assignments and seminars in between.

On the other side, most of the other students openly told us that their departments did not take internal marks or attendance score as seriously.

Oh yes… our professors were not strictly from Astrophysics background. So we only got 8–10 classes per paper. That might sound like “so you only have to go like 60 lectures in 5 months?” it’s not that easy. Our question papers and paper valuation were not that lenient.

And since we got only about 10 lectures per paper, missing one lecture meant that your attendance drops by 10%. We needed 85% attendance per paper to attempt the semester finals, which meant we couldn’t risk missing a class. If we miss a class, it meant you can’t likely afford to miss another lecture (whenever it’s scheduled) if you are sick… and you would fall sick either from reading for hours each night or from the ‘mess’ food.

In our first year, we covered all the papers they would cover for M.Sc. Physics in two years, and then we did Astrophysics in the second year.

You get my rant…

TL;DR:

Course = Torture!

But…

Whimsy is whimsy!

Wanderlust is wanderlust!

Young heart is young heart!

I had to check on the beach sunrise, as though the sun would have a hard time finding the beach if I didn’t stand there like a “lighthouse.”

That morning, I pulled on a blue pair of palazzos, my favorite basic white tunic, and a blue-and-white scarf.

The bicycle knew… “Gate 2, right?”

“…right!”

And then we had our symphony… the Sun and I.

I was there at the beach so that the Sun could rise upon the sands yet again.

Glorious again!

All the colors again!

All the romance with the ocean again..!

And that is tough work, you know… being a lighthouse for the Sun!

I got hungry.

I had to get Kothu Porotta for breakfast and go study more before the 3 pm class.

But the meal made me drowsy. Things could’ve gone South.

So I boarded a bus going North and got off 90 km later at Mahabalipuram.

Stone heaven!

I meandered through the ancient marvel still standing tall and strong overlooking the ocean literally and an ocean of history figuratively.

The figure of the place is carved in stone in my heart almost a decade later still.

But I had to hurry before the Sun made direct eye contact with the vertex of my head… I was not being too polite to not swallow my own shadow with my feet… I had that lecture to attend right.

And as fate would have it, a “strike” stuck somewhere. No buses back to Pondi!

Buses were going to Chennai. I had relatives there.

But it wasn’t a matter of safety… just yet!

My best bet was taking a bus to Chennai, boarding a train to Puducherry and then two buses to reach the campus.

But I don’t bet. So I do not always choose the best bet 😅

I waited…

.

.

.

The road shimmered under the afternoon heat.

The Sun had fully abandoned romance and switched to interrogation.

Every passing minute felt louder.

I checked the time.

Then checked again…

as though the clock might develop compassion between glances.

.

.

.

3 pm was no longer comfortably far away. It was marching toward me with academic intent.

A few others had gathered too, all wearing that familiar stranded expression, the one that silently asks, now what?

I talked to two other ladies waiting to get to Pondicherry. They had baskets of fruits and snacks remaining that they hoped to sell there.

We waited some more.

Dust rose with every passing vehicle only to settle back down like disappointment.

Then came the small thing that became a big memory.

A truck rumbled to a halt.

The driver, a weathered man with tired eyes, looked at the three of us stranded on the dusty road. He didn’t offer a grand speech. He didn’t ask for money. He simply leaned over, opened the door, and gave a brief, reassuring nod.

“Pondi?” he asked.

Was it a tiny gesture? A truck driver extending a safe shelter to three stranded women?

It felt monumental!

In that tight space, sitting soaking in the heavy aroma of unsold guavas and the loud rattle of that engine… one of the ladies moved her basket to make room for my feet, offering a smile that sure said… “we are safe now.”

It was a split-second decision by a stranger to care, but it completely rewrote the trajectory of my day.

By 3 pm, fuelled by the sunrise, kothu porotta, Mahabalipuram, truck ride, and a cola I fell into the comatose wakefulness I practiced for lectures.

A decade later, the massive stone temples of Mahabalipuram still stand tall, but it is the quiet grace of that truck ride that truly stayed in my heart.

Thanking ShubhamAgrawal, not just for this lovely prompt or the image he made for the challenge post… but for having me host two challenges in his publication… both of which I think got the best homes at Writer’s Circle. It was “Tu kar, Mein sambhaal lunga”

Tagging and thanking Sumedh Pimplikar for that recent favor at midnight and a home for my wandering prompt. That felt to me like “Tu kar, Mein sambhaal lunga”

Thanking and inviting 🌸Preeti Pathak🌸 Parul Bishnoi ⭑ Priyanshu Jha, Monika Mahadev, Arpita Srivastava, and dear writers Seema Tripathi, Sunita Chakraborty, sita, Brookink, Mamta Verma, Ferdousi Akter, Kalindi Singh, Pooja Rathore, Fatehana, Inbaa Sivasankar, GUDDANTI MIHIR, Phaguni Shrivastava, Rachana Adhikary, Silent Writer, Rockstar Girl/Kaylee, Meta Marvelia, Sudeshna Hajra, Saksham Mundra, Golam Mohiuddin, Hooria Akbar, Paulia Dianz ❃, 𑣲Nayanika Roy, Ashlesha Kodaty ✨, Read with Shifa🌻, Ravinimbus, and Alexandra Grant to this cute challenge. I hope you find the time to participate in:

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